European Court changes/rewrites software law

[MatthewMcEwan]

This is just a repost from another forum but seeing as I don't see this posted here I'm guessing most of you haven't seen it

"http://curia.europa..../cp120094en.pdf


This lovely piece of news has been making a lot of waves over the Internet today.


I haven't had a chance to read it at work, but from what I understood so far, essentially the European Court of Justice has declared that downloadable software is, in fact, a "product", and not a "service", as all software publishers have been trying to make us believe for the last nearly 25 years. With all the things this implies, such as consumers' right to re-sell their products.


This is absolutely HUGE news for IP law, and software in general. The precedent this sets will probably lead to an escalation of tensions between publishers and consumers, and a lot of the definitions will need to be re-thought.


Coming at the time when the publishers are actvely trying to "go digital", what do you think this could mean for us, the consumers?"

From what little I know about the subject it basically means that you can now legally re-sell a downloaded game(and other downloadable products) so long as in the T&C it states you have the right to unlimited use of it. Just like you might a disk based one, this is because the company no longer has the right of distribution.

So yeah just felt like because isn't posted already I might as well put it up, also wasn't sure if this thread should be in General or Serious so if I made a mistake could a Mod please move the thread.

[Spaceboy]

Posted here : http://forums.aria.co.uk/showthread....wnloaded-Games

[Martin]

Such a bad idea for the games industry.

[Terbinator]

This is just a repost from another forum but seeing as I don't see this posted here I'm guessing most of you haven't seen it

"http://curia.europa..../cp120094en.pdf


This lovely piece of news has been making a lot of waves over the Internet today.


I haven't had a chance to read it at work, but from what I understood so far, essentially the European Court of Justice has declared that downloadable software is, in fact, a "product", and not a "service", as all software publishers have been trying to make us believe for the last nearly 25 years. With all the things this implies, such as consumers' right to re-sell their products.


This is absolutely HUGE news for IP law, and software in general. The precedent this sets will probably lead to an escalation of tensions between publishers and consumers, and a lot of the definitions will need to be re-thought.


Coming at the time when the publishers are actvely trying to "go digital", what do you think this could mean for us, the consumers?"

From what little I know about the subject it basically means that you can now legally re-sell a downloaded game(and other downloadable products) so long as in the T&C it states you have the right to unlimited use of it. Just like you might a disk based one, this is because the company no longer has the right of distribution.

So yeah just felt like because isn't posted already I might as well put it up, also wasn't sure if this thread should be in General or Serious so if I made a mistake could a Mod please move the thread.

That's debatable and no precedent has been set, either. No laws have been passed or made in relation to this, they've merely suggested something and now the many arms of the EU government will have to club together and work towards creating something that represents the ruling.

As with all legislation, its there to be interpreted.

[k3vst3r]

Just gives EU another bat to beat money out of developers