If you don’t retain some kind of actual ownership, they will not be allowed to use terms like “buy” or “purchase” on the store page button. I hope there aren’t huge holes in this that allow bad actors to get around it, but I certainly loathe the fact that there’s no real way to buy a movie or TV show digitally. Not really.
EDIT: On re-reading it, there may be huge holes in it. Like if they just “clearly tell you” how little you’re getting when you buy it, they can still say “buy” and “purchase”.
Just let me buy a license then download it wherever I want
“Ubisoft take note”
Ubisoft is nothing compared to Valve… You don’t own anything you purchase on Steam and it’s the biggest store by a huge margin, don’t know why Ubisoft is mentioned specifically…
In the unlikely event of the discontinuation of the Steam network,” Valve reps have said, “measures are in place to ensure that all users will continue to have access to their Steam games.”
They can still delete your account and cut you off from your games.
You don’t own anything you purchase on Steam
Games sold on Steam are not required to use Steam’s DRM. There are lots of DRM free games on Steam. Steam is only required to be installed to purchase/download them but not to run them. After download, the game files can be copied and ran on any computer without any verification.
So they’re not DRM free then if you need Steam to download them. You also need to be connected to the internet at least once to confirm ownership, so even if you download it once and think that you can now just transfer the game from one PC to another without an internet connection or without Steam, you can’t.
DRM free and owner ownership means physical.
They will get around it. Instead I suggest that buy buttons should say what you’re buying.
For example: Just “buy” should not be allowed.
“Buy License” or “Rent Game” for games with DRM. “Buy game” where you own your digital copy and can do whatever you want with it.
The power to destroy a thing is the absolute control over it
DRM violates this principle. Atreides forever
If you’re not receiving physical media, and you’re not saving a copy to local storage, then you’re not buying anything. You’re renting it.
That’s not even the best metric. You save Destiny 2 to local storage, but you still don’t own that either.
You can buy a perpetual license and then you own it (the license) regardless of storage or possession.
That’s great until they decide to stop providing whatever content you licensed.
You can’t just go out and buy a perpetual license for any random thing you purchase.
Do they need “buy” or “purchase”? All they need is “pay”, and nobody would notice.
I would still imagine that has a very different psychological effect. Nobody wants to click a “pay”-button…
Shopping cart icon, and “checkout”