*I started writing this... wow... over two months ago. But I think it is still important, so I am just now finishing it up and actually posting it.* - November 19, 2010
I was downright shocked to see the following article over at gamespot.com today:
Court ruling could affect pre-owned game sales
Basically the article sites a US Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling that said a consumer who had purchased a sealed copy of Autocad (computer software) could not resell the item on eBay because he did not own the software that was contained within. As a matter of fact, according to the ruling, the guy that purchased the software did not own anything! See the Autocad software came with a EULA (End User License Agreement). This document (piece of legal trickery) states that the original purchaser of the "software" did not actual purchase the software, but a license to the software and that license is non-transferable. I am not sure of all the legalities behind this and I hope to god it gets overturned upon further appeal, but for me, it raises a bigger question... When did consumers start giving up the right to own the things we purchase?
If this ruling is allowed to stand, it opens the door for all manufactures to put EULAs in all products. Basically if you purchase anything that has a EULA, you are not purchasing the actual product, but just a license to that product. So if you buy a car, you don't actually buy the car, you just are buying a license from the manufacturer to drive the car, but you can't sell the car because technically, the car still belongs to the manufacturer. If you buy a shirt, and the manufacturer puts an EULA on the collar, you can't hand the shirt down to a sibling or donate it to Goodwill because, YOU DON'T OWN THE SHIRT, you only own a license to wear the shirt, the manufacturer actually owns the shirt.
I might be taking things to an extreme with the above examples, but I really don't think so. For all the griping that the entertainment industry does about pirated materials and how much money they are losing, they themselves are engaging in a systematic process to completely take away consumer rights. They are trying to screw consumers, just as much, if not more, than they claim to be getting screwed by the consumers.
I understand the need for software companies to protect their intellectual property. At the same time, certain developers and certain companies seem to be taking greed to a whole new level.
Taking this idea of EULAs back to the video game market (the article above that prompted this post was housed on a video game site), by allowing video game developers and publishers to insert EULAs into their products, they are effectively killing the second hand gaming market. Developers have already started inserting advertisements and product placement into games. And games themselves are the most costly of all entertainment media, with the SRP of all new XBOX 360 and PS3 games being $59.99 (compared to I believe $29.99 or $34.99 for new Blu Ray movies). An argument can be made that games provide more hours of entertainment with game playthrough times ranging from 10 hours on the low end to 100 plus hours on the high end. But an argument can also be made that with the additional features stuffed on to many Blu Ray and DVDs, the gap in entertainment between the two is not that big, if it even exists at all. So you are still looking at games being one of the highest costing forms of entertainment on the market. In addition, game developers are increasing profits with in game ads and product placements, as well as cashing in on various licensing deals to have their properties appear on soda cans and pillow cases. Are we to honestly believe that they are so cash strapped, that they need to kill the second game market so that everyone has to buy a game new?
