Hard Light Productions Forums
Off-Topic Discussion => Gaming Discussion => Topic started by: Lorric on April 12, 2013, 11:57:22 am
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Madness! This is basically extortion!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2013/apr/12/smartphone-games
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Oh yes, the evil evil app makers are to blame for parents leaving credit card information on devices accessible to minors.
IMHO, the parents are much, much more to blame than the children, or even the producers of these apps. In order to make such a purchase, you need a credit card, and in order to have one, you need to be an adult (or close to it anyway). By not properly securing their devices, those parents enabled their children to make those mistakes.
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oh look, the classic "exploitative business practices are fine, it's the fault of dumb consumers for not being on their guard" argument comes out of its hole again
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Roll up! Roll up! Get your Smurfberries! Only £69.99!
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oh look, the classic "exploitative business practices are fine, it's the fault of dumb consumers for not being on their guard" argument comes out of its hole again
The thing is, these business practices aren't that exploitative. Sure, microtransactions etc are not a good thing, but ultimately, it's the parents responsibility to make sure that this **** doesn't happen.
The question here is, where does the app makers' (and the app stores') responsibility to make sure that whoever purchases something is actually the account holder end and the account holders' responsibility to make sure that no unauthorized purchases are being made begin?
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When I initially heard about this on the news, I thought it must be games that have a vast, vast array of DLC. But come on, $99 for Smurfberries?
http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/107662-Eight-Year-Old-Girl-Blows-1400-on-Smurfberries
This is companies trying to score money, through at best immoral business practices. If they were at least selling stuff that some people would actually want to buy, like say 1,000 different costume items at £3 each and someone just took them all and that was where the £3,000 bill came from, at least it would be legit stuff, but this is crazy and just plain wrong, selling Smurfberries for more than a PS3 game. It's a trap, plain and simple.
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Sure it is.
And it is trivially easy to make sure you do not stumble into it. It's one thing that this form of drug dealing is possible; it's quite another to actually fall for it (or, in this case, not think the consequences of handing your tablet or phone to your kid through) and complain after the fact.
Personally, I am of the opinion that better user education is more desirable than edge-case regulatory practices.
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Sure it is.
And it is trivially easy to make sure you do not stumble into it. It's one thing that this form of drug dealing is possible; it's quite another to actually fall for it (or, in this case, not think the consequences of handing your tablet or phone to your kid through) and complain after the fact.
Personally, I am of the opinion that better user education is more desirable than edge-case regulatory practices.
So do you think the parents should lose the money?
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Ultimately, yes. They gave their kids what amounts to free access to their bank accounts and then left them alone with a drug dealer. That kind of stupidity needs to have punishment attached to it.
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Ultimately, yes. They gave their kids what amounts to free access to their bank accounts and then left them alone with a drug dealer. That kind of stupidity needs to have punishment attached to it.
I am at a loss for words.
You are cold and hard and unfeeling.
The parents wouldn't be the only ones who would suffer, while the "drug dealer" would grow fat on the money and others would be encouraged to follow in their footsteps.
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Sure it is.
And it is trivially easy to make sure you do not stumble into it. It's one thing that this form of drug dealing is possible; it's quite another to actually fall for it (or, in this case, not think the consequences of handing your tablet or phone to your kid through) and complain after the fact.
Personally, I am of the opinion that better user education is more desirable than edge-case regulatory practices.
So do you think the parents should lose the money?
Ideally, no. But that's a natural consequence of this type of stupidity.
The government does not exist to protect people from bad deals. It would be another matter if this was actual fraud, but it isn't. It's a simple ripoff.
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Smartphones have capability to lock their respective stores with a password. Parents should make use of that and not give their credit or debit card information to minors too young to understand value of money. In fact, people should never give credit or debit card information to anyone, including their spouses and children. Granted, not even all adults understand value of money but that's different topic. As far as I know, Visa Electron is the card of choice for minors as it can be granted to as young as 10 years old. But that card is their own and parents can supervise its use and set daily and monthly withdrawal limits.
The bottom line is that parents more often than not, have means to supervise their minors use of money. They should exercise that and not blame outside parties for their own ignorance. While parents should actively seek out means to protect their minors in this brave new electric world, I have to admit that not nearly enough is done to educate parents that such things can happen in the first place and how to prevent them.
That said, there are companies out there that are blatantly exploiting minors and ignorant parents alike. It's not moral, but is is legal. Companies have throughout ages sook to exploit people to gain profit, this is nothing new. Only the means to do so are. Well, relatively new as they have existed since smartphones became popular.
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I might agree with Fury and The E if children (under 18) were not legally banned from making purchases on credit cards / phone accounts, particularly credit cards / phone accounts in their parents' names.
A child cannot consent to an EULA, a child cannot authorize purchases by credit card, and the fact that the software not only allwos credit card information to be stored and tied to the app but does not require a further code entry by default (without enabling it) is ridiculous, exploitative, and quite probably illegal. Specifically, these stores are storing credit card or account information which any person with physical access to the device can then utilize without impediment. In fact, these apps are largely relying on the fact that these store systems are not protected by default without very specific client action.
In short: these microtransactions largely rely on ignorance at the user end to make money, and actively do not prevent credit card fraud - and legally, a child authorizing a transaction on their parents' card is fraud.
So, yeah - the app makers are absolutely at fault and should be made to change these practices immediately.
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If it's fraud you can presumably just dispute the charge, correct-o? Why are these people paying the charges?
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If it's fraud you can presumably just dispute the charge, correct-o? Why are these people paying the charges?
The ones in the articles I posted have done so.
But anyone who doesn't know they can, or how to is going to get stung.
Thankfully, we're not living in The E's World, where these people should lose the money for the crime of stupidity.
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But it's fraud committed by the child
, derp
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If it's fraud you can presumably just dispute the charge, correct-o? Why are these people paying the charges?
Excellent question. If it's a credit card, they should be calling the card company and filing the charges as disputed. Wireless companies would be trickier as it is in their interest to be paid, so you may have to go to a government regulatory to get those charges dealt with.
Regardless - legally-speaking, only an account holder on credit and wireless accounts can authorize charges to them. Use by any other party is criminal fraud in Canada, US, UK, Europe.
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But it's fraud committed by the child, derp
Doesn't matter. They wouldn't be criminally-charged, but children cannot legally agree to contracts, and therefore any expenses arising from a contract engaged in or signed by a child has no force in law, and any charges associated with it are legally invalid.
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Replying to all of it, consumers shouldn't have to deal with this - smartphone software is being developed in a manner that specifically allows, if not tacitly seeks, this type of abuse in order to make money. While parents have an obligation to protect their information (through security settings they have to manually enable), the app developers have an obligation to ensure the contracts they are offering are legally-valid, a step so absurdly simple the only reason they don't do it is because it makes them less money if kids can't abuse their parents' accounts.
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I might agree with Fury and The E if children (under 18) were not legally banned from making purchases on credit cards / phone accounts, particularly credit cards / phone accounts in their parents' names.
But here's the thing: The store system cannot determine who is using the device at the time. If the account is logged in and the convenience functions turned on, then the assumption has to be that the account holder is driving. So as far as they're concerned, the entire transcation was perfectly legal. If the transaction is then disputed, how do you determine whether the dispute was legitimate, or whether it is a fraud attempt by the user?
In short: these microtransactions largely rely on ignorance at the user end to make money, and actively do not prevent credit card fraud - and legally, a child authorizing a transaction on their parents' card is fraud.
I absolutely agree! But here's the thing: As long as these practices aren't forbidden, it falls to the customer to protect himself. If the customer fails to do so and then gets bitten, it's something the customer has to deal with, not the various regulatory agencies.
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Replying to all of it, consumers shouldn't have to deal with this - smartphone software is being developed in a manner that specifically allows, if not tacitly seeks, this type of abuse in order to make money. While parents have an obligation to protect their information (through security settings they have to manually enable), the app developers have an obligation to ensure the contracts they are offering are legally-valid, a step so absurdly simple the only reason they don't do it is because it makes them less money if kids can't abuse their parents' accounts.
Exactly.
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I might agree with Fury and The E if children (under 18) were not legally banned from making purchases on credit cards / phone accounts, particularly credit cards / phone accounts in their parents' names.
But here's the thing: The store system cannot determine who is using the device at the time. If the account is logged in and the convenience functions turned on, then the assumption has to be that the account holder is driving. So as far as they're concerned, the entire transcation was perfectly legal. If the transaction is then disputed, how do you determine whether the dispute was legitimate, or whether it is a fraud attempt by the user?
In short: these microtransactions largely rely on ignorance at the user end to make money, and actively do not prevent credit card fraud - and legally, a child authorizing a transaction on their parents' card is fraud.
I absolutely agree! But here's the thing: As long as these practices aren't forbidden, it falls to the customer to protect himself. If the customer fails to do so and then gets bitten, it's something the customer has to deal with, not the various regulatory agencies.
No, no, NO.
These companies are sharks blatantly and obviously trying to screw people, who is going to spend this kind of money on this garbage?
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But here's the thing: The store system cannot determine who is using the device at the time. If the account is logged in and the convenience functions turned on, then the assumption has to be that the account holder is driving. So as far as they're concerned, the entire transcation was perfectly legal. If the transaction is then disputed, how do you determine whether the dispute was legitimate, or whether it is a fraud attempt by the user?
Does someone making a phone purchase with your credit card without your consent invalidate your ability to dispute the charge? No. The store system could contain default security features that require a password or some additional authorization to make financial; transactions. In short, the convenience settings should not be the default, nor should apps be permitted to tie directly to store systems without a requirement to enter a password or account confirmation first.
I absolutely agree! But here's the thing: As long as these practices aren't forbidden, it falls to the customer to protect himself. If the customer fails to do so and then gets bitten, it's something the customer has to deal with, not the various regulatory agencies.
Nope. Regulatory agencies exist to regulate abusive business practices. This is an abusive business practices that relies on the technical incompetence of end-users (and flaws in the story system) and therefore falls under the purview of regulatory agencies to eliminate. Furthermore, businesses offering contracts have a due diligence requirement (and should have an inherent interest) in ensuring contracts are legal to ensure they get paid. Right now, they can offer illegal contracts via technical loopholes and still get paid out for it. That is bull****.
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1. It's exploitative. Ok, we get it.
2. The parents are still stupid for effectively handing their credit card and authentication info to a minor.
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I don't even let Steam hold onto my card details, it becomes too easy with one-click buying to think '**** it, it's only 20 quid', adding the extra minimal effort of getting my card and typing in the details at least gives me time to get over the initial 'want' impulse and think 'do I really want to spend that money?'.
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I don't even let Steam hold onto my card details, it becomes too easy with one-click buying to think '**** it, it's only 20 quid', adding the extra minimal effort of getting my card and typing in the details at least gives me time to get over the initial 'want' impulse and think 'do I really want to spend that money?'.
He he. I never use the "quick buy" options on sites, I always like going the long winded way, but it's more in case of a misclick somewhere to give me time to notice.
EDIT: I wouldn't want to be typing in my details though like that, more chance of being picked up by a keylogger.
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I doubt any company in question here said 'let's set this up so kids can spend a billion dollars'; they know the charges will be reversed. That's not an exploitative practice.
What they are designing for is whales. Much of the F2P/microtransaction economy is built around making sure that whales (the guys who spend a LOAD of money on microtransactions, whether because of their wealth or their mental illnesses) can spend money really easily and really quickly.
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I don't even let Steam hold onto my card details, it becomes too easy with one-click buying to think '**** it, it's only 20 quid', adding the extra minimal effort of getting my card and typing in the details at least gives me time to get over the initial 'want' impulse and think 'do I really want to spend that money?'.
He he. I never use the "quick buy" options on sites, I always like going the long winded way, but it's more in case of a misclick somewhere to give me time to notice.
EDIT: I wouldn't want to be typing in my details though like that, more chance of being picked up by a keylogger.
Thing is, if someone gets my details through a KeyLogger or the like, I've got card insurance, but if I spend like an idiot, I don't have insurance for that ;)
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I don't even let Steam hold onto my card details, it becomes too easy with one-click buying to think '**** it, it's only 20 quid', adding the extra minimal effort of getting my card and typing in the details at least gives me time to get over the initial 'want' impulse and think 'do I really want to spend that money?'.
He he. I never use the "quick buy" options on sites, I always like going the long winded way, but it's more in case of a misclick somewhere to give me time to notice.
EDIT: I wouldn't want to be typing in my details though like that, more chance of being picked up by a keylogger.
Thing is, if someone gets my details through a KeyLogger or the like, I've got card insurance, but if I spend like an idiot, I don't have insurance for that ;)
You're covered :D
Let the insurance company get burned! :lol:
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I doubt any company in question here said 'let's set this up so kids can spend a billion dollars'; they know the charges will be reversed. That's not an exploitative practice.
What they are designing for is whales. Much of the F2P/microtransaction economy is built around making sure that whales (the guys who spend a LOAD of money on microtransactions, whether because of their wealth or their mental illnesses) can spend money really easily and really quickly.
i don't share your optimistic appraisal of the assholery of these companys. i think (well, hope rather) that you're probably right in that it isn't the primary goal of the practice, but they're sure as hell going to accept it as a side effect and not willingly stop it. at worst, nothing bad happens to them other than they have to return ill-gotten gains. at best, they get to keep the hefty percentage of it that was either not reported at all or that the bank had to eat the loss on.
this needs to be attacked from all sides. the parents need to be aware that these kinds of assholes exist and take reasonable steps to guard against this. including slapping the snot out of their kids when they do this kind of thing. still, there is NO good reason to allow businesses to exploit people like this.
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I wouldn't call that an 'optimistic appraisal' at all. A lot of the microtransaction methodology is extremely predatory.
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Ultimately, yes. They gave their kids what amounts to free access to their bank accounts and then left them alone with a drug dealer. That kind of stupidity needs to have punishment attached to it.
I am at a loss for words.
You are cold and hard and unfeeling.
The parents wouldn't be the only ones who would suffer, while the "drug dealer" would grow fat on the money and others would be encouraged to follow in their footsteps.
Welcome to real life, enjoy your stay.
This is just a specific case of Darwin Award. Parents be stupid, parents be paying the heavy price.
No, no, NO.
These companies are sharks blatantly and obviously trying to screw people, who is going to spend this kind of money on this garbage?
The people who win Darwin Awards on a daily basis. IE an astoundingly large percentage of the human population.
You sound like you need a serious reality check, my friend.
BTW, Santa doesn't exist. Neither do unicorns. Sorry.
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Ultimately, yes. They gave their kids what amounts to free access to their bank accounts and then left them alone with a drug dealer. That kind of stupidity needs to have punishment attached to it.
I am at a loss for words.
You are cold and hard and unfeeling.
The parents wouldn't be the only ones who would suffer, while the "drug dealer" would grow fat on the money and others would be encouraged to follow in their footsteps.
Welcome to real life, enjoy your stay.
This is just a specific case of Darwin Award. Parents be stupid, parents be paying the heavy price.
No, no, NO.
These companies are sharks blatantly and obviously trying to screw people, who is going to spend this kind of money on this garbage?
The people who win Darwin Awards on a daily basis. IE an astoundingly large percentage of the human population.
You sound like you need a serious reality check, my friend.
BTW, Santa doesn't exist. Neither do unicorns. Sorry.
So if I screw you out of some cash, will you be like "Okay, I was stupid, take the cash." ?
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If you, personally, screw me over, I will use every method at my disposal to get my money back.
If I lose money because I was not thorough enough in evaluating a deal, then that's something I have to learn from.
The difference here is that in the first case, the other party has a clear criminal intent, while in the second case, the deal was legal but I failed to do the research on it or think it through rationally.
EDIT: The thing with microtransactions is that they're definitely legal. There's no false advertising or anything, you generally know exactly what you get before you make the purchase. Whether or not the product you get is worth it is highly subjective.
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If you, personally, screw me over, I will use every method at my disposal to get my money back.
If I lose money because I was not thorough enough in evaluating a deal, then that's something I have to learn from.
The difference here is that in the first case, the other party has a clear criminal intent, while in the second case, the deal was legal but I failed to do the research on it or think it through rationally.
So you'd just let case number two go? I don't know if you have kids, but for the purposes of this exercise, you do now! Imagine you're dead tired, and you've had a really stressful day. Your kid comes up and says he wants to buy some add on. You just want to rest, you figure it'll only be worth like a dollar or two and let them just for the peace and it turns out it was $100. Would you just be like ehhh, my fault. Or would you claim the cash back?
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You would buy the damn addon yourself. Your kid shouldn't even have the possibility to be able to buy it himself.
If you're too tired, just say you'll do it tomorrow / this week-end. You aren't the slave of your kid, that's not how parenting works.
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It would be my fault, and I would have to eat that loss.
BUT.
Since I am aware of these pitfalls, I wouldn't be in this position in the first place, because no kid of mine will get that kind of access to my financials until they're ready and understand what they are doing.
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You would buy the damn addon yourself. Your kid shouldn't even have the possibility to be able to buy it himself.
If you're too tired, just say you'll do it tomorrow / this week-end. You aren't the slave of your kid, that's not how parenting works.
I thought of a better one. Your kid tells you it costs $1. But it costs $100. Your kid is either lying or made a mistake. You buy the thing. Because it says $100, but you see what you expect to see, so you see $1.00.
It would be my fault, and I would have to eat that loss.
BUT.
Since I am aware of these pitfalls, I wouldn't be in this position in the first place, because no kid of mine will get that kind of access to my financials until they're ready and understand what they are doing.
Even though you'd know you could claim it back? You'd just take it on the chin? Really?
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I thought of a better one. Your kid tells you it costs $1. But it costs $100. Your kid is either lying or made a mistake. You buy the thing. Because it says $100, but you see what you expect to see, so you see $1.00.
Then you win a Darwin Award. Congratulations. Wear it proudly.
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you can just tell matth is the kind of person who thinks the darwin awards are funny can't you
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I thought of a better one. Your kid tells you it costs $1. But it costs $100. Your kid is either lying or made a mistake. You buy the thing. Because it says $100, but you see what you expect to see, so you see $1.00.
Then you win a Darwin Award. Congratulations. Wear it proudly.
You are using this definition wrong. You're supposed to die due to great stupidity to win a Darwin Award.
Don't dodge the question.
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you can just tell matth is the kind of person who thinks the darwin awards are funny can't you
Of course they are. That's the whole point.
You are using this definition wrong. You're supposed to die due to great stupidity to win a Darwin Award.
Don't dodge the question.
If you are stupid enough to do something like that, you are likely stupid enough to die of great stupidity.
The question doesn't make sense. If I was stupid enough to do that, I wouldn't be smart enough to know I can claim the cash back.
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you can just tell matth is the kind of person who thinks the darwin awards are funny can't you
Of course they are. That's the whole point.
You are using this definition wrong. You're supposed to die due to great stupidity to win a Darwin Award.
Don't dodge the question.
If you are stupid enough to do something like that, you are likely stupid enough to die of great stupidity.
The question doesn't make sense. If I was stupid enough to do that, I wouldn't be smart enough to know I can claim the cash back.
Have you never misread something because you read what you expected to read? It happens. And it has nothing to do with stupidity. It's all subliminal stuff. A trick of the mind.
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Oh dear christ it's like watching a blithe optimist and an affected cynic face off against each other because that's exactly what it is. Is it just me or is HLP unusually confrontational of late?
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Have you never misread something because you read what you expected to read? It happens. And it has nothing to do with stupidity. It's all subliminal stuff. A trick of the mind.
Let me put it like this.
You're gonna call your bank and say "Hi. I'm calling you because I payed something 100$ thinking it was 1$".
What is the guy at the other side going to think.
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Oh dear christ it's like watching a blithe optimist and an affected cynic face off against each other because that's exactly what it is. Is it just me or is HLP unusually confrontational of late?
I actually consider myself a realist.
Define what definition of blithe you are using please.
Yes, there is a strange amount of confrontation around here lately.
Have you never misread something because you read what you expected to read? It happens. And it has nothing to do with stupidity. It's all subliminal stuff. A trick of the mind.
Let me put it like this.
You're gonna call your bank and say "Hi. I'm calling you because I payed something 100$ thinking it was 1$".
What is the guy at the other side going to think.
These others didn't call the bank. It's not fraud, it's back in the thread why you can get the cash back.
Anyway, unless you're going to cut out these kinds of answers, there really isn't much point in continuing with this.
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You're not helping, PH. If all you want to do is make meta-commentary about threads, use IRC.
Lorric: I feel like your scenarios are badly designed. You're assuming that I wouldn't be able to read the statements properly (I am paranoid enough about money that anything involving it will put me on high alert) and you're assuming that I would hand one of my own devices to my kid (Never gonna happen).
The thing is, I am reasonably well-educated in the risks inherent in this system. If I let a child of mine handle a device like that, I will make really really sure that there is no way in hell something like that would happen.
The only reason this is even a topic is because the parents affected by this were not aware of the risks involved. I am not one of those parents.
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You're not helping, PH. If all you want to do is make meta-commentary about threads, use IRC.
Lorric: I feel like your scenarios are badly designed. You're assuming that I wouldn't be able to read the statements properly (I am paranoid enough about money that anything involving it will put me on high alert) and you're assuming that I would hand one of my own devices to my kid (Never gonna happen).
The thing is, I am reasonably well-educated in the risks inherent in this system. If I let a child of mine handle a device like that, I will make really really sure that there is no way in hell something like that would happen.
The only reason this is even a topic is because the parents affected by this were not aware of the risks involved. I am not one of those parents.
Well you sort of already answered my question. I just want you and anyone else to not automatically think braindead idiot, there'll be ways for this to happen without it being gross stupidity. I was never assuming anything of you, more trying to create a feasible scenario that is not down to blatant stupidity.
But even such stupidity does not deserve to be punished more severely than several real crimes.
Stupidity and ignorance are not crimes. If stupidity and ignorance cause harm to others, then they can certainly become crimes. This is not the case here.
EDIT: The "punishment" is the time, stress and effort and possibly small expense it will take to get the money back.
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Stupidity and ignorance are not crimes.
Gotta disagree with that.
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Stupidity and ignorance are not crimes.
Gotta disagree with that.
Why?
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One point a lot of you are making is that the parents shouldn't have given the kids access to their credit card but I suspect you don't know how this stuff works.
Now, my experience is mainly with Apple i-whatever stuff as that's what schools mainly use, so I don't know if this applies to Android stuff too, but with Apple stuff it is trivially easy for a kid to run up charges inadvertently with the default settings on an iPad or iPhone.
The problem is that most people use a credit card to buy stuff from the AppStore rather than using vouchers, and once you do that the card is registered to your AppleID and any purchases *automatically* get charged to your card!!
The ONLY barrier is your AppleID login and by default i-devices only ask for it once, and once you've logged in it caches the ID until you clear it. The kicker is that loads of stuff requires you to be logged in to your AppleID to even work.
Because this happened to so many people in the US (Where people are a lot more litigious), Apple added an option (IIRC iOS6+) that, when enabled, means you have to type in the AppleID every time it's required instead of just once and caching it indefinitely.
This is a bit of a PITA as it turns out many things require you to type in the AppleID multiple times, but this sheds light on why they were caching it in the first place.
However, it is, by default, not set, so the owner of the device would have to know about it in order to take advantage of it.
It's also been said that if parents were supervising their kids when doing this stuff (Which, I agree, they should be, for that sort of age) they would have spotted this, but some of these games are dead sneaky and disguise the purchases so it's not immediately obvious whether you're buying something in-game or for real, esp. since as mentioned above they can just charge to your card so seamlessly.
The problem is most of these devices are easy to use so they are bought by noobs which makes them an easy target for this sort of grey-legal fraud.
It's just a symptom of the commoditization of computers into mainstream appliances for people who won't/can't spend the time to learn and it's not going to get better any time soon until we're locked out of our own machines like we are with modern cars!
Actually, this is a good life lesson in general: Don't let ANYONE or ANYTHING save your credit card details. (Or any details for that matter...!).
I got bitten by this by my insurance company on my first renewal (It turns out unless you tick the tiny box that says don't save my card details they auto-renew your policy unless you phone them and tell them not to!); Got charged a £10 'admin' fee to terminated it, but saved £100 transferring to a different company so it wasn't a total kick in the balls...
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Stupidity and ignorance are not crimes.
Gotta disagree with that.
holding yourself to a very high standard there
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Stupidity and ignorance are not crimes.
Gotta disagree with that.
This is easily the silliest thing I've read all day.
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Stupidity and ignorance are not crimes.
Gotta disagree with that.
I don't think low IQ is a crime.
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Technically speaking, being stupid and/or ignorant is not a crime. However, it can very easily lead to things that are, and they hardly ever work as excuses to get out of trouble.
"But officer, I did not know there was a law against running red lights!"
"How??? You took the test, you have a license!"
"Well, I did get a few questions wrong on the test..."
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Technically speaking, being stupid and/or ignorant is not a crime. However, it can very easily lead to things that are, and they hardly ever work as excuses to get out of trouble.
"But officer, I did not know there was a law against running red lights!"
"How??? You took the test, you have a license!"
"Well, I did get a few questions wrong on the test..."
Yes. Ignorance of the law has never worked as an excuse. People often travel abroad and get burned because of it.
But the people in my links are not such people. They've committed no crime.
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Exactly, nor are they being charged with one. But if you're going to let a child play around with an expensive piece of technology that happens to have your credit card information stored on it, then you're pretty much reaping what they sow, and I'm not about to feel sorry for you.
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The company is more or less offering a product aimed at children and makes use of business practices that abuses those kids lack of experience.
In Germany we have laws against that - not sure about the US - but over here it would be an illegal business practice, no if, no but.
Furthermore, children (age 0-6) can not legally enter a contract so, as far as the law is concerned, there would not even be a purchase, which means the company is only in possession of the money but does not have ownership - i.e.: they have to give back every penny.
Children aged 7-18 need the explicit consent of their guardians/parents for a purchase to become legally binding so in either case the parents would have the law on their side - over here.
See... even if a child steals 50 bucks from their parents, heck, even if the child would use his/her own money, and buys something at a store, without explicit consent from their parents,.... the store would have to give the money back, if the parents disagree with the purchase, because the child can not enter a legal contract that would transfer ownership of the money. I.e. if over here a store sells anything to kids they better make sure they have the parents consent, explicitly, in person or in writing, because otherwise any judge will tear them a new one and rightfully so.
The US surely must have similar laws to protect minors, no? Just saying, over here it would a) not even be possible for the minor to enter a contract without their parents consent, even a completely legal one and b) this specific contract would be completely illegal because it abuses a minors lack of competence for monetary gain which is in direct violation of our laws for the protection of minors.
In other words: An only store better make sure they double check the identity of the person they are doing business with. If they don't then any sale they make may turn out to be null and void - over here.
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Mikes, have you actually read the topic? Because it doesn't look like you did. There are already safeguards in place so that children cannot make purchases in these stores on their own.
The problem is that their parents handed them devices that had the parents' credit card info stored on them. As far as the store is concerned, the purchases were completely legal, since all the identifying information was properly provided.
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"But officer, I did not know there was a law against running red lights!"
"How??? You took the test, you have a license!"
"Well, I did get a few questions wrong on the test..."
On a slight tangent, it *is* legal to drive through a red light in the USA if you are turning right!
I did not know that when I first drove over there...
There was much honking.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8Pc2D48u2Y
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"But officer, I did not know there was a law against running red lights!"
"How??? You took the test, you have a license!"
"Well, I did get a few questions wrong on the test..."
On a slight tangent, it *is* legal to drive through a red light in the USA if you are turning right!
I did not know that when I first drove over there...
There was much honking.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C8Pc2D48u2Y
I guess Matt will want you punished. Ignorance is a crime, don't ya know! :lol:
A surprising piece of information to know.
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Well he already got punished, that's the point. Here, by excessive honking and public shame.
You don't have to enforce punishments for stupidity. It punishes itself. Those parents that lost money got the fair return of their derpness.
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Well he already got punished, that's the point. Here, by excessive honking and public shame.
You don't have to enforce punishments for stupidity. It punishes itself. Those parents that lost money got the fair return of their derpness.
So you think they should lose the money?
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Obviously ? Serves them right.
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Obviously ? Serves them right.
I can't understand why anyone would think like that.
Except maybe if they were either a sociopath, or looking to profit from such people.
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Sure, Lorric, we who believe that personal responsibility is a good thing (and that taking responsibility for your actions and owning them), we're all sociopaths and/or scammers.
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Sure, Lorric, we who believe that personal responsibility is a good thing (and that taking responsibility for your actions and owning them), we're all sociopaths and/or scammers.
There's a difference between personal responsibilty and punishing someone for making a mistake and falling into the hands of scum with a bill which could have serious consequences for them, and even if it doesn't is likely weeks of hard work to earn that money wiped out in an instant, a punishment more severe than for many real crimes which hurt people when this hurts no one.
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I don't think this is a productive topic anymore and should be closed. We're just circling here now.
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I don't think this is a productive topic anymore and should be closed. We're just circling here now.
Perhaps. I'm sure at this point I can't change them and they can't change me. I want to get to the meat of it though, why someone would think this way.
So, we've gone round the houses, why do the duo of E-Geek think this way? Want to make money, sociopath, or something else? Why so cold, hard and unforgiving?
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There's a difference between personal responsibility and punishing someone for making a mistake
Actually, those are sort of the exact same thing.
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There's a difference between personal responsibility and punishing someone for making a mistake
Actually, those are sort of the exact same thing.
Not in my book. Especially when you've got scum facilitating that mistake.
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Everybody makes mistakes, no matter how smart we normally are. Sometimes smart people are tired or lazy or make assumptions that nobody could be that evil, and then sometimes we pay for the mistakes. Yes, it's very nice if there's a way to recover from a bad mistake, and you absolutely should try it, but a lot of times there's nothing you can do, and you just have to live with it and learn.
I consider myself pretty smart. But if I'm stressed or tired or not concentrating, I can make poor decisions. That's how I ended up with the car I'm driving that had tons of problems. I couldn't return it, so I'm making the best out of the situation.
These parents could have been smart, and set up locks against adult content and all sorts of stuff, but if didn't know that this sort of danger even existed, they didn't consider protecting themselves against it. They should absolutely be entitled to their money back if they can get it, but at the same time it might not be possible, and it will just be another expensive lesson.
Let's say that cash-grabby DLC like this is a danger equivalent to viruses. You take precautions against it, but if you go online there's always some danger. And if you let somebody who's not prepared, like a kid, go on by themselves, the danger increases.
If the kid, while browsing, had picked up a virus that somehow bricked the phone, what would be our reaction? Probably the same.
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So, we've gone round the houses, why do the duo of E-Geek think this way? Want to make money, sociopath, or something else? Why so cold, hard and unforgiving?
Get off your ****ing high horse. Neither Matth nor I are scammers or sociopaths. We feel the way we do because we think that part of being a responsible adult is actually being responsible for your actions. The fact that people exist who prey on the gullible does not, in our book, absolve you from that responsibility.
At the heart of this matter is a business practice that is perfectly legal. Yes, it can and is used by predators, but that does not mean that this business practice should be abolished. It means that the predators need to be brought to account.
I will repeat it one last time for you, Lorric: If you give your children access to your bank account, and they subsequently do things you regret, you can certainly try and cancel those transactions and then deal with the aftermath. But then to go out and proclaim to everyone that it was the fault of those evil evil app developers and Things Should Be Done to stop their activities, that's not responsible behaviour in our book.
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So, we've gone round the houses, why do the duo of E-Geek think this way? Want to make money, sociopath, or something else? Why so cold, hard and unforgiving?
Get off your ****ing high horse. Neither Matth nor I are scammers or sociopaths. We feel the way we do because we think that part of being a responsible adult is actually being responsible for your actions. The fact that people exist who prey on the gullible does not, in our book, absolve you from that responsibility.
At the heart of this matter is a business practice that is perfectly legal. Yes, it can and is used by predators, but that does not mean that this business practice should be abolished. It means that the predators need to be brought to account.
I will repeat it one last time for you, Lorric: If you give your children access to your bank account, and they subsequently do things you regret, you can certainly try and cancel those transactions and then deal with the aftermath. But then to go out and proclaim to everyone that it was the fault of those evil evil app developers and Things Should Be Done to stop their activities, that's not responsible behaviour in our book.
If someone made the same mistake twice, my sympathy level would take a drop. But you're saying people should just get burned and the scammers should grow fat. You've got a nasty trap wrapped up in a pretty, kiddy package. Gullible doesn't even come into it, gullibility comes in when it's something that should be common knowledge, this is a new threat, which is why it's in the national news in the UK and the US and probably more countries. A lot of parents won't even know a damn thing about technology, much less be able to keep up with the latest stuff.
Wait a minute, that 2nd paragraph makes no sense. Who said anything about abolishing this type of DLC? No one's going to get badly hurt by some kid downloading some reasonably priced legit DLC. What's needed is to stamp out the predators. At least you don't think they should have a free hand, that's something.
It's not responsible behaviour to stop scammers?Everybody makes mistakes, no matter how smart we normally are. Sometimes smart people are tired or lazy or make assumptions that nobody could be that evil, and then sometimes we pay for the mistakes. Yes, it's very nice if there's a way to recover from a bad mistake, and you absolutely should try it, but a lot of times there's nothing you can do, and you just have to live with it and learn.
I consider myself pretty smart. But if I'm stressed or tired or not concentrating, I can make poor decisions. That's how I ended up with the car I'm driving that had tons of problems. I couldn't return it, so I'm making the best out of the situation.
These parents could have been smart, and set up locks against adult content and all sorts of stuff, but if didn't know that this sort of danger even existed, they didn't consider protecting themselves against it. They should absolutely be entitled to their money back if they can get it, but at the same time it might not be possible, and it will just be another expensive lesson.
Let's say that cash-grabby DLC like this is a danger equivalent to viruses. You take precautions against it, but if you go online there's always some danger. And if you let somebody who's not prepared, like a kid, go on by themselves, the danger increases.
If the kid, while browsing, had picked up a virus that somehow bricked the phone, what would be our reaction? Probably the same.
This is like the point I was trying to make further back in the thread, that mitigating circumstances can cause people to make mistakes they wouldn't normally make.
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Wait a minute, that 2nd paragraph makes no sense. Who said anything about abolishing this type of DLC? No one's going to get badly hurt by some kid downloading some reasonably priced legit DLC. What's needed is to stamp out the predators. At least you don't think they should have a free hand, that's something.
Jesus, you are naive.
If regulatory bodies get involved, they usually do not go for the kind regulation that only impacts the scammers. I mean, have you even thought the whole thing through? At which point does a game's microtransaction strategy become exploitative? What's the metric to use here? Please, in your infinite wisdom, give us the criteria that should be used to divide the app market into good microtransaction-based games and bad microtransaction-based ones.
The definition of "reasonably priced" is unbelievably subjective when it comes to intangible stuff like DLC. What one person sees as a reasonable offer may well be another persons' predatory trap.
It's not responsible behaviour to stop scammers?
Of course it is. But you do that by prosecuting the scammers, not by going after the legal framework they use.
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Wait a minute, that 2nd paragraph makes no sense. Who said anything about abolishing this type of DLC? No one's going to get badly hurt by some kid downloading some reasonably priced legit DLC. What's needed is to stamp out the predators. At least you don't think they should have a free hand, that's something.
Jesus, you are naive.
If regulatory bodies get involved, they usually do not go for the kind regulation that only impacts the scammers. I mean, have you even thought the whole thing through? At which point does a game's microtransaction strategy become exploitative? What's the metric to use here? Please, in your infinite wisdom, give us the criteria that should be used to divide the app market into good microtransaction-based games and bad microtransaction-based ones.
The definition of "reasonably priced" is unbelievably subjective when it comes to intangible stuff like DLC. What one person sees as a reasonable offer may well be another persons' predatory trap.
It's not responsible behaviour to stop scammers?
Of course it is. But you do that by prosecuting the scammers, not by going after the legal framework they use.
No, come on now, this isn't that complicated. It's obvious that this kind of DLC is just very wrong. It wouldn't take a genius. I can't answer it myself because I'm not qualified to, it would require some serious market research. So those are the people you turn to, the people immersed in this industry to provide your regulations, to come up with a reasonable solution. And give the companies a say. The legit companies will outweigh the scammers. They'll want the scammers gone, they put a bad image on the business they're involved with. You can work with them, not against them. A solution will be easy to implement that doesn't touch their businesses but impairs the scammers.
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You are wrong on so many levels it's not even funny.
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You are wrong on so many levels it's not even funny.
Is that so...
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TBH, existing legislation should be able to deal with this; Just need good enough lawyers. Main problem is nobody will be bothered to deal with it unless some overpaid businessman with many lawyers gets affected.
I dislike throwing new legislation as it always ends up being abused and rarely helps the people it was intended to.
We're losing rights all the time; No point in accelerating this! There was a time (At least over here) where it was the spirit of the law that was followed, but as this has changed more to the letter of the law, things become increasingly open to loopholes and abuse.
For stuff like this, education is the better way; Threads like this are good to spread the word, although probably not as useful here since most of us are quite tech savvy, but that just means we have a responsibility to pass to this info to people we know who are vulnerable to this sort of thing.
The fact that it's finally hitting mainstream news will hopefully help a lot (I first heard of this over a year ago and I suspect it was already old news by then!).
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Lorric, just stop. Lately it feels like every time we have an intellectual discussion around here you decide to show up and indiscriminately spray vover-simplification all over it. The sociopath discussion in GD, this discussion here, and a variety of others... it's getting exceedingly tiresome. Batts has called you out for it, I've called you out for it, multiple people here have called you out for it... enough already.
I may not agree with everything Matth, The E, and Fury have discussed in this thread but I still respect the nuance of their viewpoints and the 'sociopath' or uncaring nonsense is just over the ****ing top.
/thread.
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And on that note, I think we can call this quits.