Zero hell would be paid. Say they revoke your subscriptions they will receive no backlash. You have no legal recourse. The general public doesn't care about you having your items revoked. You're one person in a sea of short attention spans.
Your second part is just ignorant. Don't sign a contract and then expect it to not be enforced. The purpose of a contract is to say what each person's rights and intentions are. There's no such thing as a default clause. With forethought and intent they put in the ability to take back what you paid for.
Now are they going to wide spread yank subs? No. But what happens when an individuals does erroneously. It's an uphill battle to get it corrected?
You are the epitome of slippery slope. You allow this now and it becomes the norm. Revoking all access at any time for no reason is not acceptable DRM. Would you accept it with your food? Your clothing? Your car? Your computer? Your house?
Go read up a bit. Burning games for the 360 is trivial. Dual Layer DVD burner and http://www.imgburn.com/ (completely free) or any other software that lets you pick a custom layer break and alter the book type.
Heck there's even easy to use gui based programs that will let you take ISOs of games from outside regions and allow them to be used in your region.
As an added bonus private trackers seem to have all the big games 2-4 days before release.
The first thing the industry needs to do is get rid of street dates. With the current method the time before a launch is just boring. Everyone knows where a same will be for sale and when. The only excitement possible is from the pirates. Billy knows that the game is only available on the 12th so the pirate friend who downloads it is novel and cool.
If they were to get rid of street dates and just announce that the game is done and working it's way through the distribution channels it would generate more buzz about the game. People would spend their time looking for it and talking about where they saw it. More hype is good. Especially in the first weeks.
It would allow the legal purchaser to be cool for finding it early rather than the pirate.
I did not use the words you put in quotes. Copyright infringement is distinctly different than theft. Are you saying manslaughter and murder are the same thing? Are you saying there is no difference between assault and battery?
I'm not justifying anything. I'm saying it's not theft. No one has ever been charged with theft. Why do they need to create volumes of new laws? If it were theft they could use the existing theft laws or the new copyright laws would apply to theft.
Reading your own words. "In the case of a one-time purchase of a product license." You are licensing the game not purchasing it.
Section 1: "as a Subscriber you may obtain access to certain services, software and content ("Subscriptions") available to Subscribers." No mention of sale or transfer of ownership.
Section 2 Licensing: "The Steam Software is licensed, not sold. Your license confers no title or ownership"
They also have separate sections for Merchandise (3) and Subscriptions (4) in the contract.
Plus there's the fact that you can't transfer your game to another account. Go check. Either you don't have ownership or Steam is acting illegally this whole time and no one has done anything about it.
They're subscriptions. You have no ownership and no rights. Steam can revoke your access at any time at their whim.
Irrelevant. Please read your contract. They are quite explicit that you are not purchasing anything. There is no sale thus first-sale doctrine doesn't apply.
"The one outstanding question is "what happens if Valve shuts down," but they have promised to unlock everything in such a case."
A couple points:
Can you document this claim? The legal contract you sign when renting a game from Steam says otherwise. The only reference I find is that if they cut you off from access to Steam they "may but is not obligated to" provide a stand alone version.
If Valve/Steam fails there will likely be a transfer of ownership to people who didn't make the claim and have no intention of honoring the claim.
Steam has the worst possible DRM. If you went into a brick and mortar store and they said they reserved the right to take your "purchase" back at any time would you still buy it?
2. In the case of a one-time purchase of a product license (e.g., purchase of a single game) from Valve, Valve may choose to terminate or cancel your Subscription in its entirety or may terminate or cancel only a portion of the Subscription (e.g., access to the software via Steam) and Valve may, but is not obligated to, provide access (for a limited period of time) to the download of a stand-alone version of the software and content associated with such one-time purchase.
Cut my teeth on UO. Played a bunch of others. The ones I spent significant time in were AC, SWG, and EVE.
The game is good. He's not kidding with the RvR. You can literally create a character and click the enter scenario (battelground) button as your first action. Oh you're level one? So what? RvR is broken into tiers. T1 is levels 1-11. If you're below 8 you get buffed up to level 8. T2 buffs you to level 18 if you are below, etc. You don't have to be at the top of the bracket to compete.
You can join queues from anywhere. No running to town. Each area also has an open world RvR area with objectives to capture.
When you join a scenario you are auto added to a party.
One of my favorite mechanics is the open party system. It's like lfg/meeting stones except it works. You can set your party as open and anyone in the area can see you on the list and join. Also anyone in a party can "refer" someone to the party leader. You click them and select invite and the party leader gets a pop up saying Bob wants Alice invited y/n. Find a group is basically effortless.
The public quests are scripted outdoor events. For example the newb orc/gobbo one is as follows. Giant/Ogre thing is being chased by little annoying mobs. 30 of them must be killed. Then the giant sits down and complains about being thirsty so the group has to run around and grab 20 beer barrels. Then the giant gets up and knocks down the doors of a dwarf keep that this is happening outside. A dwarf leader comes out. He sends a couple waves at the group then he attacks with some henchmen. As you complete tasks you get influence which allow you to pick rewards in the town that quest is near. Also at the end of the quest a loot roll is made based on participation and persistance and you may get a loot bag. 2.5 minutes after the loot roll the quest resets and starts over. Also some stages are times and if not completed in time the whole quest will reset. This is mainly a mechanic to prevent them from advancing due to one person grinding for an extended period.
The scenarios are good. I've played capture and hold the CPs and a "flag runner" mechanic one. That one you have to grab the flag then interact with 3 land marks scattered around the instance. That one is a bit wonky because people never seem to know the rules. There's also a standard CTF but I've never made it into an instance on that.
The general pace of combat is a bit slower. Tanks are more tanky and healers heal more. I play a black orc (greenskin tank class) and I can soak sick amounts of damage. Put a healer on me and you have to take the healer out or put 6 or more people on me. I find myself switching targets a lot looking for the guy the healers aren't watching. Snares and roots are very effective killing tools because they allow you to cull someone from the pack. Bascially in RvR you have to work together. Two people just going toe to toe is often a sustained battle. Except for overwhelming forces 8-1 there are few quick kills.
This is getting long. I can talk more if you have questions. In summary: If you like RvR then give the game a try. If you don't like RvR but are a fan of the warhammer world I'd still say pick it up. They're very true to the world. My black orc has a skill called "Right in Da Jibblies."
An ecosystem. Doesn't need to have full-featured critters like in Spore or Creatures; just make the monsters eat each other, reproduce, and compete for resources in the obvious way. Come on, it's not difficult.
Why?
It's a pointless waste of dev, programmer, and CPU time. There's no reason for it. The eco system is players kill mobs. Mobs respawn.
An economic system. Again, nothing fancy, just set a few resource sources and sinks (even invisible) and let the market forces decide the item prices. WoW does it for the player market, why not the in-game market as well?
Again. Why?
The player market fills the niche for merchant type players.
The only goods that should be sold by NPCs, and thus subject to your system, are required cash sink goods. Required goods are required and thus the price will only fluctuate based on population.
Auto-generated, per-player quests. Gearhead can auto-generate quests, why canâ(TM)t you? I mean, most of WoW quests look the same anyway: talk to someone, find something, kill something, or escort.
Yes. Fucking. Please. Anarchy Online does this. I'm sure others do it. It really should be a must have feature.
Allow player actions to affect the world. If I kill all predators from an area I expect the ecology to be ruined. If you donâ(TM)t want players ruining the ecology, make it difficult to genocide.
This is game breaking. There is only one possible end result of this. A barren dead game world. What's the point of that.
Unlike most players I met in WoW, I find no fun in comparing the size of virtual âoeswordsâ or in optimizing numbers in a game of statistics. I want immersion. The way WoWâ(TM)s world is just some immutable scenario ruined immersion to me.
You don't want immersion, which is immpossible anyways with our current technology level. The problem is that you are looking for something that MMPOGs can't offer. You need to look for a genre that fits your need.
Not steam specifically. Slashdot has had multiple stories on people loosing access to content they "purchased", and by purchased I mean licensed/rented on extremely stupid terms, when the content provider decided they were going to revoke access. One link here. There was another one with a different vendor, I think MSFT but I can't find it.
Imagine this. You purchase a game at a brick and mortar store. At the check out the clerk mentions that they can come into your house and take the game back at any point for any or no reason. You'd be outraged. No one would every by anything from that store. Yet this is _exactly_ what you agree to when you use Steam. It's ludicrous.
1) Shrink wrap licenses have been legally tested in the 7th Circuit. The case was ProCD v Zeidenburg. The judge over turned the lower courts finding and ruled that shrink wrap licenses are in fact binding legal contracts.
2) It's pretty much impossible for it to be unconscionable. Your definition of unconscionable is slightly incorrect. unconscionable != unfair. It must be unfair weighted toward someone who has a better bargaining position, or meet other unrelated to the conversation criteria. Since Spore is a pure luxury item and there is nothing preventing you from declining the contract and no penalty for declining the contract it's not unconscionable. Please see Blizzard v bnetd for precedent.
Read your license agreement again. You rented the game. You didn't even get a discount for buying a crippled copy. They can cut you off at any time.
Steam is the furthest you can get from acceptable DRM. Please see the stories on here about people loosing their content because the company they bought it from decided to shut things down.
Exact search functionality is the ability to search for an exact term. This is impossible with Google.
Why would I need it? Contrary to what Google thinks, I know what I'm searching for better than they do.
The software I use is called Cache. The error messages are in the format [ERRORMESSAGE]. Searching for Cache with a capital C and the exact formatting of the error message is distinct and useful. Google strips the []s and ignores case. Any result that does not contain the []s is not one I want. I put them in for a reason.
I don't care if you strip them out by default but give me a way to leave them in.
*yawn* Another browser. What special feature do they have that we can't live without? Or to say that another way. Why should I bother looking at it?
These people can't even get a search engine right. They have no exact search functionality. Let me repeat that. They have no exact search functionality.
They peaked 2 years ago. In another 7 or so they'll be viewed just as microsoft is.
I was pressed for time earlier and forgot a point I wanted to make.
Yes some things are illegal to put in a contract, the example you give. That doesn't mean anything in a contract is illegal. That logic would mean all contracts were illegal which we both know is not the case.
Signing away your right to sue is illegal. Agreeing that you are "renting" software rather than buying it is very legal. So don't do it.
Slashdot Mirror
Copyright is independent of company. It is a transferable commodity. If Steam goes under someone will buy the ashes. They will own the copyright.
Zero hell would be paid. Say they revoke your subscriptions they will receive no backlash. You have no legal recourse. The general public doesn't care about you having your items revoked. You're one person in a sea of short attention spans.
Your second part is just ignorant. Don't sign a contract and then expect it to not be enforced. The purpose of a contract is to say what each person's rights and intentions are. There's no such thing as a default clause. With forethought and intent they put in the ability to take back what you paid for.
Now are they going to wide spread yank subs? No. But what happens when an individuals does erroneously. It's an uphill battle to get it corrected?
You are the epitome of slippery slope. You allow this now and it becomes the norm. Revoking all access at any time for no reason is not acceptable DRM. Would you accept it with your food? Your clothing? Your car? Your computer? Your house?
Go read up a bit. Burning games for the 360 is trivial. Dual Layer DVD burner and http://www.imgburn.com/ (completely free) or any other software that lets you pick a custom layer break and alter the book type.
Heck there's even easy to use gui based programs that will let you take ISOs of games from outside regions and allow them to be used in your region.
As an added bonus private trackers seem to have all the big games 2-4 days before release.
The first thing the industry needs to do is get rid of street dates. With the current method the time before a launch is just boring. Everyone knows where a same will be for sale and when. The only excitement possible is from the pirates. Billy knows that the game is only available on the 12th so the pirate friend who downloads it is novel and cool.
If they were to get rid of street dates and just announce that the game is done and working it's way through the distribution channels it would generate more buzz about the game. People would spend their time looking for it and talking about where they saw it. More hype is good. Especially in the first weeks.
It would allow the legal purchaser to be cool for finding it early rather than the pirate.
So you can claim something based on it happening on your computer but they can't claim something based on it happening on their computer.
You're a hypocrite and a liar.
I second the fact that these things you claim do not exist.
I did not use the words you put in quotes. Copyright infringement is distinctly different than theft. Are you saying manslaughter and murder are the same thing? Are you saying there is no difference between assault and battery?
I'm not justifying anything. I'm saying it's not theft. No one has ever been charged with theft. Why do they need to create volumes of new laws? If it were theft they could use the existing theft laws or the new copyright laws would apply to theft.
Copyright violation is not theft.
lol. Thank you. That is fucking brilliant.
So Steam is acceptable DRM because if they legally revoke your access as you agreed to let them do you can perform an illegal act to get it back?
Reading your own words. "In the case of a one-time purchase of a product license." You are licensing the game not purchasing it.
Section 1:
"as a Subscriber you may obtain access to certain services, software and content ("Subscriptions") available to Subscribers." No mention of sale or transfer of ownership.
Section 2 Licensing:
"The Steam Software is licensed, not sold. Your license confers no title or ownership"
They also have separate sections for Merchandise (3) and Subscriptions (4) in the contract.
Plus there's the fact that you can't transfer your game to another account. Go check. Either you don't have ownership or Steam is acting illegally this whole time and no one has done anything about it.
They're subscriptions. You have no ownership and no rights. Steam can revoke your access at any time at their whim.
You're completely wrong. The things you list are not actions that Steam may decide to make. They are cases of Steam being forced to do something.
The contract clearly states that "Valve may choose to terminate or cacel your Subscription . . ."
That's a blanket we can revoke your access for any or no reason. You have no rights with Steam. They can cut you off at any time.
Irrelevant. Please read your contract. They are quite explicit that you are not purchasing anything. There is no sale thus first-sale doctrine doesn't apply.
Please document this claim as it exists no where in the contract you sign when renting a game from Steam.
That's fine. Not a single person has ever been charged with theft for downloading a game.
"The one outstanding question is "what happens if Valve shuts down," but they have promised to unlock everything in such a case."
A couple points:
Can you document this claim? The legal contract you sign when renting a game from Steam says otherwise. The only reference I find is that if they cut you off from access to Steam they "may but is not obligated to" provide a stand alone version.
If Valve/Steam fails there will likely be a transfer of ownership to people who didn't make the claim and have no intention of honoring the claim.
Steam has the worst possible DRM. If you went into a brick and mortar store and they said they reserved the right to take your "purchase" back at any time would you still buy it?
From http://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/
2. In the case of a one-time purchase of a product license (e.g., purchase of a single game) from Valve, Valve may choose to terminate or cancel your Subscription in its entirety or may terminate or cancel only a portion of the Subscription (e.g., access to the software via Steam) and Valve may, but is not obligated to, provide access (for a limited period of time) to the download of a stand-alone version of the software and content associated with such one-time purchase.
Cut my teeth on UO. Played a bunch of others. The ones I spent significant time in were AC, SWG, and EVE.
The game is good. He's not kidding with the RvR. You can literally create a character and click the enter scenario (battelground) button as your first action. Oh you're level one? So what? RvR is broken into tiers. T1 is levels 1-11. If you're below 8 you get buffed up to level 8. T2 buffs you to level 18 if you are below, etc. You don't have to be at the top of the bracket to compete.
You can join queues from anywhere. No running to town. Each area also has an open world RvR area with objectives to capture.
When you join a scenario you are auto added to a party.
One of my favorite mechanics is the open party system. It's like lfg/meeting stones except it works. You can set your party as open and anyone in the area can see you on the list and join. Also anyone in a party can "refer" someone to the party leader. You click them and select invite and the party leader gets a pop up saying Bob wants Alice invited y/n. Find a group is basically effortless.
The public quests are scripted outdoor events. For example the newb orc/gobbo one is as follows. Giant/Ogre thing is being chased by little annoying mobs. 30 of them must be killed. Then the giant sits down and complains about being thirsty so the group has to run around and grab 20 beer barrels. Then the giant gets up and knocks down the doors of a dwarf keep that this is happening outside. A dwarf leader comes out. He sends a couple waves at the group then he attacks with some henchmen. As you complete tasks you get influence which allow you to pick rewards in the town that quest is near. Also at the end of the quest a loot roll is made based on participation and persistance and you may get a loot bag. 2.5 minutes after the loot roll the quest resets and starts over. Also some stages are times and if not completed in time the whole quest will reset. This is mainly a mechanic to prevent them from advancing due to one person grinding for an extended period.
The scenarios are good. I've played capture and hold the CPs and a "flag runner" mechanic one. That one you have to grab the flag then interact with 3 land marks scattered around the instance. That one is a bit wonky because people never seem to know the rules. There's also a standard CTF but I've never made it into an instance on that.
The general pace of combat is a bit slower. Tanks are more tanky and healers heal more. I play a black orc (greenskin tank class) and I can soak sick amounts of damage. Put a healer on me and you have to take the healer out or put 6 or more people on me. I find myself switching targets a lot looking for the guy the healers aren't watching. Snares and roots are very effective killing tools because they allow you to cull someone from the pack. Bascially in RvR you have to work together. Two people just going toe to toe is often a sustained battle. Except for overwhelming forces 8-1 there are few quick kills.
This is getting long. I can talk more if you have questions. In summary: If you like RvR then give the game a try. If you don't like RvR but are a fan of the warhammer world I'd still say pick it up. They're very true to the world. My black orc has a skill called "Right in Da Jibblies."
Because they made a law saying it is.
Here's what I want from a medieval MMO:
Why?
It's a pointless waste of dev, programmer, and CPU time. There's no reason for it. The eco system is players kill mobs. Mobs respawn.
An economic system. Again, nothing fancy, just set a few resource sources and sinks (even invisible) and let the market forces decide the item prices. WoW does it for the player market, why not the in-game market as well?
Again. Why?
The player market fills the niche for merchant type players.
The only goods that should be sold by NPCs, and thus subject to your system, are required cash sink goods. Required goods are required and thus the price will only fluctuate based on population.
Auto-generated, per-player quests. Gearhead can auto-generate quests, why canâ(TM)t you? I mean, most of WoW quests look the same anyway: talk to someone, find something, kill something, or escort.
Yes. Fucking. Please. Anarchy Online does this. I'm sure others do it. It really should be a must have feature.
Allow player actions to affect the world. If I kill all predators from an area I expect the ecology to be ruined. If you donâ(TM)t want players ruining the ecology, make it difficult to genocide.
This is game breaking. There is only one possible end result of this. A barren dead game world. What's the point of that.
Unlike most players I met in WoW, I find no fun in comparing the size of virtual âoeswordsâ or in optimizing numbers in a game of statistics. I want immersion. The way WoWâ(TM)s world is just some immutable scenario ruined immersion to me.
You don't want immersion, which is immpossible anyways with our current technology level. The problem is that you are looking for something that MMPOGs can't offer. You need to look for a genre that fits your need.
Not steam specifically. Slashdot has had multiple stories on people loosing access to content they "purchased", and by purchased I mean licensed/rented on extremely stupid terms, when the content provider decided they were going to revoke access. One link here. There was another one with a different vendor, I think MSFT but I can't find it.
Imagine this. You purchase a game at a brick and mortar store. At the check out the clerk mentions that they can come into your house and take the game back at any point for any or no reason. You'd be outraged. No one would every by anything from that store. Yet this is _exactly_ what you agree to when you use Steam. It's ludicrous.
This is incorrect for the USA 7th Circuit. Shrink wrap and click through licenses are legal and binding. Please see ProCD v Zeidenberg.
1) Shrink wrap licenses have been legally tested in the 7th Circuit. The case was ProCD v Zeidenburg. The judge over turned the lower courts finding and ruled that shrink wrap licenses are in fact binding legal contracts.
2) It's pretty much impossible for it to be unconscionable. Your definition of unconscionable is slightly incorrect. unconscionable != unfair. It must be unfair weighted toward someone who has a better bargaining position, or meet other unrelated to the conversation criteria. Since Spore is a pure luxury item and there is nothing preventing you from declining the contract and no penalty for declining the contract it's not unconscionable. Please see Blizzard v bnetd for precedent.
Read your license agreement again. You rented the game. You didn't even get a discount for buying a crippled copy. They can cut you off at any time.
Steam is the furthest you can get from acceptable DRM. Please see the stories on here about people loosing their content because the company they bought it from decided to shut things down.
Exact search functionality is the ability to search for an exact term. This is impossible with Google.
Why would I need it? Contrary to what Google thinks, I know what I'm searching for better than they do.
The software I use is called Cache. The error messages are in the format [ERRORMESSAGE]. Searching for Cache with a capital C and the exact formatting of the error message is distinct and useful. Google strips the []s and ignores case. Any result that does not contain the []s is not one I want. I put them in for a reason.
I don't care if you strip them out by default but give me a way to leave them in.
Don't be evil is a lie.
what? have you ever tried putting quotes around what you want to "exactly" search for? cuz i'm pretty sure that works.
You are wrong. Quotes ignores special characters and case. I want exact not close to exact.
*yawn* Another browser. What special feature do they have that we can't live without? Or to say that another way. Why should I bother looking at it?
These people can't even get a search engine right. They have no exact search functionality. Let me repeat that. They have no exact search functionality.
They peaked 2 years ago. In another 7 or so they'll be viewed just as microsoft is.
I was pressed for time earlier and forgot a point I wanted to make.
Yes some things are illegal to put in a contract, the example you give. That doesn't mean anything in a contract is illegal. That logic would mean all contracts were illegal which we both know is not the case.
Signing away your right to sue is illegal. Agreeing that you are "renting" software rather than buying it is very legal. So don't do it.
Do you have a related example?