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Apple Can Delete Purchased Movies From Your Library Without Telling You (theoutline.com)
Casey Johnston, writing for The Outline: When you buy a movie on iTunes, it's yours forever, until such a time as when Apple maybe loses the rights to distribute it, and then it will disappear from your library without a trace. This is what happened to Anders G. da Silva, who goes by @drandersgs on Twitter, and who tweeted about losing three movies bought on the iTunes Store.
When da Silva wrote to Apple to complain about the missing movies, Apple wrote back to him that "the content provider has removed these movies from the Canadian Store. Hence, these movies are not available in the Canada iTunes Store at this time." For his trouble in notifying Apple that it had disappeared three of his ostensible belongings for incredibly dubious legal reasons, Apple offered da Silva not even a refund, but two credits for renting a movie on the iTunes Store "priced up to $5.99 USD." After he argued that he was not in the market for rentals and would just like the movies he purchased, please, Apple tried to appease him with two more rental credits.
When da Silva wrote to Apple to complain about the missing movies, Apple wrote back to him that "the content provider has removed these movies from the Canadian Store. Hence, these movies are not available in the Canada iTunes Store at this time." For his trouble in notifying Apple that it had disappeared three of his ostensible belongings for incredibly dubious legal reasons, Apple offered da Silva not even a refund, but two credits for renting a movie on the iTunes Store "priced up to $5.99 USD." After he argued that he was not in the market for rentals and would just like the movies he purchased, please, Apple tried to appease him with two more rental credits.
Never buy Apple unless you are okay with being a slave to their dictatorial policies. Please support Linux.
This is why I buy the Blu-ray and rip it to my NAS; at least on shows I want to still have access to in 20 years. (Yes, I still have VHS tapes and a VCR)
You didn't purchase movies. You entered into an agreement which allows you access to content as long as Apple feels like providing it. LOL. Silly users, thinking you "owned" movies.
My kids have on occasion wanted to buy movies from Comcast and I have resisted specifically because I don't want to have to do business with a specific utility in order to maintain access to purchased content. Instead, I have allowed that content to be purchased from the equivalent of merchants like Apple and Amazon. This story sets a dangerous path that suggests physical media may still be the only way to go. It also gives a certain amount of moral license back to torrent downloads.
...movies are always free on The Pirate Bay.
This is why we don't buy anything as a download. Physical media only. I'll take the time to rip it myself. If you want to own it, you have to have something physical to maintain control of it.
"Growing old is inevitable; growing up is optional."
Digital purchases do not imply that you own the content. Digital purchases are a contract that you can have access to said content for as long as the distributing company has the right to distribute it.
Nothing new here, please move along.
If you gave me a choice between a printer and a giraffe with explosive diarrhoea, i'll get my ladder and my raincoat
What do you mean Steam is next? Steam just pulled the plug on Windows XP and Windows Vista. A different shade of the same thing...
This is why we need stronger consumer protection. This isn't a weird, difficult, complex issue. In my mind, there's a very simple solution to this:
Make it illegal for digital media stores to remove access to anything that has been purchased. If, for some reason, they're unable to continue hosting it for streaming, they should be legally required to provide you with a DRM-free download.
Or else, they should be barred from using words like "buy" or "purchase". They can offer "long term rentals" with clear and explicit wording that access may be revoked at any time. Those disclaimers should not be buried in a EULA or terms of service. It should be legally required to be displayed obviously each time the long-term rental is offered.
You could debate some of the details, but the basic gist should be clear: Either provide people with what they "bought", or make it clear that they're not buying it.
Good reason to go back to bitTorrent. Buying should mean you own it.
I looked up ownership up in the dictionary and it said, "the state, relation, or fact of being an owner". This did not help me much so I looked up the definition of 'owner'. It said a "person who owns something". I looked up 'own' and it said "to have as property". I looked up 'property' and it said "something owned".
Well none of this was enlightening so I looked up possession and law and it turns out possession is "nine tenths of the law". Well, I'm sure as hell not reading nine tenths of the law. It'd take me ages. As much as I'd like to help, I can't because I don't know what ownership means...
Did you purchase those movies, or did you temporarily acquire rights to view them. Did you basically pay $19.99 to rent a movie for a few years? When you could have paid $24.99 for that same new release on Blu-Ray. And keep that physical copy for potentially decades (archival life of non-writable blu-ray seems high). In addition your Blu-Ray disc falls under first sale doctrine (17 U.S.C. Sec. 109), so a few years from now you can sell it or gift it legally if you decided you didn't want it. Instead of waiting for Apple to delete it under the ever-shifting sands of distribution rights agreements for streaming.
People really want the convenience of streaming, and are apparently willing to pay a premium for it. But there are still some major drawbacks compared to physical media.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
In this case, however, she bought the movies and then deleted them from her system. She was relying on Apple's service to be able to re-download them again.
These are two seperate things.
If she had kept her local copies, Apple would not have removed these items from her computer; they were, however, unable to re-supply her with copies of the movies she'd bought via their service because thye'd lost the licensing rights to distribute said movies.
Imagine a store that you buy a DVD from that also allows you to stream a copy of the same DVD from their servers. If you lose the DVD, or destroy it, you can stream the movie until they lose licensing rights. If you don't lose or destroy the DVD, you don't have to rely on this third party.
The person in the story 'destroyed their DVD' and then their streaming provider lost their distribution rights.
She relied on a third party backup. She thought this was a guaranteed service. She was wrong.
None of this, however, has anything to do with buying vs leasing/licensing/renting and companies telling you you bought something when you merely licensed or rented it (although this remains an issue in digital consumer law in any number of countries). If she'd kept her downloaded copy, she'd still have it.
Corporation, n. An ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility. - Ambrose Bierce
Spoken like someone that doesn't have kids. How many times I've heard that damn crab crone "kiss the girl.?" Thank god I drew the line at a teletubby disk collection.
I read at +2. If your post doesn't reach that level I will not see or respond to it.
How many times I've heard that damn crab crone "kiss the girl.?" Thank god I drew the line at a teletubby disk collection.
Have you considered investing in one of these?
Time to offend someone