Looks like late stage capitalism is taking away people's right to personal property.
this post was submitted on 31 Jan 2024
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I'm not much of a gamer anymore...
Might have to visit some torrent sites anyway. Maybe I can find someone who likes Ubisoft games but can't afford them and doesn't know how to acquire them...
Never was
Everyone here will balk and biych about it and rightly so, but this will happen, unfortunately. Why? Because Ubisoft is on the path of enshittification, and most of humanity are dumb and don't care and will walk willingly like sheep to the slaughter.
Can someone explain the logic behind this? Other than "they say that, so we get to say this!"
The original context of this quote. Which has suspiciously been removed, is in reference to subscription models taking off.
The original quote is more along the line of "a subscription model isn't feasible unless gamers get used to the idea of not owning their games"
So really any line of logic is flawed because it misrepresents the original comment.
No it's not. I'm the guy who started this quote and it was on a Louis Rossmann video about a company who broke their customers' lifetime licenses to make them switch to their subscription model.
This is the video: https://youtu.be/tkmOddW1vu8?si=jAqmaOjzwYvdgYap
I'm technol33t.
I'm talking about the Ubisoft quote.
Ohhh that tracks.
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(3 replies)
Hey I've seen this one before!
If purchase isn't ownership,
Then it's time for communusm
EDIT: forgot to type time
The term “If purchase isn’t ownership” has no relationship to the article quote. The suggestion of not owning games refers to having subscription-based access to them; as of yet only ever offered as a suggested alternative to purchasing games, which is still very much an option.
These memes are always using terribly structured logic to justify piracy.
The suggestion of not owning games refers to having subscription-based access to them; as of yet only ever offered as a suggested alternative to purchasing games, which is still very much an option.
That is exactly the problem though. How long will it be until the subscription model is no longer an option but the only option? Because i would bet money on that being the actual goal.
That is already the case for many mobile games, so why the person you're talking to doesn't think it will happen overall, I'm not sure.
And I would bet money against that.
Look at the reaction in these comments. Even if some games get attention from Game Pass, each individual game gets its renown through major fans that play 50 hours a month. What would any of these publishers have to gain from suddenly denying that revenue flow for JUST the people subscribing? Even a single game attempting that model would likely receive major backlash.
Regardless, I’m going to continue judging memes and arguments like these as pathetic - as they’re already fully assuming at-present a situation we haven’t even started to move towards.
How have we not started moving towards it when every company is trying their damnedest to get subscriptions? Look at new vehicles, they are paywalling features on an already purchased car, I bet you would have "bet against this" too before it happened. The problem is companies are slowly changing things over time hoping consumers don't notice until it's too late.
"Publishers will remove purchase options" does not follow from "Publishers want to add subscription options". The logic is not there.
If you can name more than a few games that removed their option for purchase due to something other than music licensing problems, that suggest it's part of a move to encourage people to use subscriptions, you have a case. Otherwise, it's fantasy. I can't even think of a single game that's done that.
I can live with that, I mean, subscription for games, but once a game enters the catalog, it can never be removed.
He's basically threatening to move to a subscription-instead-of-purchase model. They've toyed with this idea for years, and have been trying to normalize it.
These memes are always using terribly structured logic to justify piracy.
Agreed. Nobody needs to justify piracy. Piracy is automatically justified because the reasons people justified banning piracy were bad-faith. Digital IP is theft whose only purpose has failed.
I just borrow my games for a little while then I set them free.. like a butterfly if you will...
Software piracy isn't theft because you're not taking anything away from someone else.
That said, this meme makes no sense. You don't own a car you rent. The car can still be stolen.
But not from the person renting it.
You pay for it, sure, but I'm not sure you "purchase" a rental car. Imho there sould be a legistlation that says you can't use wording like "buy" or "purchase" for digital media that you don't own. Like "buy license" or "start rental"... IDK
Sure? Stealing from a rental car company is still theft. If software piracy was theft, making that software a rental instead of a purchase doesn't change that fact. You would still be stealing something.
Knowledge theft just can't be compared with object theft like that. If you had a device that could perfectly replicate a car just by sitting in it, that would be closer.
Alternatively, car companies that can grenade your car's engine if you drive somewhere they don't like, or otherwise prevent you from using the car, while still asking for $50k+.
None of that has to do with the definitional distinction the meme is making. I've already said it's not actual theft, my problem is that the argument presented is bad. Even if a customer transaction does not confer ownership, it is possible to steal the thing transacted upon. So piracy WOULD still be theft, if it was theft in the first place. The argument doesn't work, unrelated to whether or not I agree with the conclusion.
Alternatively, car companies that can grenade your car's engine if you drive somewhere they don't like, or otherwise prevent you from using the car, while still asking for $50k+.
Any car that exists can be stolen. That describes a car I wouldn't want to buy or rent, it does not describe a car which could be taken without that taking being theft.
A device that destroys itself when stolen can't be stolen successfully. The metaphor still fails somewhat as making a new car isn't free.
I think I see your point though; theft isn't defined by ownership, so ownership status is not a case for theft (although they do tend to be caused by the same things). "If the plane wasn't flying, then I didn't crash"; crashing is not defined by flight worthiness, or even being in the air.
The logic of the idiom is in the simile though, "buying ≠ owning" has the same logical flaw; there are lots of things we buy that can't be owned, chiefly services. Yet the expectation of the saying is that buying to own is not owning. Perhaps more explicit would be "If not giving what was payed for isn't stealing, then taking what should be given isn't stealing either", or "If you take our right to own, we'll take your right to own".
Like most sayings, being snappy is more useful that being correct, but there's also an important meaning there if we take the snap out of it.
If someone invented a machine that could print out cars for cents on the dollar, that wouldn’t make stealing those cars fair; especially if inventing that machine cost him billions of dollars.
In fact that’s reasonably close to the case for certain kinds of food - the costs for producing them are infinitesimal, but the logistics of researching that development process, making storefronts, advertising them, and having staff on hand to process the purchase add up. Yet that doesn’t stop some people from pointing to that production cost as reason to shoplift.
Memes like this have always been backwards justification to excuse piracy.