A European court ruling today has confirmed that end users are legally allowed to sell on second hand digitally downloaded videogames. The court has decided that an author of a piece of software can no longer oppose the resale of the license once used. In short: it’s against the law for a company to stop you selling on digitally distributed software.
“The exclusive right of distribution of a copy of a computer program covered by such a licence is exhausted on its first sale,” says the new ruling, which also states that end-user license agreements that oppose the law are null and void – “even if the licence agreement prohibits a further transfer, the rightholder can no longer oppose the resale of that copy.”
Naturally, this affects the likes of Steam and, importantly, the PSN.
How the infrastructure for such transfers will manifest themselves is anyone’s guess – presumably there’ll need to be some way to change the owner of a game digitally, so that the title no longer works on your machine but will on someone else’s. And of course, the service to make such a transfer could be chargeable by the license holder.
Via lo-ping.
bmg_123
Oh dayum! Sounds good to me!
coruscant
Presumably it just means that technically they CAN be sold on, but as it isn’t possible given the way digital content works on most systems, things will stay the same. It doesn’t say that publishers HAVE to make it possible so it sounds like a moot ruling.
SH Number 7/Mini-Lipscombe
That’s what I thought.
Lord_Gremlin
Erm, that’s what it means actually. Publishers will have to come up with solution or close their business in EU. It’s same as companies that sell TVs HAVE to take back faulty ones.
Expect PSN down until it’s legal again.
Tuffcub
No its not. Read the link. It says the purchaser can sell on the program, but there is no mention of the supplier making a mechanism to do this available.
What you could do is legally sell a PS3 full of PSN downloads – but that’s about it.
Awayze
I assume Steam and PSN will now have to provide a code for each download item so the code can be sold on to another person and when they activate it, your item becomes deactivated.
Jambo
I guess what this could refer to mostly is people selling their accounts and making that process legal. Seem to recall there being an issue before where someone had their account closed for trying to sell it. I doubt the platforms themselves will actually setup ways for you to sell on your licenses individually.
The Lone Steven
How does one sell a digital game? As it will be locked to one account and you would have to give up the account. I suppose you could make several accounts just for the purpose of selling the games but i suspect Valve and Sony would catch on if they detect the amount of accounts being used at the same IP address unless they use a proxy server to avoid getting tracked. Or they could burn it to the disc and then sell it although it may be very close to piracy.
Hmm, i wonder if Sony and Valve will open up an offical preowned market on their services to make it easier to sell games but automatically get a 10% cut to help with the running of the service as well as to compensate the developers for the loss of profit?
Alex C
Looking into this, it won’t affect services like Steam as they effectively just ‘rent’ you the license – this only affects ‘sales’ of DD stuff from what I can tell. A change of wording in the ToS would mean that most services won’t need to do very much.
Forrest_01
One would assume that streaming services such as Gaikai & Onlive also wouldn’t be affected by this as well then, as you never officially own the product.
KeRaSh
Really? That would suck. I thought Steam was the perfect place to start since they already have the gifting system in place. I was looking for an easy way to get uncut Steam games through the likes of game gifting from regions that have the uncut version. Steam could charge a small fee for each resold copy for providing the infrastructure for this kind of business so they would make some money with it, too.
Uhyve
Oracle tried to make the same argument:
“Oracle, which makes a vast proportion of its revenues from maintenance agreements as well, had tried to argue that it does not sell software as such, only licences. However, the court effectively backed up Bot’s opinion that this was an “artificial distinction”.”
http://www.zdnet.com/oracle-cannot-block-the-resale-of-its-software-in-europe-7000000189/
But yeah, alot of this is going to be down to interpretation at this point, so this quote may or may not be applicable.
Deathbrin
Rent you the license? So a retail copy would be renting the license as well, as it can’t be registered without Steam and is effectively a digital code-in-a-box?
quinkill
@ Alex C, that’s not strictly true, if you read the ruling the legal state of a digital download would not be and cannot be converted to a “rental” model. What you say would only work if the content was being streamed.
ProjectJAY
I was under the impression that one of the reasons the industry was moving towards digital downloads was to avoid second-hand sales? I don’t see les corporations being too happy about this…
Jas-n
If anything you’ll probably be able to sell back to the service provider at a reduced price, then the license tied to your account is revoked. EA has the functionality for PC purchases, I got a refund for some poor value Sims 3 DLC content.
Tuffcub
That will teach you to buy Katy Perry DLC.
LivedeviL
I think your logic is sound, just depends on how Sony (for example) would be able to resell the “second hand” copies and would they sell the for the same price they purchased them for or at a, say, 1% discount of what they are selling “new” (which the game would end up being.
I’m starting to think they will put a clause somewhere that allows them to stop you selling it on…
Jas-n
You’d be selling the license back for a reduced price, which would then be available for new purchases.
psychobudgie
They can’t add a clause. It wouldn’t be legal. They could however just refuse to honour it until challenged in the courts and choose to do it on a case by case basis. Pretty much the same way they treat the Sale of Goods Act.
TSBonyman
Proper order, If the industry really wants to go digital they’re going to have to look after this aspect of consumer rights. Now just needs a practical way to implement it.
gazzagb
This changes nothing. Sony and MS will just change it so buy using PSN/XBL you agree to waiver your right to be able to sell on your digital games. Done.
An-dz
dam it your right, they would never think about letting people do this, i know me and my mates would all be swaping games about for 1pence just like you do with disks.
tonycawley
You hand over 1p to your mate to borrow their game? Why? This is mental. You can’t add a clause to bypass a law, the law states you can’t refuse it, any clause saying otherwise wouldnt be legal.
Grey_Ghost13
But that wouldn’t get arounf the EU court rulling would it? If you read the second paragraph, espescialy “end-user license agreements that oppose the law are null and void – ”even if the licence agreement prohibits a further transfer, the rightholder can no longer oppose the resale of that copy.”
That would prevent them from implementing anything that preventing resales of digital copies.
gazzagb
They’ll be a loop hole for them, I’m sure.
hazelam
HA!