VALVe sued in France, because of customer rights

Post » Sat Dec 19, 2015 9:30 pm

So it seems VALVe got sued in France because the following are abusive and illegal in France's law.

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1158923

  • Steam's Subscriber Agreement explicitely forbids users to sell their games, despite the transfer of ownership of digital products/licenses being legal
  • Valve declines any responsibility in case they get hacked and users' personal info get stolen
  • Valve claims ownership on the rights of any user-created content uploaded on Steam
  • It is impossible to get the money on your Steam Wallet back if your account is closed/deleted/banned
  • Valve applies Luxembourg's consumer law regardless of the user's country

So it looks like that law that passed in what 2012? In the European Union to allow people purchasing software digitally to be able to resell their digitally purchased software is being enforced.

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SiLa
 
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Post » Sat Dec 19, 2015 12:03 pm

Good, now lets hope the USA can catch up to these laws regarding digital purchases. One thing I don't like about Steam is that lingering thought of losing the hundreds of games I have purchased.
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Crystal Birch
 
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Post » Sat Dec 19, 2015 5:25 pm

It's possible they'll end up with a compromise of people being able to sell accounts, but not individual games from those accounts.
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Charlie Ramsden
 
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Post » Sat Dec 19, 2015 9:00 am

They are currently in court in Australia as well for breaching consumer laws, i know the case was coming to a conclusion but have not heard anything, problem is they think that because they have a long terms of agreement document quoting laws that are not always applicable in countries outside the U.S. as my friend used to say dazzle them with dexterity and baffle them with bulls**t.

I got into an argument with Blizzard who stated that once id signed their TOA, they were covered and you suffered the consequences, i read through the whole document and picked it apart, they hadnt updated the document to follow changes in law, their current TOA was worthless, especially the part about any court case had to be held in the the U.S. till they were force to hold a case outside of the U.S. against their TOA, because they couldnt legally enforce it, if a normal everyday person thought it was true because they wrote it down, then they thought they could get away with it, it applied even less in Australia because they had an office here thus they were under Australian law, they do not have extraterritorial status.

  • Steam's Subscriber Agreement explicitely forbids users to sell their games, despite the transfer of ownership of digital products/licenses being legal. Isnt that between the owner and the games company.
  • Valve declines any responsibility in case they get hacked and users' personal info get stolen. Thats questionable that should only be shown that if Steam had taken due care and had to the best of their ability to secure the users data, otherwise if they have a poor easily compromised system then that should be shown to any user, using the service.
  • Valve claims ownership on the rights of any user-created content uploaded on Steam. Old story a way to try and steal whats not yours and make money off someone elses work, a bit like the copyright argument.
  • It is impossible to get the money on your Steam Wallet back if your account is closed/deleted/banned. I know in Australia no matter what reason if they are trading in this country they are required to refund you, because ive seen some of the reasons they have ceased accounts, and its an easy way to make excuses close accounts and Steam profits.
  • Valve applies Luxembourg's consumer law regardless of the user's country. And personally why hasnt anyone annexed this ink blot on the map, concreted over it and put a hot dog stand on it. But also that also doesnt apply if you are trading in a country their laws apply to your product or service no matter what thats why Luxembourg's consumer law currently dont mean anything in the court their in, in Australia.
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Nuno Castro
 
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Post » Sat Dec 19, 2015 10:02 am

To be fair, that's probably as much [censored]-covering as anything, as it is the simplest way to avoid trouble relating to ownership and distribution and things.
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Brad Johnson
 
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Post » Sat Dec 19, 2015 11:22 am

I'm having a feeling VALVe will soon end up in court in South Korea as well.

Afterall in 2012 South Korean S.W.A.T. teams raided Blizzard Entertainments Seoul offices when Diablo III released for sale when people got that one error they couldn't return the physical boxed version of the PC version of Diablo III for a full refund.

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Lily Evans
 
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Post » Sat Dec 19, 2015 8:57 pm

Wha? Publishers and digital distributors are not above the law? :o
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e.Double
 
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Post » Sat Dec 19, 2015 3:00 pm

In the rest of the world? No I don't think so.

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Fanny Rouyé
 
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Post » Sat Dec 19, 2015 1:07 pm

Well obviously not, but for a long time it has looked like that.
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Sun of Sammy
 
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Post » Sat Dec 19, 2015 8:53 pm


That whole incident reeks of what's wrong with people.

They were okay enough with the idea of having to use online verification to play but when the servers couldn't handle the load they flipped their crap and demanded refunds instead of what sane people will do and wait for the congestion to clear.
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Britta Gronkowski
 
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Post » Sat Dec 19, 2015 5:29 pm

hhhhmmmmm news about valve but not about half life 3?...........:( my favorite video game series will never come to a close. my hope has never been lower humanity has failed:(
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Rachell Katherine
 
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Post » Sat Dec 19, 2015 9:30 am

People have a right to return their physically purchased video games in this case the physical boxed version of the PC version of Diablo III that they purchased to return for a full refund if they want to.

People have a right to also be able to return their digitally purchased software for a full refund and people should be able to also resell it if they want to. Thankfully this is progressing slowly, but it is progressing in the European union (EU). Once this happens in the European Union (EU) VALVe will not be able to keep on changing their End User License Agreement (EULA), because VALVe will either have to obey the law or risk exiting the European Union (EU) market.

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Elle H
 
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