Valve Under Threat of Legal Action from German Consumer Group

[Shawn Zipay]

October 10 is the deadline set for Valve to come up with a response to the demands made by the Federation of German Consumer Organization regarding Steam's new EULA terms. A representative for the organization said that if Valve does not respond by this deadline, they will move to "resolve the dispute in court."

Back in August, Valve modified the Steam Subscriber Agreement, which provided a deterrence from suing Valve over frivolous issues. It also did not properly address the fact that a EU court ruling in July allows for the resale of digital goods. This is the issue that the German consumer group has a beef with.

The group also claims that Valve illegally coerced users into consenting to the new EULA. How? Apparently, it's because Valve would not grant access to their Steam library of paid titles until they agreed to the new terms.

This is not the first game developer that the group has set their sights on. In July, they went after Blizzard, claiming that they did not do enough to inform German consumers that Diablo III would require a persistent online connection to play the game.

How this matter is resolved may set a new precedent for many publishers and future legal battles. This includes EA who set up a similar EULA for Origin prior to Valve implementing their updated EULA for Steam.

(via Cinema Blend)

[SgtMattBaker]

Man, everybody is suing everybody ... we should jump on the bandwagon and sue that other TGN for ... erm, something.

[Shawn Zipay]

I'm not sure "making Zips' life a living hell" is grounds for legal action.

[K-16]

Harassment and misrepresentation can be made valid if we all gather together and do a class-action lawsuit. I mean yeah, we don't even have circumstantial evidence against the spamming TGN, but uh...... We can make it a valid litigation simply with sheer numbers. Yep... Sheer numbers... Class-action lawsuit! Just uh... Provide a copy of two years' worth of Twitter and YouTube comments and we'll file the claim and have random lawyers from around the world make it all official or something. I'm sure the TGN/CS-Nation community knows a relative or two who are lawyers and willing to do this for free (until we win).

[CptainCrunch]

Im all for this.

[DunkinSPE]

Would be funny if Valve just pulled out of the German market. No new games or purchases from that area. Exit that market and see what happens.

[Vreki]

The group also claims that Valve illegally coerced users into consenting to the new EULA. How? Apparently, it's because Valve would not grant access to their Steam library of paid titles until they agreed to the new terms.

I am not a fan of frivolous lawsuits, but I don't think they should be able to lock you out of your own games if you don't like a new EULA.
This could undermine the trust of Steams business model.

[DunkinSPE]

Honestly who sits down and really reads the EULA's? Every MMO out there has one. I've probably accidently given rights of my firstborn child over to a game company at some point. Heck if you hit decline on any SOE's games it exits the game until you log back in and agree. Microsoft has done the same thing for years with their OS. If they are going after Valve they sure as hell better go after Microsoft.

I mean the digital product you purchase from Steam is essentially a license to play a game for a set price. But the actual product is a set of files stored on their servers which once you pay the license fee they allow you to access according to the customer agreement you accept at the point of sale. At the sale screen there is all that fine print about it being a digital good. We should all understand that in buying a digital good that it is up to us as consumers to realize that we are getting an access key not a "Physical Product". If we were buying a physical product we could box it up and sell it. But how do you box up a license key to a game that is stored on a server that you don't own tied to an activation method that is proprietary to the company that created it? I think that's the issue here is the benefit of today's technology effecting the ability to trade a good after an initial sale. Common Law is still behind the technology curve.

If I were Vale I would look at creating a Steam Premier service where they charge you and extra $5-$10 and send you hard copy of the game and possibly give some sort of secondary key that can be used to activate a game again a year after purchase.

I don't buy the games because I trust valve. I buy them because they are the right product, at the right price, at the right time. And the life expectancy of any trade-able good varies. I don't expect Valve to keep the same set of games on their server for perpetuity. How many people still have 5 inch floppy drives on their rigs today so they can play Oregon Trail old school style?

[Shawn Zipay]

Many people read the EULA's, especially if they live in a country where EULA's are not legally binding. This is more than just the EULA though. This has a lot to do with the ruling by the EU courts saying that people are permitted to resell their virtual goods, such as purchased video games.

It's largely the EU court's ignorance of the system that led to this but since it's a legal ruling now, it doesn't much matter what the opinion is. Either Valve fights it or they have to find an alternative means to legally resolve the situation.