Yeah not legally enforceable, you can't make people agree under a threat that has being a law for age's, if companies think if they put out a TOS and give you no option to decline that means they can enforce it not a chance moment it goes in front of a judge "Oh they had to agree to your TOS or lose thousands of dollars worth of property, yeah not a chance that is agreement under duress."
Valve is the one company holding back the investor parasites from completely destroying the industry. They're effectively providing the government regulation of the industry that governments themselves wont do. Valve is a rare example of a monopoly that does more good than bad. If the alternative is to let "competition" like Epic become more powerful, I choose less competition.
If you steal cable tv channels, you go to jail for theft (or pay a huge fine) It's the same concept. If you want to argue that piracy has cases where it could be morally acceptable, do that. But it is and always will be, theft. You didn't way for the game, you didn't pay for access to use the game. The only time it isn't theft is if the game is abandonware, because then there would be no way to pay for the game, as it's no longer being sold.
@@LabelsAreMeaningless I dont think you got to jail for stealing if you access cable TV without a valid contract. The lawsuit will use a different term than stealing.
"You think". Buy a "smart" TV or even a John deer tractor, update it and decline the terms. See what happens. Edit: People trying to explain laws to me, this was not my opinion, i stated a fact. You likely just agree like everyone else because you want it to keep working. Please control your emotions when you are hit with facts that you don't like. If you want to complain about it, then please do complain to the companies and law enforcement instead of just agreeing every time and then getting mad when someone points it out.
@@Xamp1256 Yes i know. i'm not here to argue about opinions, i'm just pointing it out. We like to think we live in an ideal world but i gave an example that is real where you can end up with a non functioning TV, that's all, i don't need it explaining.. because if we live by your logic then why is nobody suing TV manufacturers.
@@Xamp1256 you gave an example over how you feel the law should be verses reality. if that's the case then why is it a reality. think about it for 2 seconds. i didn't make just make it up and it isnt my opinion. i don't need the law explaining to me because i'd like to think it works like that but if did then whys this happening.. hm?
The fact that they can take away access to previously purchased items bought under a different agreement unless you sign on to a new agreement that applies retroactively is really sketchy (edit: I more meant scummy). We got to get on the same page as the EU and declare that digital goods are still things you actually own and that you have at least some overarching protections over them.
It's not sketchy. Every American voting Red or Blue has been "asking" for this. Seriously... do folks never actually listen to the candidates they vote for? They tell voters every single election what they are going to do. They don't even make it a secret. They just keep voters distracted with party politics to notice that when it comes to fleecing Americans they quickly agree to act fast but blame each other for any problems while they laugh inside at voters and make a show of holding their noses when they vote on legislation.
The sad thing is even if they made the decision that those digital products are still yours, then steam would still be a service. They would probably invent some backassward way of being able to send you copies of the games you own per your request and primarily just remove the restriction that steam be active for you to play the game. There is a good chance they might open a second store to cater to customers that don't want to open a steam account that exclusively sells hard copy games, but it would still end up being more expensive between shipping and handling. Overall, this really wouldn't save a steam account from things like this. They might adjust their policies, maybe change a ban so that you can't access steam servers or what not, but steam a service includes so many elements you just can't separate from the games you buy.
@@DemonKing19951 They already kind of have that mechanism... the offline mode. You could theoretically download all your games before cancelling and somehow keep playing it (although the DRM will eventually expire and make the game unplayable, so that's still a service they need to provide). The next best thing is to provide an easy way to download the keys for the games you own that support it, but likely that's about it. They definitively won't let you download games after you dropped the service, at least not for free. That hypothetical second portal will likely charge a fee per download.. and not necessarily a trivial one, since you would be using their service as a cloud backup for the games.
@@foxskyful probs Just meant he doesnt like EA Desktop, Ubisoft Connect and Epic Games Launcher since these are the major ones (gog Galaxy ist a good one tho unifies them all and hast it's own shop without drm)
bro it's digital. How can you ever truly own something you have to re-download from a 3rd party in the future if it gets deleted on your end? That's why you have to agree to the terms. Banned steam accounts still get access to previous purchases, but you're just out of luck with buying in the future. Know how the game is played.
The problem is that you always have to agree to the terms under duress. It basically says "Sign this, or lose everything you've previously purchased".. Which is, of course, legalized theft and blackmail (extortion) in every sense, and would probably nullify the agreement in any sane court.
@@umokwhy2830 never encountered that issue(probably mostly because I haven't played much in a long while), but back in the day I would simply turn off the wi-fi, launch steam in autonomous mode, open the game and then, if I wanted to play multiplayer, turn the wi-fi back on
@@Ixarus6713 you are not even legally owning games on steam at the first place, it never was the case, by buying games you are buying a license to play which can be revoked. Sounds absurd because it is, but it's true.
and gog is borderline profitable. 1 millions profit last year. sounds like a lot until you remember that having a world wide store with people downloading stuff all over the world cost billions...
Hard Agree, everyone wants the money Valve makes, but does not want to put in the 10+ years of work Valve spent on making Steam not suck. Steam sucked too, but it takes time to make a platform like this successful. Steam is not a "Get rich quick" scheme. it's changed the wya we play games. everyone under estimates it's.... Impact.
Not really, people are just die-hard loyal to valve for inexplicable reasons. Don't get me wrong, I use steam almost exclusively, but 90% of the reasons not to use Epic or GOG are nebulous at best. There isn't really anything aside from these three, unless you count these single publisher launchers.
Yeah. I always buy games from GOG when I can at all do so. Worse comes to worse I can at least store my games off line and never had to be connected to a service if I don't want to.
Gog is nearly as good as steam in every way, and they're infinitely better in many ways. If they could tripple or quadruple their library without adding more trash, they'll be bajillionaires and the entire industry will have to stop scamming purchasers.
@@kphuts815 Within the last year or two, a man died during a family visit to a Disney theme park, and the company tried to avoid wrongful death litigation because they had agreed to a Disney+ Subscriber streaming contract that included an arbitration clause - something obviously totally unrelated. They dropped that attempt after some bad publicity, but the fact they even tried that BS is pretty concerning.
@@kphuts815 Someone was visiting Disney World or Disney Land IRL, and had a food allergy that they told the restaurant at the theme park about. The restaurant said the customer would be safe because it would not be in contact or did not contain the ingredients they were allergic to. The customer ate the food, and later died due to the food containing ingredients they were allergic to, even though the customer received reassurance they would not be exposed to the ingredients they were allergic to. The now-widow of the deceased customer attempted to sue Disney for wrongful death IN COURT, and Disney said they waived their right to sue IN COURT due to the customer and now-widow having signed up for a free 10-day trial of Disney+, because in the ToS of Disney+ it says you must go through arbitration for any legal disputes, NOT court. I believe Disney ended getting slapped by the courts for that flimsy defense, but I do not know for certain because I didn't follow the story because I was so disgusted by Disney's actions. Remember Disney is a multi-billion dollar company ($88.9 Billion in 2023 alone, in revenue). Disney is an evil company for more reasons than can be listed on TH-cam.
Gigantic user agreements, signed electronically, are a corrupt scam. It is not actually valid consent, when it is absolutely certain that 99% of people will not, and in fact in a practical sense cannot, read and understand the deceptive material contained therein. In fact that is the intent. So-called consent is never actually consent, unless it is informed.
@@SuperDeluxe80 NO online user agreement (of the kind we're discussing) involves legitimate consent, NONE of them are a valid contract. Not even if one includes personal info.
@@JarrenOmgWhatIsEvenHappening No, the kind of electronic signature we're talking about is not legitimate. Yes, illegitimate rules pretend otherwise, but an unjust law is no law at all.
That was exactly my thinking. Valve obviously broke some laws. Law firms saw the opporunity to do some good for clients and as well make shitload of money - win-win. Valve does not like it (for obvious reasons). You cant threaten client with losing their accounts/products/services already paid for just because you file a lawsuit against them for breaking anittrust laws. It is like hey airbag in our car was faulty, but if you file a lawsuit against us you are going to lose all the cars you bought from us, even cars before this incident.
@@Izmael1310lawfirms never seen the opportunity to do good for end users. They seem an opportunity to make bank off a user agreement that states it would pay all legal fees of the end user even if valve wins the case. This ain't a case of steam Vs the end user. It's a case of legal extortion of valve by a lawfirm using end users as a way to make free money because valve had an agreement that favoured the end user.
@@TheWeeJet 1. Pretty sure multiple states including California require that if you force arbitration you pay the fees. So they didn't mess the agreement it's just not enforceable if they don't do that. Courts generally take a dim view of mandatory, unavoidable costs to access justice. 2. While it's true they make bank either way. It's also true that Valve did this to themselves. The entire point of class action was to make it so you didn't have 1,000 individual suits. If you force people to pay for the cost of arbitration and only allow individual suits you make it so any behavior below a certain dollar value is ultimately not punishable. Set arbitration cost at even 100 dollars which really isn't much to get a retired judge to listen to a case and deal with paperwork and suddenly any case less than a couple hundred dollars in value isn't worth fighting. That's the worse evil. They have 1500 dollar an hour attorneys. They by default have access to a Justice system which does allow them to avoid automatic fee shifting and which consolidates mass cases into one. And they actively decided to forgo that. Arbitration isn't meant to be a cure all. They could just force arbitration OR class action for example
Forced arbitration is BS. It won't be long until every business requires you to agree to forced arbitration upon entering their doors, unless people collectively take a stand and STOP GIVING THEM MONEY.
Companies already all do that if you don’t want to engage with said companies you won’t be able to use any service the real solution is to get the federal government to ban forced arbitration.
It is but legal DDOSing is very much in vogue now. Far more people like money than there are people that can arbitrate. If a legal attack avenue goes viral arbitration can create a tidal wave of bs. I remember getting ads for the Valve litigation that lead up to this change.
They already do. Well all the big ones like Disney. Tho steam was different for saying we'll pay fees, which they got taken advantage of for. Good riddance that it's gone. The world is healing. Tho I wonder if steam will be destroyed.
@@commode7x most of the time you don’t need a programmer or pirate a game. Lots of games cna be easily pirated by just copying the files adding them online. Most steam games are similar, except you just remove the steamapi that prevents steam from opening and telling you that you don’t own the game. Sure, some games like ones packed in launchers are more difficult, but piracy is not as hard as you’re making it sound.
So, TL;DR: - Steam generously offers to pay low court fees for its users. - Somebody tries to exploit this for millions. - Steam claps back in a way that's pretty heavy-handed, but which actually benefits users in the long run by allowing class-action suits and removing the arbitration waiver. Yeah, Imma side with Steam on this one. One of the few genuinely good companies in the gaming space.
*illegal, period Edit: seems I need to be pedantic for those whose cerebral bits carry all the features of a bowling ball: smooth, dense, and a few holes you keep putting your fingers in. _Forced_ arbitration - ya know, the topic of the video - should be illegal, full stop. Edit 2: Holy....just....wow.... Days after I was more specific, and people are stillmouthbreathing down my neck. If the difference between forced arbitration per TOS/EULA bullshittery and point of contention agreements hasn't sunk in by this point, and especially why one is ridiculously bad and should be banned, just pull up a bowl of catchup flavored mayo and dine on that corporate toejam.
You can still get yours through arbitration, but it is a little harder. Amazon or Google got a nice hit to the wallet after a bunch of people sued through arbitration. The fees piled up quickly
I swear that Gabe vowed at the beginning of the steam store that if Steam ever shut down they would provide the full downloads of our games. Has that philosophy change? I mean if games are delisted we can still download them if we bought them. If a completely online games is shut down, obviously we aren't expecting to keep those. But for any game with an offline mode, they said they would provide those as downloads if they shut down. Is that changed now?
Yeah they have everything backed up with a 3rd party company in case Steam ever gets shutdown they will just release a final offline update and you will still be able to download everything (obviously not online only games0 and use the platform without any DRM. Even if they didn't do this and just abandon Steam, people have already figured out ways to patch Steam and access your entire library with no DRM so its actually really easy to implement.
@@I_watch_things376 That's seperate to what OP was asking but yes you can download anything that's ever been removed from sale on Steam provided you own it. Many years ago Valve reassured people that they had a contingency plan in place in case Steam shut down so that people would still be able to download and use Steam without any DRM at all and 100% offline mode, provided the company shutdown of course. This philosophy has not changed, Steam support will back this up if you raise a request to them too.
The good guy Gabe interpretation is that it's because of publishers and their tos which steam is bound by. I personally like steam and valve but they're stepping outside what's fair play imo. Especially things like banning games from being cheaper elsewhere. I hope the courts give them an attitude adjustment.
A vow means nothing. If they (or he) really cared you'd get a refund if you were forced to delete your account or accept the new terms. They're holding you hostage.
Some days I wonder if it's really the corporate suits doing this crap or if it's just a group of blood sucking lawyers. Then I remember it doesn't actually matter because the suits aren't stopping the lawyers on moral grounds and the lawyers aren't warning the suits where it will go. They both seem to forget that if you push hard enough the police and soldiers will stop protecting them when people start going for the mob solution.
“Your dispute with us isn’t valid unless you delete your account which you’ve spent an unknown amount of time and money on.” This sounds like extortion, it doesn’t sound legally valid. Imagine suing your bank and they say “you can’t sue us you still have an account” except instead of getting your money out when you close the bank just keeps or wipes everything. It’s obviously not right.
Keep in mind the change is a result from being extorted by law firms and if they cant stops the extortion valve would go bankrupt and everyone would lose their games
@@against1virusValve is a multi billion dollar company with hundreds of millions in profits every year. They can lose 1000000 of these cases and still be in the green. Cut the "valve is a small indie company" bull. That stopped being true over a decade ago.
Valve does this because (Correct me if I'm wrong.) A law firm currently tries to lawsuit Steam in the tens of thousands, which mean that if Steam hasn't change their agreement this lawsuit would bankrupt Steam itself as a whole. (The previous agreement was Steam would pay for the legal fees if it's under ten grand US dollars.) The argument here is not about what's right, it's about law firms getting money from the legal fees whether they win or not.
I don't think it's legal, because if a client voluntarily deletes their account, they would no longer have a standing to sue Valve. The best course of action is the one that are going to sue to avoid using Steam service until the case is over, this way they would avoid implicitly accepting the new terms by using the service. Also, I'm pretty sure EU would not accept that they cannot sue Valve in EU. BTW Valve makes billions in profit, they can afford loosing a few hundred millions.
I think if Valve is saying "You must agree or close your account" then you should be able to say "I close my account because of this but you must REFUND ME THE VALUE OF EVERY GAME." Because they are changing the deal of the agreement retroactively, it means they are forcing us to lose money. The best thing is I think this COULD be argued in court.
Let me remind you the only reason valve is changing the agreement is because a lawfirm is abusing the goodwill part of the old agreement that was saying valve would pay for the end users legal fees even if the end user lost the case. Don't you think it's a little strange that a single lawfirm has made over 75,000 independent cases against valve and had adverts up to asking for more people to come to them to get more individual cases. This lawfirm only has 10 employees. That's 7500 separate cases per employee and they were still asking for more. They were not planning on winning any case. They just wanted the free money printer
@@TheWeeJet There was only an incentive to abuse that goodwill portion of the agreement because the users were locked out of class action lawsuits. There is absolutely no reason for the forced arbitration to be present in the agreement. Class action suits are a hassle and law firms wouldn't even take cases that were a waste of time and baseless anyway. A corporation is trying to weasel their way out of any accountability by brute forcing their customers out of any option to hold them legally accountable for anything. Especially holding thousands of dollars worth of games purchased hostage to make people quit their form of completely legal protest against said corrupt and anti-customer corporation.
Plot twist: Agreeing to change the agreement in a manner that puts an ultimatum on users is actually a big-brain move to turn the tables on whoever sued them before by creating a contract that cannot be legally upheld.
Australian consumer law says I own my games, and last I checked, a ToS or EULA isn't legally enforceable when it violates law. Any item sold through a 1 time purchase is considered a "good" and not a "service" and can not legally be removed, revoked, or have access to it restricted in any way. Steam has to abide by our local consumer laws to legally operate in Australia, which is probably why I never saw this pop up and why the arbitration clause never applied to us in the first place.
"Own our games" still hasn't been challenged in Australian court. Steam was still hiding behind the "We are a service"... but the judge said the law doesn't differentiate between goods or services. It is "goods AND services", and all rights to consumer protections apply. Valve got ripped to shreds by the Judge for basically failing to read Australia's TOS
Aus consumer law doesn't protect your game licenses right? You've always been paying for a license, not ownership of a copy of the software like you would with physical mediums. A non-transferrable license, no less.
@@singithi8556The game files are literally downloaded to your local computer. That is not "licensed" use in my opinion. A license is when the files are on a server and you access the server.
@@singithi8556 Selling a game licence would still fall under "Goods and Services." Steam is treated like any other store here, so most games they offer are still considered goods. Just like they would be if EB Games (Australian GameStop) sold them to you in person. EB Games can't just go to your house and take back the games you bought, so why would Steam be allowed to? All the same rules apply, and it's why Valve have a grudge with Australian law. After all, Australia did force them to create their 2 hour refund policy. Before that, they never offered refunds to anyone.
So in US you still need to sue a company where the company is located? This is extremely disadvantageous for the consumer and extremely advantageous for the company. In the EU, the rule is that legal action is taken where the end consumer lives. If you want to do business with end consumers in , then you have to accept that if these people sue you, it will happen in . If you don't like that, don't do business with people there. If you only want to be sued in your home city, then you can only do business there. It must also be reasonable for a global corporation to be sued anywhere in the world.
That's why this ruling doesn't effect us. You can't do business where we live unless you play by our rules, which protect consumers and are enforceable. Hi 5 from AU
It honestly doesn't matter in the long-run. They can't set terms like that. I mean...they can try...but the instant someone DOES bring a CA suit against Valve...that shit is toast. A judge would take one look at that and toss that particular bit of the agreement right the fuck out. "You're an online digital service provider with clients and customers across the world. You have no legal grounds to force them to come here to sue you."
I think it should match brick and mortar stores. If I leave my house, walk/drive down the street and enter a store, then I am on their turf. Same with online. If my browser sends request packets across the line to a server in the U.S. Then I am on their turf. I think the idea that you should go by where the customer lives comes from a misunderstanding of the technology. Don't like that? You mis-understand how everything online should match a real-world analog. I guess if anyone wanted to sue me based on their local laws, then I simply won't ever do business globally.
Any thoughts on customers not getting recompense for items disappearing from their guild banks, and the topics talking about it on the WoW general forum? (Amazing how little coverage by content creators that story is getting.)
6:45 That's... not true though? For example: Final Fantasy XIV goes on sale on the Square Enix store far more often than it does on steam, so much so that the FFXIV community encourages people to buy the game through the SE store rather than on Steam. And someone in an email just saying that they're not ok with a company selling the game cheaper elsewhere doesn't mean they can stop the developer from doing that unless their contract states that, so the emails should be a non-issue. People are free to say what they want, but it's the contract that matters. Unless the implication is that the email was sent to try and bully a dev into doing what they want. So unless that's the case that doesn't make sense. An email stating a preference is not a legally binding agreement or evidence of wrong doing.
It seems like something that wouldn't hold any water. That's the only trick they have. They think they are gods, but they are more akin to children playing in the schoolyard trying to establish bullshit rules they just make up as they go. The court should make an example out of them and clean up the mess that is corporate EULAs and similar items.
Don't worry. I have a solution. Just send them a contract of your own that says "Unless you mail me a postcard weighing exactly 5 oz in the color of my asshole detailing the exact time in Greenland and staple a baggie of fingernail clippings to it, you have agreed to the above terms and I now exempt myself from your changes to the agreement that I originally made with you at the time of opening my account."
@@IrradiatedOne What? It's perfectly illegal, but it can absolutely be enforced. Much like piracy, Valve has access to all the data. Unlike piracy, Valve has the ability to destroy all of the financial equity from the Steam purchases at any time. There are already laws in the United States that cover this under extortion, fraud, and harassment. And if Valve tries to argue this in court, it'd be perjury, since they know for a fact that they forced contract signatures under duress for an obviously untenable contract. It's a 'scam' in the same way grabbing and holding your $8000 Ming vase over a concrete floor if you don't 'sign' this contract is a scam.
@@notmirelnam248 and dont send it from a P.O. box, and it must be your wet ink, and probably good to send it certified mail to yourself first, then to them. your wording isnt correct but at same time you have the right idea, LMAO
You can’t sneak language into your tos after a suit has began that dismiss the suit. This prevents new folks from joining but it cannot kill any case currently running.
That does depend. Some cases are about the TOS forbidding something that is ridiculous. If they then change TOS to not do that anymore mid-trial, a judge can then decide that since the point is now moot, the court has better things to do.
@@DemonKing19951 the army of lawyers didn't foresee the current mess steam are in. Corporations with armies of lawyers loss all the time in the courts.
@@DemonKing19951 no sir. You and the presenter are assuming motive. Claiming that there are a lot of lawyers doesn’t make the claimed motive more likely. Claim + claim =\= evidence
We really need a lawsuit about when changes of user agreement after the fact are invalid when at a detriment to the consumer. For instance I started on Steam when they were brand new with just Halflife and a few other Valve titles when you actually owned the game. They later changed the user agreement forcing you to agree or else you would lose access to games you already bought. Its no different then buying a car with a 10 year warranty to have the manufacturer change the warranty to cover less and forcibly update your current warranty and if you refuse they take back their car at your loss 100%.
We do in fact have thousands of cases across the world on it and the usual case result is retroactive clauses are never valid, you can't just add things that take away someone's legal rights and options companies still do it because they assume you are too stupid
@@TheRenofox Realistically though, refund what? Say I had a copy of Half Life with 200 hours, what would they refund me? The cost of HL then? With inflation? Today's cost? Would the fact that I got "my moneys worth" come into account? Shouldn't it? I understand the concept of "ownership" "it's my right" etc, but realistically, digital goods might be nnn-perishable, unlike say, a car, but these too have an "expiration date". Especially shit that no one cares about. Like, most people have shit sitting in their library that they have never played (nor presumably will), that Valve could sneakily remove and they wouldn't even notice.
@@sinister3vil MAybe but I've got the Orange Box behind, ive got Half Life Collectors edition behind me, I've got Half Life Platnium with Oppsing Forces and Blueshift behind me all activated on steam and i have the physical copy
@@sinister3vil I mean .. if you have your home foreclosed on it you either have the option of selling it beforehand for the market value of the home ( or whatever offer you can obtain before the deadline ) or it goes into auction. You could also have assets have liens put on them, which results in the property being sold and whatever value minus the liens on it are then given to you. So Steam should absolutely be giving you the market value of your account at time of closure, without trying to pull a Steam Summer Sale on your account during that time. It shouldn't matter what you paid before .. what should matter is what it's worth now, like anything else. Doesn't matter if you put 200,000 miles on an antique roadster if you can still sell it for tens of thousands of dollars.
I KNEW IT!!! It's great to be vindicated after all this time. Every time I claim that Valve won't let developers sell on other platforms, escpecially if it's cheaper, some idiot tells me I don't know what I am on about and that Valve, their preciouc Valve, would never do that. Sorry, but I whole heartedly agree with you on developers being able to sell their game however they want without Valve dictating how the developer is allowed to sell their game. If a developer chooses to create a key, and then sell it somewhere, and then bring the user to the steam platform, then that's on Valve. If they weren't monopolistic bullies that mistreat their customers, then maybe people wouldn't be doing it. I will always opt to buy elsewhere if it's an option as cross platform works on most of them so I don't need to support Steam to play with my friends that have a steam version. I honestly hope steam collapses and gets replaced with something better.
You already don't, and that is not even because of Steam -- since the industry discovered that the big money was in Live Service Games, you'll find that for most games, you giving them money makes you a Subscriber, not an Owner.
It honestly depends on the person. Some people pirate games because they just want it for free, some people pirate games because they dislike the company and don’t want to give them money, some people pirate games because they don’t like it being exclusive to a specific store. Some people pirate games with DRM because they want a DRM free version
@@Necro-the-Pyro I say 2 of the 4 are service problems but I literally wasn’t denying that it can be due to a service problem, I was just adding on that there are other reasons. I have many friends who pirate to get the game free. If getting the game free is a service problem, then everything in the world is a service problem.
@@WhatIsTheHeat Your reasons listed for piracy were "game is too expensive", "company does sh**ty things", "company does sh**ty things", and "company does sh**ty things". Those are all 100% service problems.
"Your failure to cancel your Account prior to the effective date of the amendment will consitute your acceptance of the amended terms." This is more common than uncommon, so not exclusive to Valve, heck Google, Netflix, Amazon, Facebook et.c et.c all use this clause (or VERY similar) and has been, FOR THE LAST 10 YEARS. EDIT: And I can't think of a time since ANY subscribtion EVER hasn't had this clause, so make it atleast 40 years old clause.
it's about time the US and EU start regulating EULA, they KNOW they are making people agree to things without even realizing because no one reads the EULA, and it's designed this way.
Steam is not a subscription service though. You're not paying them a monthly fee to access Steam. You "bought" games and Valve changed the rules of the game after those purchases had occurred. Passive non-acceptace is not acceptance. While I like this channel, the way it sucks up to Valve is sickening. Valve is a company. They are not your friend. They are there to make money from you.
@@MistaCen if you’re referring to just ignoring the the terms of service agreement, using the service in general after they say explicitly say “using the service means you agree” then you agreed. If you disagree then you don’t use the service. This has been the case for every ToS for a long time.
I can’t play hunt showdown anymore because of dx12. I bought the game, played it for years. The new big update like in aug or whatever, made it black screen on startup. (Ive tried everything, my gpu is basically blacklisted by dx12 despite being compatible, don’t troubleshoot for me) It’s just interesting how games as a product are “justifiable” to just stop being what you paid for. Like it’s one thing for the game you love to change some core mechanic and become something you don’t like anymore. But for the developers and publishers to basically just say “you’re not allowed to use the product anymore.” That’s fucked. I mean banning is different. But imagine if Minecraft updated and, because of a glitch, you can’t play it anymore. It’s not simple to fix, and the devs won’t fix it. The troubleshooting fix is, “buy a new gpu.” You just bought a car? We’re gonna change the parts every month to make it better okay? Don’t want that? Uh, that sucks. *changes your tires. They’re now gray instead of black.* *changes your windshield. The sun tint reaches 1 cm lower.* “we became aware of a minor bug regarding your ignition. This tweak should fix it.” *your car no longer starts* “damn sucks to be you. No refunds. Try buying a new engine”
I am also a victim at Crytek's altar. It really sucks to simply be unable to play hunt anymore. It bothered me last year when they announced the big update how they said that they were anticipating 10% of their customers would no longer be able to play the game, but they were willing to make that sacrifice for an improved experience for the remaining 90%. Well, I got sacrificed, and I'm not too happy about it. And I also really wonder if my sacrifice has actually amounted to an improved experience for others. Do they like the game better now that they liked to 2 years ago?
"I've spent 2000 dollars on my steam account, I'm not going to delete it." This line alone shows that they are holding your account for ransom, and thus your 'agreement' of their terms and services related to that are 100% unenforceable as you were, technically speaking, under duress (at least in the U S A). when will these companies learn to not be idiots, and to just be an actual trustworthy group rather than attempting to violate their customers trust every step of the way. Additionally, their updating of the agreements during a court case regarding them, more than likely targeted at their opponents in said case, could be considered in duress*, and undermining of the court case and judges authority. *duress changed from Bmail as I have made the grave sin of accidentally considering similar as same. Though in this case the function would be the same if they both applied, Bmail wouldn't apply here.
Changing terms to protect from extortion should never be illegal. blame the law firms abusing the good will of valve and forcing valve to resort to extreme methods in self defence
I have no clue where to start with your comment. Both sides are getting extorted, but one side isn't able to change the rules without going broke on a lawyer, and possibly not even then. While the other side is threatening every purchase ever made to the accounts, potentially thousands of dollars a person that would have been spent over several years, or to accept their terms. Textbook blackmail. "Do as we say, or you lose everything you've paid for." is absolutely an agreement not legally acceptable because there's no proof you weren't under duress when agreeing unless you say so. They cannot simply steal potentially thousands of dollars for free. Which side are you even rooting for? Additionally, the threat is effective immediately to the people in the active court case against them, which can't be legal since it's blackmail that directly undermines the legal system.
@@niaford690 so valve should just pay for thousands of frivolous lawsuits out of pocket without being able to do anything about it? the sides are lawyers abusing loopholes to rob a company or a company that goes overboard to defend against the unwarranted attack so i am on valves side since they have not done anything to hurt me especially since i live in the eu where the change does not apply
Technically your offline games would probably still work, and if you don't follow steam tos they absolutely have a right to take you off their servers, it's just inevitable when using an online service.
"Failure to cancel.." is what triggers the passive agreement clause. This isn't enforceable because it would apply legal agreements to inactive accounts. Having an account, but not logging in until the current court cases are heard puts those accounts in legal limbo, defaulting back to the last agreement between both parties.
Depends. You can't sue a company and feign ignorance on the case. We are not talking about random jon does that just decided to log in one day. Those people that are activelly suing Valve on Arbitration must know about those changes. The clause is valid. If clausures like that could not be enforced, no company ever could make any change into their ToS after they published the first ToS, because someone could always be away for an extended period of time. This will be a case-by-case basis, but this clausule is valid.
It's funny because everybody agrees you can't consent by not saying anything in any other case. being passed out and people f_cking you isn't consensual because you didn't say no. It's assumed you don't consent unless proven otherwise. But people treat companies like a force of nature, a sacred cow. So we pretend it's okay when they do something analogous to that.
@@joshuahudson2170 nope, i didnt know about the case details, i was in ignorance of valve doing this stuff to the gaming market rigging commissions to publishers, which is anti-competitive, and once learning about the problem, i can still sue, even having agreed, as i originally never agreed and only click agree because of the extorsion over my property and my estate, which means i signed under duress unless i am in error
Better to buy DVD games, so you actually own them and can always play no matter what :). I have big collection of DVD games, started collecting early. Lucky me.
i actually didnt know that we dont own the steam games kinda i did own them even if it was in a form of license and argument against steam on no you dont, they do use BUY and the SHOPPING CART thus they are showing your buying something wich by STANDARD CONTRACT in society we own what we buy as we bought it.
@KimAlmighty1 most games on steam are DRM free. Every DRM Free game I purchase, I install and move to my external storage so I have it forever. (Just In case)
We shouldn't be responsible for what happened in the past. It's equal to worrying about stepping on cracks on the sidewalk because some judge 50 years from now wants to press charges on you for doing it today. NOTHING should ever be retroactive. The laws and agreements of the time should be used to judge the product released at said time.
I love what Valve has done for the linux community. I moved away from windows when XP came out because of the EULA. However, since steam released all those years ago after the half-life mod. I knew we didnt own the games we purchased on the platform. When GOG came around and physical media died out. I could at least own rhe files of the games I bought. I have always bought on GOG first and only on steam if the game was not available on GOG. Lots of excluves on steam. Dark Souls games come to mind. But GOG has the older games i love as well from Dungeons and Dragons series, Stonekeep, etc that steam dies not have. They both have a purpose, and i never use a downloader if at all possible loke epic, ubisoft or ea stores. The only one i use because of linux support is steam. And i only use it when needed if GOG doesnt get the game.
Monopoly by incompetence, Valve truly is suffering from success. But this definitely explains why I saw a bunch of class action lawsuit ads against Valve a while back, I always thought "I don't remember Valve don't anything bad, why would I want to sue them?"
You didn't want to sue them because if you do, the greater evils that are Epic Games, Sony, and Ubisoft would've won, not because Valve does anything different from any other company
@@TheGreenTaco999 for someone who's criticizing, you're pretty illiterate. I never said Valve doesn't do anything different, I said that Valve doing things different isn't the reason why the close majority take Valve's side. It's because the companies that gain from Valve's loss are the greater evils.
@@TheGreenTaco999 Those other companies have shareholders, in the case of Epic, they have Tencent (a chinese public traded company), so yes they are different because they have shareholders to "bring" value to at the cost of the consumer. Valve only answers to their partners and customers.
@@TheGreenTaco999 Valve is the main reason the PC gaming industry still exists. It nurtured the community and kept it alive. And, while it provides few privileges relative to other companies (like free games once every so often on Epic, or some early release games on Sony, etc), it guarantees you will have access to your entire library no matter what (unless its an online game that goes defunct with no offline mode to play, at which point there is little point in having said game.), and that you OWN your games, and aren't leasing them.
Yeah, until the servers shut down, the physical copy can no longer contact them, and then you can't even play your physical game because it's governed by EULA too lmfao
steam is a good platform but it should NEVER get a monopoly, in fact all steam games should be playable via any means one wishes steam account or no steam account
It's about "what" you buy nowadays... you don't buy the physical copy anymore, just the opportunity to play. Thus, is it possible to steal the opportunity to play? I mean, if they're just gonna redefine everything, then that pretty much just means you can interpret it however you want... lol, property/ ownership is thew new genderfluid...
@@flamegrylls8965 If when purchasing something it the purchase can at any time be revoked, stealing that item is not ethically equal to theft. If they were being honest it would not say buy on the button to purchase it.
Oh yeah and we have plain language contracts too. EULAS that only take a minute to read, and make sense. It's a whole new world. We just figured it was communism and the best country in the whole gosh darned world probably wouldn't want no high falutin' consumer rights.
I doubt a retroactive agreement is even legal in most parts of the world, I'm shocked it is in the US. You can't retroactively change the rules for deals you've already done; not without undoing the deals which means customers would have to get full compensation for every single cent they've ever spent under the old rules (plus interests).
The US is a shit hole country when it comes to legal loopholes and abuse. We have major corruption problems in our court system that most people can't afford to take to the supreme Court to actually have them be addressed by someone who can do something about it. Welcome to America, the land where money is the only thing that talks.
I'm not sure It's even legal in the US. I don't think anyone sued any company for it yet. It is illegal for parties to change the terms of contracts retroactively and TOS' are contracts so there's a strong possibility if somebody decides to sue, they might win.
Then Steam needs to refund me every cent of every purchase I made through them if I don't own a protected user license of every game for my lifetime or the lifetime of those I pass it onto. I spent that money, they need to give it all back to me.
you're exchange a financial position with them in the form of services. Look up the definition of what constitutes a digital signature in relation to click wrap agreements...you'd be surprised. It's very vague but I wouldn't be surprised if there's also something beneficial to them in WA state law which governs it that reinforces what they're doing.
@@naejimba ever heard the line "i take your silence as an agreement", that is essentially what they're saying, so yeah, it has been a thing for several decades at this point
You're not taking NO action though, you're continuing to make use of their service. Continuing to do something IS doing something. Stopping using their service is doing nothing. It's your actions in absolute terms that count, not changes relative to your existing behaviour.
Continuing to use a service after the end user agreement has changed even if you avoided accepting the altered agreement manually has pretty much always been a tacit agreement to the amended end user agreement. Your option to decline is to cease using the service.
in europe it does not matter what a contract or a user agreement says, so they can write in it what they want, does not hold any legal ground in EU countries in front of the Law
In that context, nothing in the law matters either. If contracts and agreements between parties can be ripped up at a whim then why should any law set by these governments be respected or enforced?
That's not entirely true, according to the EU's website on contracts with consumers, it's never just thrown out of consideration, it is debated whether: 1. The contract is in good faith to the consumer 2. The contract is transparent 3. Certain parts (not all) of the contract will be thrown out IF it is decided that it is unfair to the consumer If the contract has been decided to meet the requirements of the EU law it is entirely read in.
@@Gearhead2675 Well duh.. If you have a contract with another individual, which says you can murder them, even when signed by both parties, it still is murder. To give an extreme but obvious example. You can't set up a contract which breaks existing law. Not that hard to understand, or is it?
@@Gearhead2675 You're misunderstanding, contracts and agreements between parties can be ripped up ( and should be ) when said contract or agreement goes against the law, which supercedes any other contract or agreement. Why should any law set by these governments be respected or enforced? Because they are in charge. Go on, step out of line, see what happens.
Would you believe me if I said I actually got the infamous pop-up WHILE playing one of my Steam games? I was playing LEGO Star Wars The Complete Saga with my friend via Remote Play Together, and it paused the game and opened the pop-up, which is crazy to me because it’s literally the equivalent of Valve snatching my controller away and forcing me to agree to their terms before I can get back to playing the game I paid for on my valid Steam account with my friend who is connected by his valid Steam account.
but valve are the good guys... Support Nintendo, the last company offering real physical ownership. dont be a fool. 20 years of owning nothing and being happy on PC is long enough to know you fkd up
Yet one more reason I don't use Steam whenever possible. Thankfully, I don't need to have all the latest games, so most of what I need is on GOG. But I do "own" a few newer games on Steam, but I wait and "buy" those games on sale, and consider those games to be rentals with an undetermined end date. I think the last Steam game I "bought" was Sniper Elite 5 because I am sometimes foolish and impatient. 🙂
Well, while Steam has its struggles now, we have to remember that it will be the last advocate of "free market" in the industry. If Steam goes out, an important store for independent to medium-sized companies will leave the market to subscriptions gatekeepers ... the end of video games dev. free market.
I agree! How is it legal when they are trying to extort steam under a clause they made to keep our rights and abuse it while the court deems it fair? This law firm is trying to take away our rights by extorting steam and abusing this system that gave rights to the steam users with no money. The law firm should be defamed for that trashy morality, no I don't think having a small monopoly built on good intentions warrants getting extorted to the ground and ruining the platform. People who think otherwise should not be allowed to use steam. If these people didn't ruin it there would be no new arbitrations so how can they complain to valve about the arbitration which could potentially save our last hope.
I do wonder if smaller indie-focus websites like itch io would get some more traffic... And of course there will definitely be a new gen wave of piracy for AAA if Steam ever goes down. The remaining online stores would either become homogeneous as developers try to spread across more services to guarantee sales, or else they remain on a single platform and cross their fingers that enough people will care to install it in order to buy and play their game. Some companies may even make their own platforms just so you run and buy their games specifically, which we have already seen. I think it's going to be a time of inconvenience and various game companies whining about not making enough money (which they always do anyway).
I would go then to GOG. It is a really small market compared to Steam, but is the one site I still feel like "hmm...this is on sale...I might buy it", so much money spent on Steam through sales...where was I? Right, The other sites didn't lure me much with games I would like to buy. Steam has their sales, a very good and powerful launcher, support for Linux, good review statistics and so on, GOG tries to be DRM-free, you can just download the game without their launcher and also has some pretty good sales. GOG has a marginally small profit, but they go in the right direction, similar to Steam. The competition on the other hand has not really much, especially not much consumer friendly things. You have Epic Games Store with its free games time to time, but they have yet to make profit and the store is still a mess. PSN? Sony has some really controversial decisions made, especially recently including their PSN account requirement. I see myself maybe buy a game from Epic Store when I really want to play it (still won't go in a shopping spree like I would do with Steam or GOG) but I try as much as possible to avoid Sony, I really don't have any trust in them.
I just want to see all these little developers nipping at Gabe's heels try to deal with shareholder-appointed CEOs and legal teams who legit don't give a single shit about video games beyond making more money every quarter at any and all cost.
I'm glad I'm not the only one who noticed this. I was typing a comment out about it but figured I'd double check to make sure I wasn't the only one paying attention.
They should go after Nintendo because there prices for digital games is ridiculously high and it makes 2nd hand games literally a few pounds lower than that game new
They can't. Nintendo is completely within their legal right to do so with their first party exclusive games. Valve doesn't have first party exclusive titles.
Given the cost of producing new games today their prices aren't high at all. The prices of video games just haven't risen that much at all in the last 15 years.
Remember when you'd buy a disc set put it in the pc and just play it. Digital content was dlc and update fixes. Online cloud and digital game releases have a lot to answer for.
That never happened. You bought a license to use the software, which came with the disc set as part of the package deal. The disc was never the main thing you were purchasing. That’s the way it’s always been, at the very least back to the 80’s. Just most people never understood how it actually worked.
@@shivorath not my point but hey ho as a gamer since the 80s with the BBC and Spectrum I know what EULA is but I also knew that my copy of Elite and Dungeon Master etc were on the disc not subject to the shenanigans of online EULA and subscription agreements.
@@shivorath Buddy man he's saying that they used to be a tangible object which once in your hands was fully out of the influence of anybody else. They can revoke that license at any time, but unless they care enough to come get the disc it's still getting used.
@@shivorath NO, you actually bought that copy of the software that item it was yours and no amount of legal actions from the publisher could negate the access to your copy, you had a cdkey to prove that one copy was yours and you couldnt´abuse it that was the difference.
"Not what the subscriber agreement had in mind" Yeah well i didn't fucking want to have to spend a year in law school to understand a EULA to play a video game either.
@@MunchieLuknight Protest abusive legal agreements by jumping to a company well-known for being ravenously litigational over its properties and gameplay patents. Sounds rational.
@@Eidako the only company protecting physical ownership. the only company that didnt hire sweet baby. the only company that blocked blackrock buying its stock. i personally dont care about how Nintendo fights piracy, and theft. only thieves do
@@MunchieLuknight LOL. "Nintendo Agrees to Settle FTC Charges" (Los Angeles Times. Apr 11, 1991) "The Pursuit of Cheap Video Games Has Been Getting Switch Owners Banned" (Vice. Feb 5, 2020) "Nintendo Conducted Invasive Surveillance Operation Against Homebrew Hacker" (Torrent Freak. Dec 23, 2020) "Nintendo's Recent Reign of Terror On TH-cam Is Just The Beginning" (CBR. Oct 2, 2024)
At the end of the day, Steam is one of the last gaming companies that actually answers my support tickets with a human response in a timely manner with a resolution. Try to open a ticket with Blizzard/Activision see if you can say the same. They also treat developers extremely well. This seems like a huge case of "this is why we can't have nice things". Honestly I hope this fucks over the law firms.
10:40 "Your failure to cancel your Account prior to the effective date of the amendment will constitute your acceptance of the amended terms" is a mandate which exceeds the authority of a contract because the determination of whether or not you have accepted the amended terms is for the judge to decide, not Steam. So, run this past a solicitor BEFORE taking it at face value because, as a customer, there is also nothing preventing you from posting your own amendment to Steam's terms in the classifieds section of the local newspaper and, as part of those amended terms, dictating Steam's acceptance of your amendment in the event they fail to respond by the effective date of those terms. How long do you think that would hold up?
@@Mercurio-Morat-Goes-Bughunting The "if you keep doing x then you are therefore agreeing by this new contract" has been shot down by many judges in court cases before as not a proper legal statue to hold a party accountable to. Id drop the court cases numbers but it's been like 5 years since I looked at the cases with this. So yeah, it's up to a judge.
All of the content sites are just selling you a license to use the product. From Amazon onward. We need to fight against that. In the past, you bought a physical copy that is yours forever. I've got games that go back decades and I never have to worry that some corporation is going to take that away.
the thing is most games have changed. you have perpetual online registration and other stuff that even if you own a physical copy once the servers are shut down you cant make use of them anyways. congrats you now own a copy of a game you cant play.
If drug through a proper court it likely wouldn't be, the same way most EULA magic isn't. But if I were to guess the why they threw that in there would be to convert all the inactive accounts rather than delete them and face that ugly backlash.
Steam is the cheapest site to buy games legally, even at normal price. As a Steam, PlayStation and Nintendo user I dare anyone to find a legal and not shady cheaper price. This cases are nothing more than attacks to the consumer friendly platform. The industry big names have tried to fix pricing, eliminate the second hand market and make game prices higher and keep them even if game is 10 years old. Steam is the only front against that. PS4 digital store was forced to adopt the "sales" model when PS4 was losing terrain against PC during 2015 and 2016. Nintendo has resisted and has managed to train its users to pay full price and even sell at high prices, kind of like a cult, but even them have some sales now and that's thanks to Steam's consumer friendly politics. Steam offers good prices, sales, free online, robust downloading platform, a good launcher and unencrypted file system. All of that is a nightmare for money milking companies that's why Denuvo exists to start to take away the control from the user. Steam is under attack because it's good to us the players
It's absolutely ridiculous how in the US a company can basically put in a contract - that you have no saying on - that you're waving your rights. A clause like that is laughable any where else in the world.
It's laughable here in the US, too, which is why Valve looks draconian and terrible in doing just this. It is also why the cases Valve tried to get dismissed weren't dismissed.
I knew something was up when a company said “ you can take us to court” and dropped the bullshit arbitration clauses. The ability to do that is total BS.
@@NeonLuminous I mean, serious, delete your steam account, stop giving steam money. Use GOG. Over here calling me a company simp for telling you to stop giving a company your money. Zero self awareness.
10:09 The thing about retroactive clauses for ongoing cases... They aren't enforceable. WotC tried this and they backed down, not because of the consumer backlash, but because they had no legal standing to retroactively change the rules of an ongoing legal disagreement. There's lots of precedent in courts that changing the terms for a violation of prior terms in an ongoing case don't fly.
Yeah, wasn't it for jurisdiction reasons? Like that court said they legally didn't have the proper jurisdiction over the law firm? Valve will just refile under a court that does have jurisdiction.
I'm more than anything amazed that a US citizen can sort of just sign their rights away by way of a 'legal agreement' that says they 'promise to do things in Kings County.' Even signing away something retroactively sounds dubious as hell and should not be legally enforceable (not a lawyer though, certainly not a US lawyer). It sounds so bogus.
You can only sign your rights away when you sign them away and then never take action challanging them in court. Basically they cant sign away your rights, but your rights being respected isnt always an automation, sometimes you need to take legal Action. Which in this case I cant see you loose
That line about failure to cancel your account, that won't hold up in court either. Continued Use of an account, that would (generally) hold up in court, but "If you happen to have an account and do not go out of your way to cease having one, you agree to this new contract you may not have even seen" is Never Legal. Lets use something non-contractual that will make the absurdity of that position obvious. "If you have ever visited my house before, you must come here and tell me you are not going to visit again, or else I have the right to your bank account, retroactively forever" posted Almost solely, inside your own house, so those who have been there before, but have no intention of visiting in the next 2 years, will have no way to know, that their bank account has been declared your property due to their prior visit.
These are common terms for most online services. You generally agree in the TOS that they can update the TOS at any time by notifying you of the change and giving you time to opt-out. Your explicit "opt-in" action was your agreement to the original TOS that included the ability for them to update the TOS without any further explicit assent on your part. The notification requirement is satisfied by just posting the new TOS publicly on their website somewhere...they don't have to prompt you when you log in. Google/TH-cam has functionally identical clauses in their TOS.
@@jdlightsey Doesn't matter how common; it's not legal but rarely tested. Google's getting away with it because the expected damages for a free service are $0.
I can't see how it'd be legal for a company to hold an already established business deal hostage to force you to drop your charges, after you've filed those charges. Isn't that intimidation?
In most places as far as I'm aware arbitration is by agreement. I believe you would have to take them to court and sue to get your case arbitrated. Kind of moot at that point I would think.
From what I can see, it seems more like a way to avoid getting flooded by BS arbitration by money-hungry goblins. Basically, the previous agreement allowed you to force Valve to arbitrate and they would pay the legal cost whether they win or not. With the new lawsuit's results, it means there is a chance they may win the arbitration, so they make millions of cases knowing that Valve will be forced to stand for all the costs, in other words, there's no risk to them with a possibility of a big payout. But for Valve, the legal fees would go through the roof. So by trying to be ¨kind¨ with the previous agreement they shot themselves in the foot and are now pressing the emergency stop button.
I thought Steam's market dominance was a sign that most gamers understood what "this software is not sold, it is licensed" meant. If you owned your games, you could sell them, and Steam provides no mechanism to do so, not that it would make any sense.
@@MunchieLuknight Nintendo? The company that inhibits any ability to play their games on a product not provided by them? They also primarily sell things digitally now anyway.
While this case does revolve around jurisdiction, this isn't simply a dismissal on jurisdiction. Valve tried to sue Zaiger to prevent them from going forward with the SSA mandated individualized arbitration and the Court agreed it did not have jurisdiction to hear that suit. However, the case lays out what case law would require to be able to bring this type of suit. While valve could technically bring the same suit in a different jurisdiction, there is likely a reason they filed it in WDWA and another jurisdiction might find it has jurisdiction but would ultimately rule against valve, but the reasoning of the Court in this case will hold for many jurisdictions (even though it is not binding in anyway) save for the five in which the arbitration has begun... this is why Valve inserted a choice of laws provision/// to try and create the jurisdiction in WD Washington.
I like GOG fine, but to be realistic they will never have the library available on Steam. Too many companies wet themselves at the thought of not having DRM. I own a few on GOG, but the bulk of my library is on Steam. The only time I'm upset at Steam is because they force updates and all these companies that like to go in and force their launcher on old games they don't even support any more just to try to force you into their ecosystem.
@@TrackMediaOnly "I like GOG fine, but to be realistic they will never have the library available on Steam." Which is why the statement that "gaming is dead" is true, at least for now.
GOG is exactly the same thing, the difference is that because of the lack of DRM they can't enforce taking away your license to play the game, so it's kinda of a loophole.
Until a judge says the use of the agreement to hold potentially thousands of dollars of purchases hostage against lawful legal proceedings is in fact unlawful.
@@raze2012_ so what should Valve do since their competition is just X.X ? Refuse to take on games to sale? Close shop? What should companies do when they suffer from succes in your opinion? Lay down and die? "totally not a monopoly" brain dead take
@@raze2012_ Just because valve don't treat its users like slaves, it does not make them a monopoly. You tell me, would you pick a country where you're free or a country where you're treated like a slave?
Unfortunately, ProCD v Zeidenberg (1996) establishes precedent that the EULA can in fact hold potentially thousands of dollars of purchases hostage against basically anything. The United States legal system is cooked.
TLDR is Valve nearly got buried alive in legal fees due to a couple law firms taking advantage of its old subscriber agreement by organizing 10s of thousands of individual arbitrations against Valve due to monopolistic practices, and a judge refused to dismiss those cases so they were all about to go forward. The new subscriber agreement does sound better because it removes the forced arbitration, but there's a couple weaselly things that were inserted to basically make the 10s of thousands of legal cases go away, you either delete your account to continue your case or drop it, and you're not given any other choices.
Tldr, valve goodwill is taken advantage by some people. Arbitration in simple terms is a way to solve an agreement problem between two parties outside the open court or tldr solving them privately behind the desk. Unlike most companies who would force customers to use arbitration, Valve is willing compensate the lawsuits as long as it is under $10k even if they lose. This good will however, is biting them in the ass. Some bastards use 75k individual users to charge 'arbitration' with valve as ask for that 10k compensation money. As a result, Valve has been forced to stop the arbitration option and opted for open court. Consumers won't be able to solve any agreement problems with valve privately.
steam doesnt have a monopoly its literally just better that everything else, it just sounds like all these other companies are whining because the popular kid keeps getting trophies and certificates when hes a A+ student with extracurriculars in sports while theyre glue sniffers
Retroactive clauses are simply not enforceable so it will be fun to see Valve try to argue that with the other pending cases. Forcing also the location where the suit can be filed is also of questionable enforcement since subject matter jurisdiction means a few things could affect where the suits are placed
@@Sepiriel it’s important for Valve to force legal actions to take place where they are incorporated or else foreign law firms will attempt and are attempting to drag Valve into parts of the world that could be easily skewed against them. This is in reaction to the lawsuit just filed against Valve in Great Britain. They need the case to be tried in American courts according to the rights pertaining to American citizens and businesses.
@@bruxinth4660 I'm very interested to see how the UK or EU legislators react to this, since they don't give a rip about the State of Washington or any of the other 49 if someone breaks one of their laws-worst-case scenario, Valve could be forced to stop doing business in those places or have to set up a subsidiary entirely subject to UK or EU (or anywhere else) law. And that's to say nothing of current Steam gamers in places like Russia or China or India or any other place that REALLY doesn't give a rip what a bunch of corporate suits in Bellevue think.
"Tens of thousands are suing you for going 'nuh uh' to everyone to create a monopoly. What do you have to say for yourself?" "Nuh uh" "Damn I guess everyone loses the case."
Tens of thousands are suing them to exploit a loophole in the steam tos to get money even while losing the cases, it's not the same thing, Valve just changed that bit to remove the loophole, if anything now everyone can actually sue them without arbitration
This was a case of 75000 people individually suing steam all under a single lawfirm. A lawfirm that noticed a loophole that even if they lost every single case they would still make $10,000 per case they lost. And if they win they make even more. They were literally putting out ads to get people to sue steam for free money and no risk. It is literally a case of legal extortion. All because valve had in the agreement that even if end users lose a case against them valve will pay the end users legal fees. Do you understand. This is a case of a lawfirm abusing a loophole in a agreement to basically print free money from valve using end users as the method to do that not caring if the end users even get anything out of it. Even if they lost all 75000 cases, that would mean that lawfirm still makes $750,000,000. The fact people thinks this is just valve against end users is insane. It's a lawfirm using end users and money printers issue
You don't ACTUALLY own your favorite video games, especially if you get them in discs from GameStop. I say this because these games are software, which software CANNOT be bought physically, and can ONLY be bought digitally. Physical copies of games on discs or cartridges don't help because those things are still software. So therefore, the "You'll own nothing and be happy" myth is actually true. Nobody owns games AT ALL. And don't any of you console-only players dare say "oH bUt PhYsIcAl MeDiA iS bEtTeR tHaN dIgItAl MeDiA!!!!!1111!!!11!!" because you will NEVER own a single video game you pay for. You will ALWAYS only own the license to play them. You can't just own the software of the game. You own a copy of the disc, but you DON'T own the software of the game. This will NOT change. I bet you're saying that we shouldn't be okay with NOT owning software, which CANNOT be sold in GameStop, or even a grocery store. >:(
It isn't, valve is like the last company that should be toppled and all this is gonna do is pave the way for fucking streaming service practices for games and worse services, also this all started cause valve didn't want you to under cut them, which seems reasonable. Also with the forced arbitration case valve would've covered the fees for the normal individual, no other company does that.
Forced arbitration is most certainly a bad thing, and this is good. But arbitration itself isn't necessarily bad, and can be preferable in some cases to the cost & time involved in a court case.
Another important part is being able to say, jointly decide on who will arbitrate it. Letting one side pick the arbitrator and the rules (like forced arbitration does) is a very bad idea. But yes, being allowed to arbitrate as an option is good, when done right.
@@Uniformtree000Yes, it is still a bad thing. Forcing people into arbitration without recourse is always a bad thing, even if they dress it up with a "good" aspect.
Wild how this nonsense is even possible. I'm definitely glad that i live in the EU, where it's more about common sense and fairness rather than who's more clever in how to write their ToS as one sided as possible.
@@Chareidos Sure, but don't paint Valve as angels, when clearly forced arbitration or the retroactive clause in SSA is anti-consumer and would be illegal in the EU.
I think that their TOS in Europe are different. If I remember right, they cannot force european citizens to go to court or arbitration outside of the country they provide the service in - so the whole case has another dimension here with Valve operating world-wide.
I'm sure I could have purchased a brand new car with what I've spent on Steam. Of course that have been over the course of 20 years. Absolutely no regrets. Very happy with my 2000+ Steam library.
@@darkarma9368 why is it so common to throw money at companies without even getting anything in return? I hear so many people saying they own tons of games they don’t play and it just confuses me. If you don’t like a game then refund it, stop throwing money at companies for no reason
I like having a beefy Steam library, but I try to hold myself to a strict regimen of buying games, downloading those games, playing those games, uninstalling those games, and then repeating the cycle. The only exceptions are games that I replay constantly like the Batman Arkham series and Skyrim, and also games that I PLAY constantly because they are session based instead of campaigns, such as Monopoly and Civilization.
i wonder if the new agreement is even valid for the ones that are already in the Arbitration cases because it shouldn't be possible to force the other party into a different agreement mid case.
Almost certainly not, for this whatever contract terms that were agreed to will prevail at the time the claim was submitted to the courts. The retroactive nature is likely just in relation to people who haven't filed lawsuits/arbitration claims for something steam did during the old contract terms and the customer might file in the future.
@@dovos8572 Yeah, like he said, not a lawyer so I would view his take with a grain of salt. I'm not a lawyer either, but courts generally frown upon people trying to play games and pass one over on a court ruling.
According to the lawyers in said cases no it's not valid due to reasons involving things like forced consent etc. "You can't unilaterally change a contract" and other such rules.
um, isn't that just going to make steam just improve the platform more? making it so they cannot use price variations to dictate what they will/wont sell on the platform? Like it's just an incentive for steam to add more improvements like better FamilyShare, Market UI, Social Features, etc.
@@binary3111The Epic Games store kind of made an example of that. The “benefits” that they showcased before it’s launch were more beneficial to game developers/publishers, since it was really them taking less of a cut on each store purchase. It’s one of those things where it takes a substantial effort of matching the leading competitors quality, and enough funds to advertise and get some publicity. Nowadays, a lot of companies are making launchers for their games, and people have gotten sick of having to use (or be forced to install) so many different launchers when they just want one that fulfills their needs. That’s typically why people stick to brands (or in this case, launchers) they recognize or are more familiar with, since the competition doesn’t match the leader(s).
@@Dr.Oofers bs The insentive for devs to be in EPIC are not worth it, nobody wants a store 51% owned by Tencent, keep information leaking, once worked as a spyware in transparent mode in your system, and that actually participates in monopoly practices like locking games behind their shop as "exclusive" f Epic. With all that mentioned ppl with half of a brain would just wait until any game Epic releases to lock to be released later in the other shops, which means it won't help devs sale numbers until is out of that jail
@@Mr2ops I'm not saying I'm against it. I'm more looking at it. If Steam improves their platform more. It would just make it more of an incentive to use Steam.
Shorting a market intentionally is wrong - it's not antitrust at all - it's a reasonable business position. If I have a product and want to sell it on epic games, steam, and gog - the price should be the same in all three places to avoid any antitrust by pushing consumers to a specific market. This doesn't make sense 🙃
See my thing is, If this were true they would need evidence that Valve had been de-listing games on steam for selling cheaper elsewhere regardless of Steam Keys. One employee said something in an email, but does that make it true? "We wouldn't be okay with selling games on Steam if they are available at better prices on other stores, even if they don't use Steam Keys." Is out of context, we don't have the email or the email chain, I would love to read the entirety of where this quote is taken from. I'm not trying to come off as if I'm defending Valve as if they have never tried to do some really dog shit things, but in this case, without evidence of such actions I don't know how there could be any case at all. The quote seems to be addressing Valve's policy on pricing parity for games sold on Steam compared to other platforms or stores. Valve has been known to expect that games sold on Steam should not be offered at significantly lower prices on other stores, even if they don’t use Steam keys ( ̶w̶h̶i̶c̶h̶ ̶w̶o̶u̶l̶d̶ ̶s̶t̶i̶l̶l̶ ̶g̶i̶v̶e̶ ̶V̶a̶l̶v̶e̶ ̶a̶ ̶c̶u̶t̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶s̶a̶l̶e̶s̶). It could also relate to Valve's broader business strategy of protecting their revenue, considering that if other platforms can offer lower prices, customers might shift away from Steam for purchases. With this quote taken out of context, We don't know what this employee could be referring to, but we can inference, one of the two above conclusions, or both.
There is more than just that, it just will take time for the process to go before we really see the full effect. Because if it was just that than they wouldn't have a strong case, but when included with everything included in all the arbitration than it makes for a very strong case against steam. It just will take time.
Valve does not get a cut of profit off of the sale of steam keys off platform. The developer/publisher can request the creation of keys at no cost to them and valve will only step in if an unusual amount of keys are being generated or being sold at under market price.
All these years I only bought games during those crazy sales and thought I was getting away with murder at those prices. I knew this day would come eventually.
@@loganmedia4401 Well I'd guess that depending on how the agreement shakes out after these changes, there's a chance that the delisted games you bought that you still have access to now could get scrubbed off since they would have no obligation to provide them to you any longer. It doesn't seem like something Valve would do, but that would be on the table if it becomes a legal burden.
@@fs127? it's that way right now and you don't see this happening except when the developers themselves remove the game. Also, no actual steam user is making money off this lawsuit; it's 1 company with 10 employees making all the money from valve, which inevitably is going to cost me and you because some loser decided to screw everyone over for a claim they know will lose in court Like they quite literally know they lose every case but don't care because valve still pays them. If anything we should be starting a class action against the law firm for abusing valves system and extorting steam users out of legal rights in exchange for 5 dollars (TH-cam ads to get you to sign over rights for 5$....)
@@fs127 It's not something Valve would do but it's something the shareholders will force them to do when Gabe is driven to go public by this extortion.
The thing is, once this all passes, Valve could easily re-institute the old arbitration clause with modifications to prevent mass-arbitration cases, which would then re-protect themselves from open court cases. Genius!
On thing that has pisses me off about steam is the back and forth no accountability thing they have with developers. If you have a problem that ruins your game entirely then the developers say you need to go tk steam and steam says you need to go to the developers to resolve the issue. My friend got banned off rust after his account got hacked and the hacker sabotaged his account. They recognized the issue even seeing the paper trail of the stolen account report but still nothing was done. They eventually went to the back and forth of ask steam followed by ask face punch studios. Steam is a great platform and definitely the best at what it does but it's only friendly towards buying games and does nothing for you if you have an issue with the game.
► Enjoy games, without the bs: bellular.games
► Read the latest Loading Screen: bellular.games/valve-retroactively-protect-themselves-from-lawsuits/
Yeah not legally enforceable, you can't make people agree under a threat that has being a law for age's, if companies think if they put out a TOS and give you no option to decline that means they can enforce it not a chance moment it goes in front of a judge "Oh they had to agree to your TOS or lose thousands of dollars worth of property, yeah not a chance that is agreement under duress."
Valve is the one company holding back the investor parasites from completely destroying the industry. They're effectively providing the government regulation of the industry that governments themselves wont do. Valve is a rare example of a monopoly that does more good than bad. If the alternative is to let "competition" like Epic become more powerful, I choose less competition.
Valve is the one company holding back the investor parasites from completely destroying the industry.
Valve is the one company holding back the investor para sights from completely destroying the industry.
They're effectively providing the government regulation of the industry that governments themselves wont do.
If games are not property, piracy is not theft.
If you steal cable tv channels, you go to jail for theft (or pay a huge fine) It's the same concept. If you want to argue that piracy has cases where it could be morally acceptable, do that. But it is and always will be, theft. You didn't way for the game, you didn't pay for access to use the game.
The only time it isn't theft is if the game is abandonware, because then there would be no way to pay for the game, as it's no longer being sold.
@@LabelsAreMeaningless I dont think you got to jail for stealing if you access cable TV without a valid contract. The lawsuit will use a different term than stealing.
@@LabelsAreMeaningless
You seems not understand
what's the differences of the acts
come with "go to jail" or " pay the fine"
@@CanaldoVoid The stupidest point that someone always brings up in these discussions.
Stop buying digital licenses then.
I don't think "agree to these new terms, or you'll lose everything you have purchased in the past" is legal in many countries.
"You think". Buy a "smart" TV or even a John deer tractor, update it and decline the terms. See what happens.
Edit: People trying to explain laws to me, this was not my opinion, i stated a fact. You likely just agree like everyone else because you want it to keep working. Please control your emotions when you are hit with facts that you don't like. If you want to complain about it, then please do complain to the companies and law enforcement instead of just agreeing every time and then getting mad when someone points it out.
@@ricky_pigeon What the TOS say and what is legally enforceable are two different things.
@@Xamp1256 Yes i know. i'm not here to argue about opinions, i'm just pointing it out. We like to think we live in an ideal world but i gave an example that is real where you can end up with a non functioning TV, that's all, i don't need it explaining.. because if we live by your logic then why is nobody suing TV manufacturers.
@@Xamp1256 you gave an example over how you feel the law should be verses reality. if that's the case then why is it a reality. think about it for 2 seconds. i didn't make just make it up and it isnt my opinion. i don't need the law explaining to me because i'd like to think it works like that but if did then whys this happening.. hm?
@@ricky_pigeon People don't sue because they don't know their rights. Simple as.
The fact that they can take away access to previously purchased items bought under a different agreement unless you sign on to a new agreement that applies retroactively is really sketchy (edit: I more meant scummy). We got to get on the same page as the EU and declare that digital goods are still things you actually own and that you have at least some overarching protections over them.
@@porgy29 but hey, if you can't own them, you can't steal them, so yohoho and away we go
It's not sketchy. Every American voting Red or Blue has been "asking" for this. Seriously... do folks never actually listen to the candidates they vote for? They tell voters every single election what they are going to do. They don't even make it a secret. They just keep voters distracted with party politics to notice that when it comes to fleecing Americans they quickly agree to act fast but blame each other for any problems while they laugh inside at voters and make a show of holding their noses when they vote on legislation.
The sad thing is even if they made the decision that those digital products are still yours, then steam would still be a service. They would probably invent some backassward way of being able to send you copies of the games you own per your request and primarily just remove the restriction that steam be active for you to play the game. There is a good chance they might open a second store to cater to customers that don't want to open a steam account that exclusively sells hard copy games, but it would still end up being more expensive between shipping and handling.
Overall, this really wouldn't save a steam account from things like this. They might adjust their policies, maybe change a ban so that you can't access steam servers or what not, but steam a service includes so many elements you just can't separate from the games you buy.
Yeah...but I have control over my saves...which I would rather over owning the game. It's a fair trade in my book.
@@DemonKing19951 They already kind of have that mechanism... the offline mode. You could theoretically download all your games before cancelling and somehow keep playing it (although the DRM will eventually expire and make the game unplayable, so that's still a service they need to provide). The next best thing is to provide an easy way to download the keys for the games you own that support it, but likely that's about it.
They definitively won't let you download games after you dropped the service, at least not for free. That hypothetical second portal will likely charge a fee per download.. and not necessarily a trivial one, since you would be using their service as a cloud backup for the games.
I'm a big Steam fan, but we need to start pushing for actually owning our games as digital property. Because as it stands right now, it's not good.
@@ChromaSoul agreed!
"big steam fan" just shows how brainless you are
@@foxskyful probs Just meant he doesnt like EA Desktop, Ubisoft Connect and Epic Games Launcher since these are the major ones (gog Galaxy ist a good one tho unifies them all and hast it's own shop without drm)
bro it's digital. How can you ever truly own something you have to re-download from a 3rd party in the future if it gets deleted on your end? That's why you have to agree to the terms. Banned steam accounts still get access to previous purchases, but you're just out of luck with buying in the future. Know how the game is played.
That's how gog was born. Being able to own your games without drm. That's why it's getting very popular. @@Gamefreak924
The problem is that you always have to agree to the terms under duress. It basically says "Sign this, or lose everything you've previously purchased".. Which is, of course, legalized theft and blackmail (extortion) in every sense, and would probably nullify the agreement in any sane court.
Exactly. It should be: 'Sign this and keep everything you legally own.'
But they won't do that. Because games as a service companies are scumbags.
Steam has been prompting me with an agreement window for years. I just x out and game.
@@oldmanoob9987 too many games fail to load if you don't agree, so how you getting around it?
@@umokwhy2830 never encountered that issue(probably mostly because I haven't played much in a long while), but back in the day I would simply turn off the wi-fi, launch steam in autonomous mode, open the game and then, if I wanted to play multiplayer, turn the wi-fi back on
@@Ixarus6713 you are not even legally owning games on steam at the first place, it never was the case, by buying games you are buying a license to play which can be revoked. Sounds absurd because it is, but it's true.
Valve sure makes a lot of money, but that's because every other launcher/shop (except GOG) sucks.
and gog is borderline profitable. 1 millions profit last year. sounds like a lot until you remember that having a world wide store with people downloading stuff all over the world cost billions...
Hard Agree, everyone wants the money Valve makes, but does not want to put in the 10+ years of work Valve spent on making Steam not suck.
Steam sucked too, but it takes time to make a platform like this successful.
Steam is not a "Get rich quick" scheme. it's changed the wya we play games. everyone under estimates it's.... Impact.
Not really, people are just die-hard loyal to valve for inexplicable reasons. Don't get me wrong, I use steam almost exclusively, but 90% of the reasons not to use Epic or GOG are nebulous at best. There isn't really anything aside from these three, unless you count these single publisher launchers.
Yeah. I always buy games from GOG when I can at all do so. Worse comes to worse I can at least store my games off line and never had to be connected to a service if I don't want to.
Gog is nearly as good as steam in every way, and they're infinitely better in many ways. If they could tripple or quadruple their library without adding more trash, they'll be bajillionaires and the entire industry will have to stop scamming purchasers.
especially after the disney debacle of "We can kill you with food allergies becuase you signed up for streaming" I absolutely hate forced arbitration.
When was this? I'm genuinely curious about how this happened
@@kphuts815 mid-August, just google it, it is truly crazy
@@kphuts815 Within the last year or two, a man died during a family visit to a Disney theme park, and the company tried to avoid wrongful death litigation because they had agreed to a Disney+ Subscriber streaming contract that included an arbitration clause - something obviously totally unrelated. They dropped that attempt after some bad publicity, but the fact they even tried that BS is pretty concerning.
@@kphuts815 Someone was visiting Disney World or Disney Land IRL, and had a food allergy that they told the restaurant at the theme park about. The restaurant said the customer would be safe because it would not be in contact or did not contain the ingredients they were allergic to. The customer ate the food, and later died due to the food containing ingredients they were allergic to, even though the customer received reassurance they would not be exposed to the ingredients they were allergic to. The now-widow of the deceased customer attempted to sue Disney for wrongful death IN COURT, and Disney said they waived their right to sue IN COURT due to the customer and now-widow having signed up for a free 10-day trial of Disney+, because in the ToS of Disney+ it says you must go through arbitration for any legal disputes, NOT court. I believe Disney ended getting slapped by the courts for that flimsy defense, but I do not know for certain because I didn't follow the story because I was so disgusted by Disney's actions. Remember Disney is a multi-billion dollar company ($88.9 Billion in 2023 alone, in revenue).
Disney is an evil company for more reasons than can be listed on TH-cam.
thats the first google search i came up with
Gigantic user agreements, signed electronically, are a corrupt scam.
It is not actually valid consent, when it is absolutely certain that 99% of people will not, and in fact in a practical sense cannot, read and understand the deceptive material contained therein. In fact that is the intent.
So-called consent is never actually consent, unless it is informed.
no real signature you didn''t actually sign it.
@@JarrenOmgWhatIsEvenHappening incorrect, but thank you for the effort you put in to demoralization and discouragement in order to foster change 🤣
@JarrenOmgWhatIsEvenHappening
No personal info is linked to steam so it don't count. No ssn# means it's void.
@@SuperDeluxe80 NO online user agreement (of the kind we're discussing) involves legitimate consent, NONE of them are a valid contract. Not even if one includes personal info.
@@JarrenOmgWhatIsEvenHappening No, the kind of electronic signature we're talking about is not legitimate.
Yes, illegitimate rules pretend otherwise, but an unjust law is no law at all.
It can be argued that agreeing to retroactive waiving is under duress and therefore non enforceable.
Cough cough I forgot to take my antipsychotics when agreeing the new agreement /s
That was exactly my thinking. Valve obviously broke some laws. Law firms saw the opporunity to do some good for clients and as well make shitload of money - win-win. Valve does not like it (for obvious reasons). You cant threaten client with losing their accounts/products/services already paid for just because you file a lawsuit against them for breaking anittrust laws. It is like hey airbag in our car was faulty, but if you file a lawsuit against us you are going to lose all the cars you bought from us, even cars before this incident.
@@Izmael1310lawfirms never seen the opportunity to do good for end users.
They seem an opportunity to make bank off a user agreement that states it would pay all legal fees of the end user even if valve wins the case.
This ain't a case of steam Vs the end user.
It's a case of legal extortion of valve by a lawfirm using end users as a way to make free money because valve had an agreement that favoured the end user.
@@TheWeeJet
1. Pretty sure multiple states including California require that if you force arbitration you pay the fees. So they didn't mess the agreement it's just not enforceable if they don't do that. Courts generally take a dim view of mandatory, unavoidable costs to access justice.
2. While it's true they make bank either way. It's also true that Valve did this to themselves. The entire point of class action was to make it so you didn't have 1,000 individual suits. If you force people to pay for the cost of arbitration and only allow individual suits you make it so any behavior below a certain dollar value is ultimately not punishable.
Set arbitration cost at even 100 dollars which really isn't much to get a retired judge to listen to a case and deal with paperwork and suddenly any case less than a couple hundred dollars in value isn't worth fighting.
That's the worse evil.
They have 1500 dollar an hour attorneys. They by default have access to a Justice system which does allow them to avoid automatic fee shifting and which consolidates mass cases into one.
And they actively decided to forgo that.
Arbitration isn't meant to be a cure all. They could just force arbitration OR class action for example
@@TheWeeJet I don't know about you. But I for one find the idea that "my games are not mine" thoroughly offensive and extortionist.
Forced arbitration is BS. It won't be long until every business requires you to agree to forced arbitration upon entering their doors, unless people collectively take a stand and STOP GIVING THEM MONEY.
And they'll murder you without any repercussion because you blinked in their direction once, kind of like that woman at disneyland not that long ago.
You watch Louis Rossmann? It's pretty much already here.
Companies already all do that if you don’t want to engage with said companies you won’t be able to use any service the real solution is to get the federal government to ban forced arbitration.
It is but legal DDOSing is very much in vogue now. Far more people like money than there are people that can arbitrate. If a legal attack avenue goes viral arbitration can create a tidal wave of bs. I remember getting ads for the Valve litigation that lead up to this change.
They already do. Well all the big ones like Disney.
Tho steam was different for saying we'll pay fees, which they got taken advantage of for.
Good riddance that it's gone. The world is healing.
Tho I wonder if steam will be destroyed.
The beauty of PC gaming is that any toxic policies provided by publishers can easily be checked by piracy.
I'd hardly call it easy. You need a competent programmer to pirate in the first place, then rely on them after that.
@@commode7x You missed the point.
@@commode7x most of the time you don’t need a programmer or pirate a game. Lots of games cna be easily pirated by just copying the files adding them online. Most steam games are similar, except you just remove the steamapi that prevents steam from opening and telling you that you don’t own the game. Sure, some games like ones packed in launchers are more difficult, but piracy is not as hard as you’re making it sound.
And guess who uses PCs more then any console? Competent programmers, hackers and cyber security enthusiasts.
@ipodtouchiscoollol He didn't get the point, it went completely over his head.
So, TL;DR:
- Steam generously offers to pay low court fees for its users.
- Somebody tries to exploit this for millions.
- Steam claps back in a way that's pretty heavy-handed, but which actually benefits users in the long run by allowing class-action suits and removing the arbitration waiver.
Yeah, Imma side with Steam on this one. One of the few genuinely good companies in the gaming space.
Arbitration should be illegal for big companies vs individuals
*illegal, period
Edit: seems I need to be pedantic for those whose cerebral bits carry all the features of a bowling ball: smooth, dense, and a few holes you keep putting your fingers in. _Forced_ arbitration - ya know, the topic of the video - should be illegal, full stop.
Edit 2: Holy....just....wow.... Days after I was more specific, and people are stillmouthbreathing down my neck. If the difference between forced arbitration per TOS/EULA bullshittery and point of contention agreements hasn't sunk in by this point, and especially why one is ridiculously bad and should be banned, just pull up a bowl of catchup flavored mayo and dine on that corporate toejam.
The issue is we have constructed a society such that they couldn't handle even more of a case burden than they are already
Arbitration is okay, what should be illegal is forcing a person into arbitration without them being able to appeal to an actual court of justice.
You can still get yours through arbitration, but it is a little harder. Amazon or Google got a nice hit to the wallet after a bunch of people sued through arbitration. The fees piled up quickly
ABSOLUTELY
I swear that Gabe vowed at the beginning of the steam store that if Steam ever shut down they would provide the full downloads of our games. Has that philosophy change? I mean if games are delisted we can still download them if we bought them. If a completely online games is shut down, obviously we aren't expecting to keep those. But for any game with an offline mode, they said they would provide those as downloads if they shut down. Is that changed now?
@@matthewbarrios1028 as far as I'm aware even if a game is delisted if you previously bought it you can still download it and that has never changed
Yeah they have everything backed up with a 3rd party company in case Steam ever gets shutdown they will just release a final offline update and you will still be able to download everything (obviously not online only games0 and use the platform without any DRM.
Even if they didn't do this and just abandon Steam, people have already figured out ways to patch Steam and access your entire library with no DRM so its actually really easy to implement.
@@I_watch_things376 That's seperate to what OP was asking but yes you can download anything that's ever been removed from sale on Steam provided you own it.
Many years ago Valve reassured people that they had a contingency plan in place in case Steam shut down so that people would still be able to download and use Steam without any DRM at all and 100% offline mode, provided the company shutdown of course. This philosophy has not changed, Steam support will back this up if you raise a request to them too.
The good guy Gabe interpretation is that it's because of publishers and their tos which steam is bound by.
I personally like steam and valve but they're stepping outside what's fair play imo. Especially things like banning games from being cheaper elsewhere. I hope the courts give them an attitude adjustment.
A vow means nothing. If they (or he) really cared you'd get a refund if you were forced to delete your account or accept the new terms. They're holding you hostage.
of course LAWYERS are taking advantage of good will
Always
Some days I wonder if it's really the corporate suits doing this crap or if it's just a group of blood sucking lawyers. Then I remember it doesn't actually matter because the suits aren't stopping the lawyers on moral grounds and the lawyers aren't warning the suits where it will go. They both seem to forget that if you push hard enough the police and soldiers will stop protecting them when people start going for the mob solution.
Free Money Glitch
Did you not watch the video on _why_ they're doing this? Lawyers are your friends, dude. It's the huge corporations who are fucking you over.
the only innocent parties here are the users
Video starts at 4:23
“Your dispute with us isn’t valid unless you delete your account which you’ve spent an unknown amount of time and money on.” This sounds like extortion, it doesn’t sound legally valid.
Imagine suing your bank and they say “you can’t sue us you still have an account” except instead of getting your money out when you close the bank just keeps or wipes everything. It’s obviously not right.
well said
Keep in mind the change is a result from being extorted by law firms and if they cant stops the extortion valve would go bankrupt and everyone would lose their games
@@against1virusValve is a multi billion dollar company with hundreds of millions in profits every year. They can lose 1000000 of these cases and still be in the green. Cut the "valve is a small indie company" bull. That stopped being true over a decade ago.
Valve does this because (Correct me if I'm wrong.) A law firm currently tries to lawsuit Steam in the tens of thousands, which mean that if Steam hasn't change their agreement this lawsuit would bankrupt Steam itself as a whole. (The previous agreement was Steam would pay for the legal fees if it's under ten grand US dollars.)
The argument here is not about what's right, it's about law firms getting money from the legal fees whether they win or not.
I don't think it's legal, because if a client voluntarily deletes their account, they would no longer have a standing to sue Valve. The best course of action is the one that are going to sue to avoid using Steam service until the case is over, this way they would avoid implicitly accepting the new terms by using the service.
Also, I'm pretty sure EU would not accept that they cannot sue Valve in EU.
BTW Valve makes billions in profit, they can afford loosing a few hundred millions.
"the entire staff-" the entire staff what. THE ENTIRE STAFF WHAT!?
THE ENTIRE STAFF!
@@GinaRanTruthEnforcer ..of Annapurna Interactive resigned.
Know where you are and are coming to get you!
Just wanted to speak to you about your cars extended warranty.
@@t3chsupp0rt12why not shortend warranty?
I think if Valve is saying "You must agree or close your account" then you should be able to say "I close my account because of this but you must REFUND ME THE VALUE OF EVERY GAME." Because they are changing the deal of the agreement retroactively, it means they are forcing us to lose money. The best thing is I think this COULD be argued in court.
I would close my Steam tomorrow
Let me remind you the only reason valve is changing the agreement is because a lawfirm is abusing the goodwill part of the old agreement that was saying valve would pay for the end users legal fees even if the end user lost the case.
Don't you think it's a little strange that a single lawfirm has made over 75,000 independent cases against valve and had adverts up to asking for more people to come to them to get more individual cases.
This lawfirm only has 10 employees.
That's 7500 separate cases per employee and they were still asking for more.
They were not planning on winning any case. They just wanted the free money printer
@@TheWeeJet There was only an incentive to abuse that goodwill portion of the agreement because the users were locked out of class action lawsuits. There is absolutely no reason for the forced arbitration to be present in the agreement. Class action suits are a hassle and law firms wouldn't even take cases that were a waste of time and baseless anyway. A corporation is trying to weasel their way out of any accountability by brute forcing their customers out of any option to hold them legally accountable for anything. Especially holding thousands of dollars worth of games purchased hostage to make people quit their form of completely legal protest against said corrupt and anti-customer corporation.
"I am altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it further."
@@TheWeeJet holy moly is that what you got out of this? "Poor corporation being bullied with its own tos"? Are you a vegetable or something?
Plot twist: Agreeing to change the agreement in a manner that puts an ultimatum on users is actually a big-brain move to turn the tables on whoever sued them before by creating a contract that cannot be legally upheld.
Australian consumer law says I own my games, and last I checked, a ToS or EULA isn't legally enforceable when it violates law.
Any item sold through a 1 time purchase is considered a "good" and not a "service" and can not legally be removed, revoked, or have access to it restricted in any way.
Steam has to abide by our local consumer laws to legally operate in Australia, which is probably why I never saw this pop up and why the arbitration clause never applied to us in the first place.
"Own our games" still hasn't been challenged in Australian court.
Steam was still hiding behind the "We are a service"... but the judge said the law doesn't differentiate between goods or services. It is "goods AND services", and all rights to consumer protections apply.
Valve got ripped to shreds by the Judge for basically failing to read Australia's TOS
Aus consumer law doesn't protect your game licenses right? You've always been paying for a license, not ownership of a copy of the software like you would with physical mediums. A non-transferrable license, no less.
@@singithi8556The game files are literally downloaded to your local computer. That is not "licensed" use in my opinion. A license is when the files are on a server and you access the server.
@@singithi8556 we own our games. This is written in law
@@singithi8556 Selling a game licence would still fall under "Goods and Services."
Steam is treated like any other store here, so most games they offer are still considered goods. Just like they would be if EB Games (Australian GameStop) sold them to you in person.
EB Games can't just go to your house and take back the games you bought, so why would Steam be allowed to?
All the same rules apply, and it's why Valve have a grudge with Australian law. After all, Australia did force them to create their 2 hour refund policy. Before that, they never offered refunds to anyone.
So in US you still need to sue a company where the company is located? This is extremely disadvantageous for the consumer and extremely advantageous for the company. In the EU, the rule is that legal action is taken where the end consumer lives. If you want to do business with end consumers in , then you have to accept that if these people sue you, it will happen in . If you don't like that, don't do business with people there. If you only want to be sued in your home city, then you can only do business there. It must also be reasonable for a global corporation to be sued anywhere in the world.
That's why this ruling doesn't effect us. You can't do business where we live unless you play by our rules, which protect consumers and are enforceable. Hi 5 from AU
our motto in the usa is profits over people haven't you heard
It honestly doesn't matter in the long-run. They can't set terms like that. I mean...they can try...but the instant someone DOES bring a CA suit against Valve...that shit is toast. A judge would take one look at that and toss that particular bit of the agreement right the fuck out.
"You're an online digital service provider with clients and customers across the world. You have no legal grounds to force them to come here to sue you."
I think it should match brick and mortar stores. If I leave my house, walk/drive down the street and enter a store, then I am on their turf. Same with online. If my browser sends request packets across the line to a server in the U.S. Then I am on their turf.
I think the idea that you should go by where the customer lives comes from a misunderstanding of the technology. Don't like that? You mis-understand how everything online should match a real-world analog.
I guess if anyone wanted to sue me based on their local laws, then I simply won't ever do business globally.
@@danielswan2358 Good...nobody needs your business.
20TH OF AUGUST NOT OCTOBER /FACEPALM
Voice audio also cut off early at the end. Ends with 'the entire staff' and then it cuts.
The audio gets cut off at the end before you can pitch the next video btw...
I thought that seemed off!
@@mightydeekin the entire staff looked for a bear shi**ing in the woods??🤣
Any thoughts on customers not getting recompense for items disappearing from their guild banks, and the topics talking about it on the WoW general forum?
(Amazing how little coverage by content creators that story is getting.)
6:45 That's... not true though? For example: Final Fantasy XIV goes on sale on the Square Enix store far more often than it does on steam, so much so that the FFXIV community encourages people to buy the game through the SE store rather than on Steam. And someone in an email just saying that they're not ok with a company selling the game cheaper elsewhere doesn't mean they can stop the developer from doing that unless their contract states that, so the emails should be a non-issue. People are free to say what they want, but it's the contract that matters. Unless the implication is that the email was sent to try and bully a dev into doing what they want. So unless that's the case that doesn't make sense. An email stating a preference is not a legally binding agreement or evidence of wrong doing.
the "failure to delete your account prior...." bit should be illegal to add or have be legaly binding
While it isn't 'illegal' it can't be enforced. It is to scare away those who don't know better so basically a scam.
It seems like something that wouldn't hold any water. That's the only trick they have. They think they are gods, but they are more akin to children playing in the schoolyard trying to establish bullshit rules they just make up as they go. The court should make an example out of them and clean up the mess that is corporate EULAs and similar items.
Don't worry. I have a solution. Just send them a contract of your own that says "Unless you mail me a postcard weighing exactly 5 oz in the color of my asshole detailing the exact time in Greenland and staple a baggie of fingernail clippings to it, you have agreed to the above terms and I now exempt myself from your changes to the agreement that I originally made with you at the time of opening my account."
@@IrradiatedOne What? It's perfectly illegal, but it can absolutely be enforced. Much like piracy, Valve has access to all the data. Unlike piracy, Valve has the ability to destroy all of the financial equity from the Steam purchases at any time. There are already laws in the United States that cover this under extortion, fraud, and harassment. And if Valve tries to argue this in court, it'd be perjury, since they know for a fact that they forced contract signatures under duress for an obviously untenable contract.
It's a 'scam' in the same way grabbing and holding your $8000 Ming vase over a concrete floor if you don't 'sign' this contract is a scam.
@@notmirelnam248 and dont send it from a P.O. box, and it must be your wet ink, and probably good to send it certified mail to yourself first, then to them. your wording isnt correct but at same time you have the right idea, LMAO
You can’t sneak language into your tos after a suit has began that dismiss the suit. This prevents new folks from joining but it cannot kill any case currently running.
That does depend. Some cases are about the TOS forbidding something that is ridiculous. If they then change TOS to not do that anymore mid-trial, a judge can then decide that since the point is now moot, the court has better things to do.
I mean steam has an army of lawyers, if they didn't think this would work they wouldn't do it.
@@DemonKing19951 the army of lawyers didn't foresee the current mess steam are in. Corporations with armies of lawyers loss all the time in the courts.
@@DemonKing19951 no sir. You and the presenter are assuming motive. Claiming that there are a lot of lawyers doesn’t make the claimed motive more likely. Claim + claim =\= evidence
@@DemonKing19951 Lawyers are not perfect, they are flawed humans just like everybody else. They make mistakes. They overlook things.
We really need a lawsuit about when changes of user agreement after the fact are invalid when at a detriment to the consumer. For instance I started on Steam when they were brand new with just Halflife and a few other Valve titles when you actually owned the game. They later changed the user agreement forcing you to agree or else you would lose access to games you already bought. Its no different then buying a car with a 10 year warranty to have the manufacturer change the warranty to cover less and forcibly update your current warranty and if you refuse they take back their car at your loss 100%.
We do in fact have thousands of cases across the world on it and the usual case result is retroactive clauses are never valid, you can't just add things that take away someone's legal rights and options companies still do it because they assume you are too stupid
In a sane world, Steam would at the very least be demanded to offer refunds if they shut down accounts due to a sudden change in agreement.
@@TheRenofox Realistically though, refund what? Say I had a copy of Half Life with 200 hours, what would they refund me? The cost of HL then? With inflation? Today's cost? Would the fact that I got "my moneys worth" come into account? Shouldn't it?
I understand the concept of "ownership" "it's my right" etc, but realistically, digital goods might be nnn-perishable, unlike say, a car, but these too have an "expiration date". Especially shit that no one cares about. Like, most people have shit sitting in their library that they have never played (nor presumably will), that Valve could sneakily remove and they wouldn't even notice.
@@sinister3vil MAybe but I've got the Orange Box behind, ive got Half Life Collectors edition behind me, I've got Half Life Platnium with Oppsing Forces and Blueshift behind me all activated on steam and i have the physical copy
@@sinister3vil I mean .. if you have your home foreclosed on it you either have the option of selling it beforehand for the market value of the home ( or whatever offer you can obtain before the deadline ) or it goes into auction. You could also have assets have liens put on them, which results in the property being sold and whatever value minus the liens on it are then given to you.
So Steam should absolutely be giving you the market value of your account at time of closure, without trying to pull a Steam Summer Sale on your account during that time. It shouldn't matter what you paid before .. what should matter is what it's worth now, like anything else. Doesn't matter if you put 200,000 miles on an antique roadster if you can still sell it for tens of thousands of dollars.
I KNEW IT!!! It's great to be vindicated after all this time. Every time I claim that Valve won't let developers sell on other platforms, escpecially if it's cheaper, some idiot tells me I don't know what I am on about and that Valve, their preciouc Valve, would never do that. Sorry, but I whole heartedly agree with you on developers being able to sell their game however they want without Valve dictating how the developer is allowed to sell their game. If a developer chooses to create a key, and then sell it somewhere, and then bring the user to the steam platform, then that's on Valve. If they weren't monopolistic bullies that mistreat their customers, then maybe people wouldn't be doing it. I will always opt to buy elsewhere if it's an option as cross platform works on most of them so I don't need to support Steam to play with my friends that have a steam version. I honestly hope steam collapses and gets replaced with something better.
We should OWN the games we PURCHASE
This. This is what we fight for in the end. Valve want us to literally "own nothing and be happy".
You already don't, and that is not even because of Steam -- since the industry discovered that the big money was in Live Service Games, you'll find that for most games, you giving them money makes you a Subscriber, not an Owner.
Buy physical then
If you owned the game you purchased, what would stop you from giving out free digital copies to everyone who didn't purchase the game?
@@Noname-km3zx we did when we bought the game. they decided they wanted to host a server to sell us games.
"Piracy is a service problem."
-Gabe Newell, 2011
It honestly depends on the person. Some people pirate games because they just want it for free, some people pirate games because they dislike the company and don’t want to give them money, some people pirate games because they don’t like it being exclusive to a specific store.
Some people pirate games with DRM because they want a DRM free version
@@WhatIsTheHeat All of the things you listed are caused by companies having sh**ty service.
@@Necro-the-Pyro I say 2 of the 4 are service problems but I literally wasn’t denying that it can be due to a service problem, I was just adding on that there are other reasons.
I have many friends who pirate to get the game free. If getting the game free is a service problem, then everything in the world is a service problem.
@@WhatIsTheHeat Your reasons listed for piracy were "game is too expensive", "company does sh**ty things", "company does sh**ty things", and "company does sh**ty things". Those are all 100% service problems.
@@Necro-the-Pyro Exclusivity is not necessarily bad, and for games being too expensive it really depends. My friends pirate $15 AUD Indiie games
"Your failure to cancel your Account prior to the effective date of the amendment will consitute your acceptance of the amended terms." This is more common than uncommon, so not exclusive to Valve, heck Google, Netflix, Amazon, Facebook et.c et.c all use this clause (or VERY similar) and has been, FOR THE LAST 10 YEARS.
EDIT: And I can't think of a time since ANY subscribtion EVER hasn't had this clause, so make it atleast 40 years old clause.
it's about time the US and EU start regulating EULA, they KNOW they are making people agree to things without even realizing because no one reads the EULA, and it's designed this way.
Steam is not a subscription service though. You're not paying them a monthly fee to access Steam. You "bought" games and Valve changed the rules of the game after those purchases had occurred. Passive non-acceptace is not acceptance.
While I like this channel, the way it sucks up to Valve is sickening. Valve is a company. They are not your friend. They are there to make money from you.
@@lichbane01they make you re accept the terms of service every time they change them
@@FaticusDolphinius "Passive non-acceptance is not acceptance."
@@MistaCen if you’re referring to just ignoring the the terms of service agreement, using the service in general after they say explicitly say “using the service means you agree” then you agreed. If you disagree then you don’t use the service. This has been the case for every ToS for a long time.
I can’t play hunt showdown anymore because of dx12.
I bought the game, played it for years. The new big update like in aug or whatever, made it black screen on startup. (Ive tried everything, my gpu is basically blacklisted by dx12 despite being compatible, don’t troubleshoot for me)
It’s just interesting how games as a product are “justifiable” to just stop being what you paid for. Like it’s one thing for the game you love to change some core mechanic and become something you don’t like anymore. But for the developers and publishers to basically just say “you’re not allowed to use the product anymore.” That’s fucked. I mean banning is different. But imagine if Minecraft updated and, because of a glitch, you can’t play it anymore. It’s not simple to fix, and the devs won’t fix it. The troubleshooting fix is, “buy a new gpu.”
You just bought a car? We’re gonna change the parts every month to make it better okay? Don’t want that? Uh, that sucks. *changes your tires. They’re now gray instead of black.* *changes your windshield. The sun tint reaches 1 cm lower.* “we became aware of a minor bug regarding your ignition. This tweak should fix it.” *your car no longer starts* “damn sucks to be you. No refunds. Try buying a new engine”
I am also a victim at Crytek's altar. It really sucks to simply be unable to play hunt anymore. It bothered me last year when they announced the big update how they said that they were anticipating 10% of their customers would no longer be able to play the game, but they were willing to make that sacrifice for an improved experience for the remaining 90%. Well, I got sacrificed, and I'm not too happy about it. And I also really wonder if my sacrifice has actually amounted to an improved experience for others. Do they like the game better now that they liked to 2 years ago?
Last time i was this early Ubisoft was innovative
nice
First time, then?
But was EA not evil?
Nah EA was born evil 😂
@@sinclaire5479 narr they were goodish guys 30 odd years ago.
"I've spent 2000 dollars on my steam account, I'm not going to delete it."
This line alone shows that they are holding your account for ransom, and thus your 'agreement' of their terms and services related to that are 100% unenforceable as you were, technically speaking, under duress (at least in the U S A). when will these companies learn to not be idiots, and to just be an actual trustworthy group rather than attempting to violate their customers trust every step of the way.
Additionally, their updating of the agreements during a court case regarding them, more than likely targeted at their opponents in said case, could be considered in duress*, and undermining of the court case and judges authority.
*duress changed from Bmail as I have made the grave sin of accidentally considering similar as same. Though in this case the function would be the same if they both applied, Bmail wouldn't apply here.
Changing terms to protect from extortion should never be illegal. blame the law firms abusing the good will of valve and forcing valve to resort to extreme methods in self defence
I have no clue where to start with your comment. Both sides are getting extorted, but one side isn't able to change the rules without going broke on a lawyer, and possibly not even then.
While the other side is threatening every purchase ever made to the accounts, potentially thousands of dollars a person that would have been spent over several years, or to accept their terms. Textbook blackmail. "Do as we say, or you lose everything you've paid for." is absolutely an agreement not legally acceptable because there's no proof you weren't under duress when agreeing unless you say so.
They cannot simply steal potentially thousands of dollars for free. Which side are you even rooting for?
Additionally, the threat is effective immediately to the people in the active court case against them, which can't be legal since it's blackmail that directly undermines the legal system.
@@niaford690 so valve should just pay for thousands of frivolous lawsuits out of pocket without being able to do anything about it? the sides are lawyers abusing loopholes to rob a company or a company that goes overboard to defend against the unwarranted attack so i am on valves side since they have not done anything to hurt me especially since i live in the eu where the change does not apply
Technically your offline games would probably still work, and if you don't follow steam tos they absolutely have a right to take you off their servers, it's just inevitable when using an online service.
The law firms exploiting a loophole in the steam agreement should be illegal too but here we are
"Failure to cancel.." is what triggers the passive agreement clause. This isn't enforceable because it would apply legal agreements to inactive accounts. Having an account, but not logging in until the current court cases are heard puts those accounts in legal limbo, defaulting back to the last agreement between both parties.
Depends. You can't sue a company and feign ignorance on the case. We are not talking about random jon does that just decided to log in one day. Those people that are activelly suing Valve on Arbitration must know about those changes. The clause is valid. If clausures like that could not be enforced, no company ever could make any change into their ToS after they published the first ToS, because someone could always be away for an extended period of time. This will be a case-by-case basis, but this clausule is valid.
It's funny because everybody agrees you can't consent by not saying anything in any other case. being passed out and people f_cking you isn't consensual because you didn't say no. It's assumed you don't consent unless proven otherwise.
But people treat companies like a force of nature, a sacred cow. So we pretend it's okay when they do something analogous to that.
@@gidedin In this case; the cases were filed before the new ToS so it's easy to judge.
@@joshuahudson2170 nope, i didnt know about the case details, i was in ignorance of valve doing this stuff to the gaming market rigging commissions to publishers, which is anti-competitive, and once learning about the problem, i can still sue, even having agreed, as i originally never agreed and only click agree because of the extorsion over my property and my estate, which means i signed under duress unless i am in error
Better to buy DVD games, so you actually own them and can always play no matter what :). I have big collection of DVD games, started collecting early. Lucky me.
i actually didnt know that we dont own the steam games kinda i did own them even if it was in a form of license and argument against steam on no you dont, they do use BUY and the SHOPPING CART thus they are showing your buying something wich by STANDARD CONTRACT in society we own what we buy as we bought it.
@KimAlmighty1 most games on steam are DRM free. Every DRM Free game I purchase, I install and move to my external storage so I have it forever. (Just In case)
Your argument won't work because steam will say that you bought a license, which is a thing people do.
@@nsmetroid3403Why does my Skyrim refuse to open without Steam then?
@@bobSeigar Some games require being online and connected to a server to play. Even some single player games.
@@classarank7youtubeherokeyb63 but they didnt say it and when i did i was a child and so their argument kinda doesnt work.
11:50 What a cliff hanger xD
@@asweet93 they were testing us if we actually watch to the end
THE ENTIRE STAFF-
The entire staff what..? the entire staff whaaaaat??? 😫
What's happening to the entire staff?!!
"...Z- Zelda's my what? ZELDA'S MY WHAT!?!? COME ON! WAKE UP!"
If you know, you know.
We shouldn't be responsible for what happened in the past. It's equal to worrying about stepping on cracks on the sidewalk because some judge 50 years from now wants to press charges on you for doing it today. NOTHING should ever be retroactive. The laws and agreements of the time should be used to judge the product released at said time.
you might wanna rephrase that first sentence
I love what Valve has done for the linux community. I moved away from windows when XP came out because of the EULA.
However, since steam released all those years ago after the half-life mod. I knew we didnt own the games we purchased on the platform.
When GOG came around and physical media died out. I could at least own rhe files of the games I bought.
I have always bought on GOG first and only on steam if the game was not available on GOG. Lots of excluves on steam. Dark Souls games come to mind.
But GOG has the older games i love as well from Dungeons and Dragons series, Stonekeep, etc that steam dies not have.
They both have a purpose, and i never use a downloader if at all possible loke epic, ubisoft or ea stores.
The only one i use because of linux support is steam. And i only use it when needed if GOG doesnt get the game.
Monopoly by incompetence, Valve truly is suffering from success. But this definitely explains why I saw a bunch of class action lawsuit ads against Valve a while back, I always thought "I don't remember Valve don't anything bad, why would I want to sue them?"
You didn't want to sue them because if you do, the greater evils that are Epic Games, Sony, and Ubisoft would've won, not because Valve does anything different from any other company
@@IfritBoi you describe other companies are distinguishable from Valve and then claim Valve doesn't do anything different from other companies?
@@TheGreenTaco999 for someone who's criticizing, you're pretty illiterate. I never said Valve doesn't do anything different, I said that Valve doing things different isn't the reason why the close majority take Valve's side. It's because the companies that gain from Valve's loss are the greater evils.
@@TheGreenTaco999 Those other companies have shareholders, in the case of Epic, they have Tencent (a chinese public traded company), so yes they are different because they have shareholders to "bring" value to at the cost of the consumer. Valve only answers to their partners and customers.
@@TheGreenTaco999 Valve is the main reason the PC gaming industry still exists. It nurtured the community and kept it alive. And, while it provides few privileges relative to other companies (like free games once every so often on Epic, or some early release games on Sony, etc), it guarantees you will have access to your entire library no matter what (unless its an online game that goes defunct with no offline mode to play, at which point there is little point in having said game.), and that you OWN your games, and aren't leasing them.
Digital only games ❌
Games as a service ❌
Always online game ❌
Physical copy offline single player/local co-op games ✅
Yeah, until the servers shut down, the physical copy can no longer contact them, and then you can't even play your physical game because it's governed by EULA too lmfao
@@3nertia Right. Physical *DRM-free copy offline single player/local co-op games. Easy fix.
@@3nertia Got my favorite GAMES FOR WINDOWS LIVE game CDs on the corner of my desk.....RIP
So basically games before 2010. wew
@@armin6427 So basically *good games.
steam is a good platform but it should NEVER get a monopoly, in fact all steam games should be playable via any means one wishes steam account or no steam account
If buying it is not owning it, stealing it is not theft.
This statement makes no sense. I'm fine with piracy, just be honest about what you're doing.
It's about "what" you buy nowadays... you don't buy the physical copy anymore, just the opportunity to play. Thus, is it possible to steal the opportunity to play?
I mean, if they're just gonna redefine everything, then that pretty much just means you can interpret it however you want... lol, property/ ownership is thew new genderfluid...
@@flamegrylls8965 Deprogram your consoomer brain, and then it will.
@@jasonrouse8215💯
@@flamegrylls8965 If when purchasing something it the purchase can at any time be revoked, stealing that item is not ethically equal to theft. If they were being honest it would not say buy on the button to purchase it.
Love that extra paragraph stating that EU,UK,AU,NZ and Quebec had this right way before on 0:36
@Dukenukem does this mean I own my games or am I just screwed before others
Oh yeah and we have plain language contracts too. EULAS that only take a minute to read, and make sense. It's a whole new world.
We just figured it was communism and the best country in the whole gosh darned world probably wouldn't want no high falutin' consumer rights.
I doubt a retroactive agreement is even legal in most parts of the world, I'm shocked it is in the US. You can't retroactively change the rules for deals you've already done; not without undoing the deals which means customers would have to get full compensation for every single cent they've ever spent under the old rules (plus interests).
The US is a shit hole country when it comes to legal loopholes and abuse. We have major corruption problems in our court system that most people can't afford to take to the supreme Court to actually have them be addressed by someone who can do something about it. Welcome to America, the land where money is the only thing that talks.
I'm not sure It's even legal in the US. I don't think anyone sued any company for it yet. It is illegal for parties to change the terms of contracts retroactively and TOS' are contracts so there's a strong possibility if somebody decides to sue, they might win.
Then Steam needs to refund me every cent of every purchase I made through them if I don't own a protected user license of every game for my lifetime or the lifetime of those I pass it onto. I spent that money, they need to give it all back to me.
How the f--- did we get to the point that taking NO action amounts to agreeing to new terms in a legally binding contract?
you're exchange a financial position with them in the form of services. Look up the definition of what constitutes a digital signature in relation to click wrap agreements...you'd be surprised. It's very vague but I wouldn't be surprised if there's also something beneficial to them in WA state law which governs it that reinforces what they're doing.
@@naejimba ever heard the line "i take your silence as an agreement", that is essentially what they're saying, so yeah, it has been a thing for several decades at this point
You're not taking NO action though, you're continuing to make use of their service. Continuing to do something IS doing something. Stopping using their service is doing nothing. It's your actions in absolute terms that count, not changes relative to your existing behaviour.
Continuing to use a service after the end user agreement has changed even if you avoided accepting the altered agreement manually has pretty much always been a tacit agreement to the amended end user agreement. Your option to decline is to cease using the service.
We’ve been there for at least the last 20 years. Probably longer.
in europe it does not matter what a contract or a user agreement says, so they can write in it what they want, does not hold any legal ground in EU countries in front of the Law
In that context, nothing in the law matters either. If contracts and agreements between parties can be ripped up at a whim then why should any law set by these governments be respected or enforced?
@@Gearhead2675 obviously you should just take what he said as law > everything else. The one contract to rule the others, so to speak ;)
That's not entirely true, according to the EU's website on contracts with consumers, it's never just thrown out of consideration, it is debated whether:
1. The contract is in good faith to the consumer
2. The contract is transparent
3. Certain parts (not all) of the contract will be thrown out IF it is decided that it is unfair to the consumer
If the contract has been decided to meet the requirements of the EU law it is entirely read in.
@@Gearhead2675 Well duh.. If you have a contract with another individual, which says you can murder them, even when signed by both parties, it still is murder. To give an extreme but obvious example.
You can't set up a contract which breaks existing law. Not that hard to understand, or is it?
@@Gearhead2675 You're misunderstanding, contracts and agreements between parties can be ripped up ( and should be ) when said contract or agreement goes against the law, which supercedes any other contract or agreement.
Why should any law set by these governments be respected or enforced? Because they are in charge. Go on, step out of line, see what happens.
Would you believe me if I said I actually got the infamous pop-up WHILE playing one of my Steam games? I was playing LEGO Star Wars The Complete Saga with my friend via Remote Play Together, and it paused the game and opened the pop-up, which is crazy to me because it’s literally the equivalent of Valve snatching my controller away and forcing me to agree to their terms before I can get back to playing the game I paid for on my valid Steam account with my friend who is connected by his valid Steam account.
Welcome to capitalism!
yea same lol
but valve are the good guys...
Support Nintendo, the last company offering real physical ownership. dont be a fool. 20 years of owning nothing and being happy on PC is long enough to know you fkd up
Yet one more reason I don't use Steam whenever possible. Thankfully, I don't need to have all the latest games, so most of what I need is on GOG. But I do "own" a few newer games on Steam, but I wait and "buy" those games on sale, and consider those games to be rentals with an undetermined end date. I think the last Steam game I "bought" was Sniper Elite 5 because I am sometimes foolish and impatient. 🙂
Well, while Steam has its struggles now, we have to remember that it will be the last advocate of "free market" in the industry.
If Steam goes out, an important store for independent to medium-sized companies will leave the market to subscriptions gatekeepers ... the end of video games dev. free market.
I agree! How is it legal when they are trying to extort steam under a clause they made to keep our rights and abuse it while the court deems it fair? This law firm is trying to take away our rights by extorting steam and abusing this system that gave rights to the steam users with no money. The law firm should be defamed for that trashy morality, no I don't think having a small monopoly built on good intentions warrants getting extorted to the ground and ruining the platform. People who think otherwise should not be allowed to use steam. If these people didn't ruin it there would be no new arbitrations so how can they complain to valve about the arbitration which could potentially save our last hope.
I do wonder if smaller indie-focus websites like itch io would get some more traffic... And of course there will definitely be a new gen wave of piracy for AAA if Steam ever goes down. The remaining online stores would either become homogeneous as developers try to spread across more services to guarantee sales, or else they remain on a single platform and cross their fingers that enough people will care to install it in order to buy and play their game. Some companies may even make their own platforms just so you run and buy their games specifically, which we have already seen. I think it's going to be a time of inconvenience and various game companies whining about not making enough money (which they always do anyway).
I would go then to GOG. It is a really small market compared to Steam, but is the one site I still feel like "hmm...this is on sale...I might buy it", so much money spent on Steam through sales...where was I? Right, The other sites didn't lure me much with games I would like to buy. Steam has their sales, a very good and powerful launcher, support for Linux, good review statistics and so on, GOG tries to be DRM-free, you can just download the game without their launcher and also has some pretty good sales. GOG has a marginally small profit, but they go in the right direction, similar to Steam.
The competition on the other hand has not really much, especially not much consumer friendly things. You have Epic Games Store with its free games time to time, but they have yet to make profit and the store is still a mess. PSN? Sony has some really controversial decisions made, especially recently including their PSN account requirement. I see myself maybe buy a game from Epic Store when I really want to play it (still won't go in a shopping spree like I would do with Steam or GOG) but I try as much as possible to avoid Sony, I really don't have any trust in them.
Video games makers were never that clean since the 1980s...
I just want to see all these little developers nipping at Gabe's heels try to deal with shareholder-appointed CEOs and legal teams who legit don't give a single shit about video games beyond making more money every quarter at any and all cost.
0:02 "For Valve, the 20th of October, 2024 was not just any old day in court"
That's 17 days from now.
@@techmouse. Good catch. Maybe he meant September.
He meant August
First thing I heard...
I'm glad I'm not the only one who noticed this. I was typing a comment out about it but figured I'd double check to make sure I wasn't the only one paying attention.
Tomorrow now
Some mad stuff is apparently about to go down in 19 days. Thanks for the heads up.
They should go after Nintendo because there prices for digital games is ridiculously high and it makes 2nd hand games literally a few pounds lower than that game new
@dnakatomiuk at least they hold value though
They can't. Nintendo is completely within their legal right to do so with their first party exclusive games. Valve doesn't have first party exclusive titles.
@@CGoody564 tf2, portal, portal 2 cs2
Given the cost of producing new games today their prices aren't high at all. The prices of video games just haven't risen that much at all in the last 15 years.
No, Nintendo games aren't worth what Nintendo demands
Reminder that Valve and Gaben aren't saints... they are just the least evil.
Would be nice if the American people could understand that and get out of the two party sportsball nonsense.
Most people dont care for saints, we want something workable and steam works.
I really miss disk drives.....
@@I_am_ENSanity I bet people will switch back to disc drives and use steam way less for buying games
@@tobyzilla on disc DRM was some of the most insidious shit ever tbqh
its too bad blu ray fuckign sucks on PCs. that would have helped a lot for modern pc games
Remember when you'd buy a disc set put it in the pc and just play it. Digital content was dlc and update fixes.
Online cloud and digital game releases have a lot to answer for.
That never happened. You bought a license to use the software, which came with the disc set as part of the package deal. The disc was never the main thing you were purchasing.
That’s the way it’s always been, at the very least back to the 80’s. Just most people never understood how it actually worked.
@@shivorath not my point but hey ho as a gamer since the 80s with the BBC and Spectrum I know what EULA is but I also knew that my copy of Elite and Dungeon Master etc were on the disc not subject to the shenanigans of online EULA and subscription agreements.
@@shivorath Buddy man he's saying that they used to be a tangible object which once in your hands was fully out of the influence of anybody else. They can revoke that license at any time, but unless they care enough to come get the disc it's still getting used.
@@shivorath NO, you actually bought that copy of the software that item it was yours and no amount of legal actions from the publisher could negate the access to your copy, you had a cdkey to prove that one copy was yours and you couldnt´abuse it that was the difference.
Cheaper though
And kept the supply coming
"Not what the subscriber agreement had in mind" Yeah well i didn't fucking want to have to spend a year in law school to understand a EULA to play a video game either.
then buy Nintendo games physically. they are the only company offering real physical ownership
@@MunchieLuknight Protest abusive legal agreements by jumping to a company well-known for being ravenously litigational over its properties and gameplay patents. Sounds rational.
@@Eidako the only company protecting physical ownership. the only company that didnt hire sweet baby. the only company that blocked blackrock buying its stock.
i personally dont care about how Nintendo fights piracy, and theft. only thieves do
@@Eidako what do i care? they protect consumers. dont steal from them
@@MunchieLuknight LOL.
"Nintendo Agrees to Settle FTC Charges" (Los Angeles Times. Apr 11, 1991)
"The Pursuit of Cheap Video Games Has Been Getting Switch Owners Banned" (Vice. Feb 5, 2020)
"Nintendo Conducted Invasive Surveillance Operation Against Homebrew Hacker" (Torrent Freak. Dec 23, 2020)
"Nintendo's Recent Reign of Terror On TH-cam Is Just The Beginning" (CBR. Oct 2, 2024)
At the end of the day, Steam is one of the last gaming companies that actually answers my support tickets with a human response in a timely manner with a resolution. Try to open a ticket with Blizzard/Activision see if you can say the same. They also treat developers extremely well. This seems like a huge case of "this is why we can't have nice things". Honestly I hope this fucks over the law firms.
10:40 "Your failure to cancel your Account prior to the effective date of the amendment will constitute your acceptance of the amended terms" is a mandate which exceeds the authority of a contract because the determination of whether or not you have accepted the amended terms is for the judge to decide, not Steam. So, run this past a solicitor BEFORE taking it at face value because, as a customer, there is also nothing preventing you from posting your own amendment to Steam's terms in the classifieds section of the local newspaper and, as part of those amended terms, dictating Steam's acceptance of your amendment in the event they fail to respond by the effective date of those terms. How long do you think that would hold up?
@@Mercurio-Morat-Goes-Bughunting
The "if you keep doing x then you are therefore agreeing by this new contract" has been shot down by many judges in court cases before as not a proper legal statue to hold a party accountable to.
Id drop the court cases numbers but it's been like 5 years since I looked at the cases with this. So yeah, it's up to a judge.
All of the content sites are just selling you a license to use the product. From Amazon onward. We need to fight against that. In the past, you bought a physical copy that is yours forever. I've got games that go back decades and I never have to worry that some corporation is going to take that away.
You want them to give you free access to copy and distribute and sell the code?
@@jaideepshekhar4621 nobody is saying that. Why is so bad to want a company to not take away a purchase because they felt like it?
@@jaideepshekhar4621 the boot cannot possibly taste that good
@@jonusaguilar8156 So what exactly do you want?
the thing is most games have changed. you have perpetual online registration and other stuff that even if you own a physical copy once the servers are shut down you cant make use of them anyways. congrats you now own a copy of a game you cant play.
i thought this kind of tactic of "by not seeing this agreement you accept it" was deemed uninforcable
If drug through a proper court it likely wouldn't be, the same way most EULA magic isn't.
But if I were to guess the why they threw that in there would be to convert all the inactive accounts rather than delete them and face that ugly backlash.
Steam is the cheapest site to buy games legally, even at normal price. As a Steam, PlayStation and Nintendo user I dare anyone to find a legal and not shady cheaper price. This cases are nothing more than attacks to the consumer friendly platform. The industry big names have tried to fix pricing, eliminate the second hand market and make game prices higher and keep them even if game is 10 years old. Steam is the only front against that. PS4 digital store was forced to adopt the "sales" model when PS4 was losing terrain against PC during 2015 and 2016. Nintendo has resisted and has managed to train its users to pay full price and even sell at high prices, kind of like a cult, but even them have some sales now and that's thanks to Steam's consumer friendly politics. Steam offers good prices, sales, free online, robust downloading platform, a good launcher and unencrypted file system. All of that is a nightmare for money milking companies that's why Denuvo exists to start to take away the control from the user. Steam is under attack because it's good to us the players
It's absolutely ridiculous how in the US a company can basically put in a contract - that you have no saying on - that you're waving your rights. A clause like that is laughable any where else in the world.
It's laughable here in the US, too, which is why Valve looks draconian and terrible in doing just this. It is also why the cases Valve tried to get dismissed weren't dismissed.
I have a pathetic non-disparagement clause and confidentiality agreement which works against me. All because I reported crimes. I'm in the USA.
I knew something was up when a company said “ you can take us to court” and dropped the bullshit arbitration clauses.
The ability to do that is total BS.
delete your steam account
@@TricksterRad spotted the company simp 😂
@@NeonLuminous I mean, serious, delete your steam account, stop giving steam money. Use GOG.
Over here calling me a company simp for telling you to stop giving a company your money. Zero self awareness.
@@NeonLuminous I mean, you're the one who insists on having a steam account to use steam.
@@TricksterRad Okay gaben
10:09 The thing about retroactive clauses for ongoing cases... They aren't enforceable. WotC tried this and they backed down, not because of the consumer backlash, but because they had no legal standing to retroactively change the rules of an ongoing legal disagreement. There's lots of precedent in courts that changing the terms for a violation of prior terms in an ongoing case don't fly.
Finally, a gaming news channel that seems decent. Subscribed.
It's dismissed without prejudice which will allow Valve to refile appeal.
Yeah, wasn't it for jurisdiction reasons? Like that court said they legally didn't have the proper jurisdiction over the law firm?
Valve will just refile under a court that does have jurisdiction.
I'm more than anything amazed that a US citizen can sort of just sign their rights away by way of a 'legal agreement' that says they 'promise to do things in Kings County.' Even signing away something retroactively sounds dubious as hell and should not be legally enforceable (not a lawyer though, certainly not a US lawyer). It sounds so bogus.
You can only sign your rights away when you sign them away and then never take action challanging them in court. Basically they cant sign away your rights, but your rights being respected isnt always an automation, sometimes you need to take legal Action. Which in this case I cant see you loose
That line about failure to cancel your account, that won't hold up in court either.
Continued Use of an account, that would (generally) hold up in court, but "If you happen to have an account and do not go out of your way to cease having one, you agree to this new contract you may not have even seen" is Never Legal.
Lets use something non-contractual that will make the absurdity of that position obvious.
"If you have ever visited my house before, you must come here and tell me you are not going to visit again, or else I have the right to your bank account, retroactively forever" posted Almost solely, inside your own house, so those who have been there before, but have no intention of visiting in the next 2 years, will have no way to know, that their bank account has been declared your property due to their prior visit.
These are common terms for most online services. You generally agree in the TOS that they can update the TOS at any time by notifying you of the change and giving you time to opt-out. Your explicit "opt-in" action was your agreement to the original TOS that included the ability for them to update the TOS without any further explicit assent on your part. The notification requirement is satisfied by just posting the new TOS publicly on their website somewhere...they don't have to prompt you when you log in.
Google/TH-cam has functionally identical clauses in their TOS.
@@jdlightsey Doesn't matter how common; it's not legal but rarely tested. Google's getting away with it because the expected damages for a free service are $0.
Im very glad to see few people are waking up against steam abuse
I can't see how it'd be legal for a company to hold an already established business deal hostage to force you to drop your charges, after you've filed those charges.
Isn't that intimidation?
Entrapment maybe.
it's intimidation, entrapment, and extortion.
In most places as far as I'm aware arbitration is by agreement. I believe you would have to take them to court and sue to get your case arbitrated. Kind of moot at that point I would think.
Intimidation is not the right word, "breach of contract" is the proper term.
From what I can see, it seems more like a way to avoid getting flooded by BS arbitration by money-hungry goblins.
Basically, the previous agreement allowed you to force Valve to arbitrate and they would pay the legal cost whether they win or not. With the new lawsuit's results, it means there is a chance they may win the arbitration, so they make millions of cases knowing that Valve will be forced to stand for all the costs, in other words, there's no risk to them with a possibility of a big payout. But for Valve, the legal fees would go through the roof.
So by trying to be ¨kind¨ with the previous agreement they shot themselves in the foot and are now pressing the emergency stop button.
i dont like the idea that we don't own the games we've paid for
I thought Steam's market dominance was a sign that most gamers understood what "this software is not sold, it is licensed" meant. If you owned your games, you could sell them, and Steam provides no mechanism to do so, not that it would make any sense.
why you should support Nintendo. they are the only company still providing real physical ownership
@@MunchieLuknight Nintendo? The company that inhibits any ability to play their games on a product not provided by them? They also primarily sell things digitally now anyway.
@@annaairahala9462 "they primarily sell things digitally" lie. they sell 100% of their games physically
@@annaairahala9462 hmm i think i was replying to someone else on this video and typed it here
This is just a procedural dismissal because of jurisdictional issues. Valve is allowed to do another appeal in a different jurisdiction.
While this case does revolve around jurisdiction, this isn't simply a dismissal on jurisdiction. Valve tried to sue Zaiger to prevent them from going forward with the SSA mandated individualized arbitration and the Court agreed it did not have jurisdiction to hear that suit. However, the case lays out what case law would require to be able to bring this type of suit. While valve could technically bring the same suit in a different jurisdiction, there is likely a reason they filed it in WDWA and another jurisdiction might find it has jurisdiction but would ultimately rule against valve, but the reasoning of the Court in this case will hold for many jurisdictions (even though it is not binding in anyway) save for the five in which the arbitration has begun... this is why Valve inserted a choice of laws provision/// to try and create the jurisdiction in WD Washington.
GUYS! If you haven't already, go and sign "stop killing games" petition. We already have over 300k signatures
This is the reason why I stick with GOG when I can at least possess off line installers.
@dogofwar6769 been slowly switching and happy after I have been
I like GOG fine, but to be realistic they will never have the library available on Steam. Too many companies wet themselves at the thought of not having DRM. I own a few on GOG, but the bulk of my library is on Steam.
The only time I'm upset at Steam is because they force updates and all these companies that like to go in and force their launcher on old games they don't even support any more just to try to force you into their ecosystem.
@@TrackMediaOnly "I like GOG fine, but to be realistic they will never have the library available on Steam."
Which is why the statement that "gaming is dead" is true, at least for now.
GOG is exactly the same thing, the difference is that because of the lack of DRM they can't enforce taking away your license to play the game, so it's kinda of a loophole.
I made the jump years ago when my library wasn't "too big" and they still offered the Gog Connect service, so it made it a little easier.
Until a judge says the use of the agreement to hold potentially thousands of dollars of purchases hostage against lawful legal proceedings is in fact unlawful.
Remember guys, Valve totally isn't a monopoly.
@@raze2012_ so what should Valve do since their competition is just X.X ? Refuse to take on games to sale? Close shop?
What should companies do when they suffer from succes in your opinion? Lay down and die?
"totally not a monopoly" brain dead take
@@raze2012_ Just because valve don't treat its users like slaves, it does not make them a monopoly. You tell me, would you pick a country where you're free or a country where you're treated like a slave?
Unfortunately, ProCD v Zeidenberg (1996) establishes precedent that the EULA can in fact hold potentially thousands of dollars of purchases hostage against basically anything. The United States legal system is cooked.
@@jacky7204 Until a judge says no and that precedential rule is incorrect or not applicable in this exact case. Or new legislation is passed.
I'm so confused on what this video told me
TLDR is Valve nearly got buried alive in legal fees due to a couple law firms taking advantage of its old subscriber agreement by organizing 10s of thousands of individual arbitrations against Valve due to monopolistic practices, and a judge refused to dismiss those cases so they were all about to go forward.
The new subscriber agreement does sound better because it removes the forced arbitration, but there's a couple weaselly things that were inserted to basically make the 10s of thousands of legal cases go away, you either delete your account to continue your case or drop it, and you're not given any other choices.
Something, something arbitration. Something, something monolopoly. Valve good, D4 bad.
Tldr, valve goodwill is taken advantage by some people. Arbitration in simple terms is a way to solve an agreement problem between two parties outside the open court or tldr solving them privately behind the desk. Unlike most companies who would force customers to use arbitration, Valve is willing compensate the lawsuits as long as it is under $10k even if they lose. This good will however, is biting them in the ass. Some bastards use 75k individual users to charge 'arbitration' with valve as ask for that 10k compensation money.
As a result, Valve has been forced to stop the arbitration option and opted for open court. Consumers won't be able to solve any agreement problems with valve privately.
@@Matok1 so a few scummy shitheads that abused valves goodwill have ruined it for everione else
@@ShadowGeek12 They need to have a actual list with their names and faces that pull this s**t.
steam doesnt have a monopoly its literally just better that everything else, it just sounds like all these other companies are whining because the popular kid keeps getting trophies and certificates when hes a A+ student with extracurriculars in sports while theyre glue sniffers
Retroactive clauses are simply not enforceable so it will be fun to see Valve try to argue that with the other pending cases.
Forcing also the location where the suit can be filed is also of questionable enforcement since subject matter jurisdiction means a few things could affect where the suits are placed
@@Sepiriel it’s important for Valve to force legal actions to take place where they are incorporated or else foreign law firms will attempt and are attempting to drag Valve into parts of the world that could be easily skewed against them. This is in reaction to the lawsuit just filed against Valve in Great Britain. They need the case to be tried in American courts according to the rights pertaining to American citizens and businesses.
They arent trying to, they;re stopping further ones. why wish for the downfall of one of the only good companies brother?
They are enforceable under arbitration, did you watched the video?
@@bruxinth4660 I'm very interested to see how the UK or EU legislators react to this, since they don't give a rip about the State of Washington or any of the other 49 if someone breaks one of their laws-worst-case scenario, Valve could be forced to stop doing business in those places or have to set up a subsidiary entirely subject to UK or EU (or anywhere else) law. And that's to say nothing of current Steam gamers in places like Russia or China or India or any other place that REALLY doesn't give a rip what a bunch of corporate suits in Bellevue think.
@@SimuLord They won't. Changes affect mainly US, nothing changes for rest of the world
I remember a time before DRM's, when you had the CD and your access to that could not be cancelled, unless the CD was scratched to hell haha
"Tens of thousands are suing you for going 'nuh uh' to everyone to create a monopoly. What do you have to say for yourself?"
"Nuh uh"
"Damn I guess everyone loses the case."
Tens of thousands are suing them to exploit a loophole in the steam tos to get money even while losing the cases, it's not the same thing, Valve just changed that bit to remove the loophole, if anything now everyone can actually sue them without arbitration
Tell me you don't understand the issue without telling me you don't understand the issue
This was a case of 75000 people individually suing steam all under a single lawfirm.
A lawfirm that noticed a loophole that even if they lost every single case they would still make $10,000 per case they lost. And if they win they make even more.
They were literally putting out ads to get people to sue steam for free money and no risk.
It is literally a case of legal extortion.
All because valve had in the agreement that even if end users lose a case against them valve will pay the end users legal fees.
Do you understand.
This is a case of a lawfirm abusing a loophole in a agreement to basically print free money from valve using end users as the method to do that not caring if the end users even get anything out of it.
Even if they lost all 75000 cases, that would mean that lawfirm still makes $750,000,000.
The fact people thinks this is just valve against end users is insane. It's a lawfirm using end users and money printers issue
@@TheWeeJet valve is a 10 billion dollar company, they can afford it.
@@poiu477 here, lemme just exploit your goodwill for nearly 10% of the wealth you've accumulated over 30 years in less than 3
Stop being okay with NOT owning your stuff. This needs to change.
You don't ACTUALLY own your favorite video games, especially if you get them in discs from GameStop.
I say this because these games are software, which software CANNOT be bought physically, and can ONLY be bought digitally. Physical copies of games on discs or cartridges don't help because those things are still software.
So therefore, the "You'll own nothing and be happy" myth is actually true. Nobody owns games AT ALL.
And don't any of you console-only players dare say "oH bUt PhYsIcAl MeDiA iS bEtTeR tHaN dIgItAl MeDiA!!!!!1111!!!11!!" because you will NEVER own a single video game you pay for. You will ALWAYS only own the license to play them. You can't just own the software of the game. You own a copy of the disc, but you DON'T own the software of the game.
This will NOT change. I bet you're saying that we shouldn't be okay with NOT owning software, which CANNOT be sold in GameStop, or even a grocery store. >:(
Seems like a step in the right direction to me. Hope it keeps going that way.
It isn't, valve is like the last company that should be toppled and all this is gonna do is pave the way for fucking streaming service practices for games and worse services, also this all started cause valve didn't want you to under cut them, which seems reasonable.
Also with the forced arbitration case valve would've covered the fees for the normal individual, no other company does that.
Forced arbitration is most certainly a bad thing, and this is good.
But arbitration itself isn't necessarily bad, and can be preferable in some cases to the cost & time involved in a court case.
Another important part is being able to say, jointly decide on who will arbitrate it. Letting one side pick the arbitrator and the rules (like forced arbitration does) is a very bad idea.
But yes, being allowed to arbitrate as an option is good, when done right.
Like most things in life, it's good if consensual, and abhorrent if not.
Arbitration where both sides actually agree, not some "you signed the TOS" bs.
However valve is willing to pay for the arbitration in its entirety, for the average person...so is it a bad thing in this case ?
@@Uniformtree000Yes, it is still a bad thing. Forcing people into arbitration without recourse is always a bad thing, even if they dress it up with a "good" aspect.
Wild how this nonsense is even possible. I'm definitely glad that i live in the EU, where it's more about common sense and fairness rather than who's more clever in how to write their ToS as one sided as possible.
This is only because outside the EU scummy lawfirms can exploit your goodwill. This is the reason why valve is forced to do this.
@@Chareidos Forced arbitration is not goodwill...
@@bendziox60 Maybe I am misunderstanding something here. But that it was exploited is most certainly not goodwill of the lawfirm either. :)
@@Chareidos Sure, but don't paint Valve as angels, when clearly forced arbitration or the retroactive clause in SSA is anti-consumer and would be illegal in the EU.
@@andytirtajaya why should i give a shit about the mega corp?
I think that their TOS in Europe are different. If I remember right, they cannot force european citizens to go to court or arbitration outside of the country they provide the service in - so the whole case has another dimension here with Valve operating world-wide.
2 grand... if only that is how little I spent on my steam library in which 87% of my library has never been touched
I'm sure I could have purchased a brand new car with what I've spent on Steam. Of course that have been over the course of 20 years. Absolutely no regrets. Very happy with my 2000+ Steam library.
who needs cars when you can buy hundreds of games you'll never even play
@@darkarma9368 why is it so common to throw money at companies without even getting anything in return? I hear so many people saying they own tons of games they don’t play and it just confuses me. If you don’t like a game then refund it, stop throwing money at companies for no reason
I like having a beefy Steam library, but I try to hold myself to a strict regimen of buying games, downloading those games, playing those games, uninstalling those games, and then repeating the cycle. The only exceptions are games that I replay constantly like the Batman Arkham series and Skyrim, and also games that I PLAY constantly because they are session based instead of campaigns, such as Monopoly and Civilization.
@@The8bitbeard With that many games, how can you even keep track if one were to "go rogue" and disappear? 🙃
i wonder if the new agreement is even valid for the ones that are already in the Arbitration cases because it shouldn't be possible to force the other party into a different agreement mid case.
Almost certainly not, for this whatever contract terms that were agreed to will prevail at the time the claim was submitted to the courts. The retroactive nature is likely just in relation to people who haven't filed lawsuits/arbitration claims for something steam did during the old contract terms and the customer might file in the future.
@@TheLuceon i'm just wondering because he said that most of the Arbitration cases will collabse because of this.
@@dovos8572 Yeah, like he said, not a lawyer so I would view his take with a grain of salt. I'm not a lawyer either, but courts generally frown upon people trying to play games and pass one over on a court ruling.
According to the lawyers in said cases no it's not valid due to reasons involving things like forced consent etc. "You can't unilaterally change a contract" and other such rules.
Thank you for your research
X too have clause to waive our class action possibility, which is frustrating a bit
Umm.. 11:49 "the entire staff..."?? The entire staff what, Booboo?
um, isn't that just going to make steam just improve the platform more? making it so they cannot use price variations to dictate what they will/wont sell on the platform?
Like it's just an incentive for steam to add more improvements like better FamilyShare, Market UI, Social Features, etc.
@@PanicOregon competition doesn't always mean better services for the consumer. It should, but it doesn't necessarily
Yes that's exactly why monopolies are bad
@@binary3111The Epic Games store kind of made an example of that. The “benefits” that they showcased before it’s launch were more beneficial to game developers/publishers, since it was really them taking less of a cut on each store purchase.
It’s one of those things where it takes a substantial effort of matching the leading competitors quality, and enough funds to advertise and get some publicity. Nowadays, a lot of companies are making launchers for their games, and people have gotten sick of having to use (or be forced to install) so many different launchers when they just want one that fulfills their needs. That’s typically why people stick to brands (or in this case, launchers) they recognize or are more familiar with, since the competition doesn’t match the leader(s).
@@Dr.Oofers bs
The insentive for devs to be in EPIC are not worth it, nobody wants a store 51% owned by Tencent, keep information leaking, once worked as a spyware in transparent mode in your system, and that actually participates in monopoly practices like locking games behind their shop as "exclusive" f Epic.
With all that mentioned ppl with half of a brain would just wait until any game Epic releases to lock to be released later in the other shops, which means it won't help devs sale numbers until is out of that jail
@@Mr2ops I'm not saying I'm against it. I'm more looking at it. If Steam improves their platform more. It would just make it more of an incentive to use Steam.
I know there is more to watch here... but I'm stuck on the first line.
The 20th of October 2024... hasn't happened yet.
We are in the matrix friend
valve invented time travel, nintendo is currently scrambling to draft a patent so they can sue them.
Happens all the time in our ''news'
@@Thejigholeman "No time traveru for you!" -nintendo, maybe...
August 20th, not October.
That new terms of agreement clause sound tailor made for another class action lawsuit.
Shorting a market intentionally is wrong - it's not antitrust at all - it's a reasonable business position. If I have a product and want to sell it on epic games, steam, and gog - the price should be the same in all three places to avoid any antitrust by pushing consumers to a specific market. This doesn't make sense 🙃
See my thing is, If this were true they would need evidence that Valve had been de-listing games on steam for selling cheaper elsewhere regardless of Steam Keys. One employee said something in an email, but does that make it true?
"We wouldn't be okay with selling games on Steam if they are available at better prices on other stores, even if they don't use Steam Keys."
Is out of context, we don't have the email or the email chain, I would love to read the entirety of where this quote is taken from.
I'm not trying to come off as if I'm defending Valve as if they have never tried to do some really dog shit things, but in this case, without evidence of such actions I don't know how there could be any case at all.
The quote seems to be addressing Valve's policy on pricing parity for games sold on Steam compared to other platforms or stores. Valve has been known to expect that games sold on Steam should not be offered at significantly lower prices on other stores, even if they don’t use Steam keys ( ̶w̶h̶i̶c̶h̶ ̶w̶o̶u̶l̶d̶ ̶s̶t̶i̶l̶l̶ ̶g̶i̶v̶e̶ ̶V̶a̶l̶v̶e̶ ̶a̶ ̶c̶u̶t̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶s̶a̶l̶e̶s̶).
It could also relate to Valve's broader business strategy of protecting their revenue, considering that if other platforms can offer lower prices, customers might shift away from Steam for purchases.
With this quote taken out of context, We don't know what this employee could be referring to, but we can inference, one of the two above conclusions, or both.
The email could have also been in the context of games using valve's online hosting services too, there just isn't enough nuance from either side.
There is more than just that, it just will take time for the process to go before we really see the full effect. Because if it was just that than they wouldn't have a strong case, but when included with everything included in all the arbitration than it makes for a very strong case against steam. It just will take time.
@@dorferino Absolutely a possibility.
Valve does not get a cut of profit off of the sale of steam keys off platform. The developer/publisher can request the creation of keys at no cost to them and valve will only step in if an unusual amount of keys are being generated or being sold at under market price.
@@t97exe66 This is correct. That was typed in error thank you.
All these years I only bought games during those crazy sales and thought I was getting away with murder at those prices. I knew this day would come eventually.
What day? Do you no longer have access to those games?
@@loganmedia4401 Well I'd guess that depending on how the agreement shakes out after these changes, there's a chance that the delisted games you bought that you still have access to now could get scrubbed off since they would have no obligation to provide them to you any longer.
It doesn't seem like something Valve would do, but that would be on the table if it becomes a legal burden.
@@fs127? it's that way right now and you don't see this happening except when the developers themselves remove the game.
Also, no actual steam user is making money off this lawsuit; it's 1 company with 10 employees making all the money from valve, which inevitably is going to cost me and you because some loser decided to screw everyone over for a claim they know will lose in court
Like they quite literally know they lose every case but don't care because valve still pays them. If anything we should be starting a class action against the law firm for abusing valves system and extorting steam users out of legal rights in exchange for 5 dollars (TH-cam ads to get you to sign over rights for 5$....)
@@fs127 It's not something Valve would do but it's something the shareholders will force them to do when Gabe is driven to go public by this extortion.
The thing is, once this all passes, Valve could easily re-institute the old arbitration clause with modifications to prevent mass-arbitration cases, which would then re-protect themselves from open court cases. Genius!
On thing that has pisses me off about steam is the back and forth no accountability thing they have with developers. If you have a problem that ruins your game entirely then the developers say you need to go tk steam and steam says you need to go to the developers to resolve the issue. My friend got banned off rust after his account got hacked and the hacker sabotaged his account. They recognized the issue even seeing the paper trail of the stolen account report but still nothing was done. They eventually went to the back and forth of ask steam followed by ask face punch studios. Steam is a great platform and definitely the best at what it does but it's only friendly towards buying games and does nothing for you if you have an issue with the game.