[Lorric]

"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! 

A surprising piece of information to know.

[MatthTheGeek]

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.

[Lorric]

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?

[MatthTheGeek]

Obviously ? Serves them right.

[Lorric]

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.

[The E]

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.

[Lorric]

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.

[Fury]

I don't think this is a productive topic anymore and should be closed. We're just circling here now.

[Lorric]

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?

[MatthTheGeek]

There's a difference between personal responsibility and punishing someone for making a mistake

Actually, those are sort of the exact same thing.

[Lorric]

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.

[Scourge of Ages]

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.

[The E]

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.

[Lorric]

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.

[The E]

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.

[Lorric]

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.

[MatthTheGeek]

You are wrong on so many levels it's not even funny.

[Lorric]

You are wrong on so many levels it's not even funny.

Is that so...

[Cyker]

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!).

[MP-Ryan]

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.