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Disney Pulls a Reverse Santa, Takes Back Christmas Shows From Amazon Customers
Sockatume writes "Since 2011, Amazon Instant Video has sold a series of Christmas shorts from Disney called 'Prep and Landing'. Unfortunately this holiday season, Disney has had a change of heart and has decided to make the shorts exclusive to its own channels. The company went so far as to retroactively withdrawn the shows from Amazon, so that customers who have already paid for them no longer have access. Apparently this reverse-Santa ability is a feature Amazon provides all publishers, and customers have little recourse but to go cap-in-hand to a Disney outlet and pay for the shows again."
The article says that Amazon called it "accidental," and that access has already been restored for those who already bought it.
Accidental my shiney hiney. It was only "accidental" until either the PR or legal department found out about it. In any case this is EXACTLY why I do not own a Kindle. This isn't the first time this happened and the fact that they even have the ability to do this makes me pretty uncomfortable.
Is not your library if the vendor can take it from you. You didn't buy, just got a limited permission to play it while the real owner is in good mood, and in their own terms.
Because in the end, the Grinch comes to learn the error of his ways and eventually saves Christmas. Somehow, I don't see Disney doing this...
The "temporary issue" was a lack of publicity.
Amazon deleting copies of 1984 should've been enough to persuade you that you shouldn't do business with them. This is what happens when you deal with proprietary garbage or things that are out of your control.
Don't blame Disney. This evil starts with Amazon, they're the ones that allow your purchased products to be stolen back again on a whim.
It only became temporary when they got caught.
Yes, blame Disney - they absolutely had a choice as to whether to act malevolently to their paying customers or not.
But, yes, also blame Amazon for idiotic terms.
And yes blame the legislators for allowing the widespread fraud of misleading people in to believing they purchased/bought a product when instead the seller only gave them a short term non-negotiable, unilaterally cancellable, license. These are absolutely not sales of products and when you acquire a license then you don't "buy" or "purchase" a movie/song you license it. Any attempt to "sell" when in fact the company mean "[temporarily] license" should be met with such huge fraud charges that the companies involved will barely be able to continue trading and certainly will be unable to continue if charged again. In Amazon's case for example "one-click ordering" the movie entails purchasing data or media that includes inalienable and continuous rights to consume that media in perpetuity, so they'd need to change it to "one-click license" to avoid being fraudulently deceptive about it.
Yes, I'm serious.
No, blame the end user. That's what you get for licensing your virtual entertainment and not reading the terms. I *buy* my movies on *media I own* or stored on a server *I* control. If Disney wants my stuff, they have to come into the house and physically take it. And I think I can take Mickey.
I am of the opinion that these people did not buy a license. The seller advertised the sale of the movie. The customer believed they were buying the movie. Everybody involved with the transaction referred to it as purchasing the movie. The situation where you pay for a temporary license to view a movie is called a rental, and Amazon has that as a separate transaction type.
Furthermore if you bothered to read the Militia Act of 1792, signed into law by George Washington, you'd know that the militia was to consist of everybody who could vote under the age of 45. Gun ownership was mandatory for this group, not owning a gun was, in fact, a crime.
Except for the women, of course. Oh, and the blacks, I imagine. And any other "non-people". I mean, while we're being slavishly faithful to the founder's intents and everything...
You have to remember, the democrats and liberals have to demonize and misrepresent libertarians because they thrive on a two party (acting as one) system and the republicans and conservatives have to demonize and misrepresent libertarians because they thrive on a two party (acting as one) system.