What I love about this whole thing is that it’s not just Sony’s fault but they’re getting all the blame because WB would pull all their future content if Sony bad-mouthed them.
Sony choose to not offer refunds. Sony knew the contract when they agreed to sell the content. When something gets pulled from steam I can still download and install it.
Sony entered in a contractual relationship with their customers and by Law the responsability ends there.
If you pay somebody to build you a garden shed and after 5 months of nothing happenning you complain and the builder can just say “sorry, the fly-by-night wood supliers whe paid for the wood just took of with our money, so you’re not going to get a shed and we’ll keep your money”, is that’s alright?!
Imagine what would it do to Trade and Business in general if any supplier could legally screw a customer over because they themselves chose to to engage a fishy entity as their own supplier who screwed them, so they just passed on that loss legally to all their costumers.
No, the way things work is that each contractual relationship is isolated from all others, so Sony got full freedom to chose what kind of contract they signed with WB and what contract they “signed” with their retail customers (note that retail sales are implied Contracts and there are legally mandatory implied clauses in any contracts with retail customers, covering for example legally mandated guarantees periods) - likely profiting a lot by chosing the short-term commitment with WB rather than one that tied WB for, say, 20 years - and any mismatch of obligations that might arise from that is entirelly the responsability of Sony.
Sony got to keep the profits from their own choices of licensing contracts and now it’s up to them to make up for the losses derived from the consequences that choice, on other contracts were they themselves were acting as the supplier.
You should go read the licensing agreement. For all the companies, not just Sony because like I said before they all have done this. WB would sue Sony into the ground for breech of contract if they didn’t remove those shows. They’re doing what they are legally obligated to do. I’m not advocating for letting sony off the hook here. I’m saying this will continue to happen every time a license holder decides to cut out the middleman and make their own streaming service, and unless you hold those license holders accountable it will keep happening because it is legal.
This has happened to date with Sony at least once before, Apple, Google, Spotify, Amazon, and at least half a dozen other streaming services. Nobody ever wants to hold the supplier liable. And your apology analogy doesn’t work. The people got their streamed media. The product was delivered. The license to enjoy that media was for an unspecified time, which has now come to an end because the license holder of that media has decided they don’t want you to have it in that form anymore. They’re the bad guy here. In the event that you say bought physical discs, and they were never delivered because shortly after you made your order, the company you bought from lost the right to sell them they would refund you because they themselves would be refunded when they sent all that physical media back to the supplier. But in this case that’s not what’s happening. So it’s not a one for one analog.
Ultimatelly it depends on the local laws of each country.
In plenty of countries, in Agreements with Retail Customers, there are by Law various things which if present in the Agreement are considered invalid hence null and void. Also there are mandatory “clarity” and “upfront” criteria for certain kinds of Agreements terms.
So not only would Sony have to have in the User Agreement a clause or clauses covering the possibility that purchased viewing rights might be unilaterally withdrawn at any time by Sony, it would have to be in a form considered legally valid in a Legal Jurisdiction (i.e. such clause has to be valid and it has to obbey local regulations on clarity and proeminence and in an User Agreement which is actually valid (EULAs are not valid in most of the World because they are only presented post-sale).
Of course in the “Fuck You Plebes” United States, pretty much everything goes - unless proven otherwise after somebody spent millions in a court case - so an obscure clause in an EULA de facto suffices in pretty much all but the State were Sony America has its HQ.
There is. That’s what I’m telling you. The agreement between the customer and Sony stipulates that the license can be revoked by the license holder at any time and in that case their purchases will not be reimbursed. That language is there specifically to protect them.
But either way you’re failing to take the main point into account which is that WB is not facing backlash for this, but Sony is. Both of them should face this backlash together.
“SONY grants you a limited, non-exclusive, personal, non-transferable license to use the SOFTWARE solely in connection with your compatible device (including, but not limited to, SONY’s products which the SOFTWARE is embedded in or bundled with) (“DEVICE”) solely in accordance with this EULA and the usage instructions as may be made available to you by SONY or the THIRD-PARTY SUPPLIERS. SONY and the THIRD-PARTY SUPPLIERS expressly reserve all rights, title and interest (including, but not limited to, all intellectual property rights) in and to the SOFTWARE that this EULA does not specifically grant to you.”
The license is revoked and is not transferable. Believe me when I say that none of the companies that have had this issue previously have reimbursed their customers in any countries that I can find due to riders like this.
This is an article from the last time this happened with Sony.
TL;DR summary: WB had a contract with Sony, both of which have expensive legal teams and knew exactly what they were getting themselves into, so Sony knowingly chose the cheaper option (a shorter lock-in of the right to make that content available).
Sony had contracts (implied and possibly with an agreement, part or all of which might not even be valid in various legal jurisdictions due to Consumer Protection Legislation) between legally-well-armed Sony and zero-legal-knowledge retail customers which, at minimum was portrayed by Sony in so unclear terms (at worse, purposefully to deceive) that said zero-legal-knowledge retail customers thought they were buying something when contractually it was a rental.
How exactly would WB - who negotiated with a legal expert counterparty who knew exactly what they were doing - to blame rather than Sony - who took advantage of the legal naivity of retail customers and quite possibly is leveraging the high costs of legal action against them so as not to have to refund said customers?
The legally expert and very well funded counterparty - Sony - taking advantage of a non-expert and much less well funded counterparty - retail customers - seems a vastly most likely place for shennennigans than the one between two well funded companies with their own legal experts, Sony and WB.
Sony chose to sign a contract with WB where it did not lock-in WB to certain responsabilities for a large time period - say 20 years - and instead chose a shorter time period (which both Business 101 and Asset Pricing Theory indicate as a cheaper option - locking-in certain rights contractually tends to cost more the longer the lock-in period) and per what you say, covered its liability on the client side with clausules in the user licence agreement that essentially meant they could take away any content their customer purchased.
Even putting aside the legality of those clauses and of the EULA itself (if* it was presented to the client after the client paid, it’s legally deemed is void and null per the legislation in most of the World because it’s considered an attempt at changing the terms of a contract after it has been closed), I don’t see which WB is to blame for Sony having chosen a contract length in their agreement with WB that did not guarantee that Sony’s own clients would not be removed access to the digital media they had been led to believe they bought.
It seems to me that WB had a contractual arrangement with Sony (NOT with Sony’s client’s) with which Sony agreeded (and, having lots of expensive lawyers, it can hardly be claimed that Sony did not fully understood the implications of that contract) and they fullfilled their end of the contract, whilsy Sony on the other hand had a contractual relation with retail customers (which are not expected to be anywhere as good in understanding the ins and outs of that contract as Sony’s Lawyers) and which led many if not most of the retail clients to believe they had purchased something which was not in fact sold and if the EULA was only presented to said retail clients after they paid, it wasn’t even backed by a valid contract.
It seems to me that it was Sony that deceived their clients and (if having done so purposefully, it might amount to Fraud, something a Court Of Law would have to rule on), possibly using clauses which are invalid when used with retail clients or not making it sufficiently clear to said retail clients that the nature of the transaction was not a sale but a rental for an indetermined period (both of these depending very much on the legislation of country that retail client is based) and possibly using means that are not even a valid contract in most jurisdiction (i.e. an EULA which is presented post-payment).
In summary, the WB-Sony contract was between two sets of legal experts of big companies, hence both knew perfectly well what they were getting themselves into, whilst the Sony-Retail_Customer contract was between one set of legal experts and individuals most of which with no legal expertise at all and no access to cheap enough legal expertise to analyse all such contract, and which further, had clauses going against several consumer protection laws in several countrues and possibly (if they did it by that order, which I don’t really know) using an EULA presented to the customer after the sale, something which is null and void in contract terms in most of the World because it’s an unilateral attempt at forcing a change in contract terms after the implied contract of the sale has been closed.
How exactly does it make sense to conclude that its WB - the guys that entered into a clear contract with a legally well advised counterparty - who are to blame, rather than Sony who seem to at the very least misportrayed the nature of the sale they were making to retail costumers (who are not legal experts) possibly using means which aren’t even valid under contract law or due to customer protections?
I mean, I can see how you can claim that Sony’s actions were within their contractual terms with the Retail Customers (especially in the Fuck-You-Pleb US with its nearly non-existent consumer protections) so maybe it is all legal, but blaming WB who had a contractual relationship with Sony, who most definitelly have the lawyers to make sure that contract was exactly as they wanted to is ridiculous - Sony absolutelly had the power to pay more and get a contract with WB which, say, would guaranteed that media sold to consumers by Sony would remain available forever and only new sales would stop at the end of a certain period if WB did not renew the contract, they just chose not to pay more and rely on the expectation that they could screw their own retail customers who would be de facto unable to be compensated because of the cost of pursuing a legal case against Sony to get that compensated.
Did you take into account that WB just merged discovery with HBO which means those shows will more than likely be on the HBO streaming platform which is why WB is not renewing Sony’s licensing agreement?
Those terms (EULA) are included at least twice. The first time when you set up a Sony system such as a PlayStation, and again when you download a streaming app, and again once you decide to purchase something. So there is no “it only showed up after a consumer paid” excuse here. Meaning When these consumers downloaded the discover app they agreed to WB’s TOS or EULA.
You don’t have any proof that they chose a legal contract that was cheaper or that the specified time limit was Sony’s rather than WB’s. You make a lot of assumptions here.
It’s not the responsability of Customers to make sure what Sony’s chosen contractual relationships elsewhere are - Sony can engage in whatever contractual relationships it wants in whichever way it wants (and thus maximize their profits), but if it breaks their side of contract it has to pay the penalties for it, quite independently of why.
This is how Contract Law is designed exactly because otherwised it would make it impossible to Trade: if a purchaser had to track all contractual relationships of each supplier, then as those too were linked to the contracts of their own suppliers, of the supplier of the supplier and so on. So Contract Law neatly isolates each Contract relationship from all the rest and legal responsability starts and stops at that Contract (including the implied Contract in a Retail Sale) and only betwee the parties of that Contract unless very explicitly stated otherwise in the Contract.
So, have customers in this case entered into a Contractual Relationship where Sony gets to pull the plug whenever it feels like for any reason (which are probably invalid contractual conditions for retails customers in plenty of countries, though probably not the US which has near-zero consumer protections) in which case the problem is of the customers, or have they not in which case Sony is the one with the responsability (probably of refunding their customers) and it’s up to Sony to exercise whatever contract clauses they had with WB and claim compensation from them for their own breach of contract, if Sony had such clauses in their contract (if not, it was their own choice, so tough luck)?
What I love about this whole thing is that it’s not just Sony’s fault but they’re getting all the blame because WB would pull all their future content if Sony bad-mouthed them.
Sony choose to not offer refunds. Sony knew the contract when they agreed to sell the content. When something gets pulled from steam I can still download and install it.
How much of that money is theirs to refund? A portion of that sale went to WB? Why is WB not being asked to give a refund?
Sony entered in a contractual relationship with their customers and by Law the responsability ends there.
If you pay somebody to build you a garden shed and after 5 months of nothing happenning you complain and the builder can just say “sorry, the fly-by-night wood supliers whe paid for the wood just took of with our money, so you’re not going to get a shed and we’ll keep your money”, is that’s alright?!
Imagine what would it do to Trade and Business in general if any supplier could legally screw a customer over because they themselves chose to to engage a fishy entity as their own supplier who screwed them, so they just passed on that loss legally to all their costumers.
No, the way things work is that each contractual relationship is isolated from all others, so Sony got full freedom to chose what kind of contract they signed with WB and what contract they “signed” with their retail customers (note that retail sales are implied Contracts and there are legally mandatory implied clauses in any contracts with retail customers, covering for example legally mandated guarantees periods) - likely profiting a lot by chosing the short-term commitment with WB rather than one that tied WB for, say, 20 years - and any mismatch of obligations that might arise from that is entirelly the responsability of Sony.
Sony got to keep the profits from their own choices of licensing contracts and now it’s up to them to make up for the losses derived from the consequences that choice, on other contracts were they themselves were acting as the supplier.
You should go read the licensing agreement. For all the companies, not just Sony because like I said before they all have done this. WB would sue Sony into the ground for breech of contract if they didn’t remove those shows. They’re doing what they are legally obligated to do. I’m not advocating for letting sony off the hook here. I’m saying this will continue to happen every time a license holder decides to cut out the middleman and make their own streaming service, and unless you hold those license holders accountable it will keep happening because it is legal.
This has happened to date with Sony at least once before, Apple, Google, Spotify, Amazon, and at least half a dozen other streaming services. Nobody ever wants to hold the supplier liable. And your
apologyanalogy doesn’t work. The people got their streamed media. The product was delivered. The license to enjoy that media was for an unspecified time, which has now come to an end because the license holder of that media has decided they don’t want you to have it in that form anymore. They’re the bad guy here. In the event that you say bought physical discs, and they were never delivered because shortly after you made your order, the company you bought from lost the right to sell them they would refund you because they themselves would be refunded when they sent all that physical media back to the supplier. But in this case that’s not what’s happening. So it’s not a one for one analog.Ultimatelly it depends on the local laws of each country.
In plenty of countries, in Agreements with Retail Customers, there are by Law various things which if present in the Agreement are considered invalid hence null and void. Also there are mandatory “clarity” and “upfront” criteria for certain kinds of Agreements terms.
So not only would Sony have to have in the User Agreement a clause or clauses covering the possibility that purchased viewing rights might be unilaterally withdrawn at any time by Sony, it would have to be in a form considered legally valid in a Legal Jurisdiction (i.e. such clause has to be valid and it has to obbey local regulations on clarity and proeminence and in an User Agreement which is actually valid (EULAs are not valid in most of the World because they are only presented post-sale).
Of course in the “Fuck You Plebes” United States, pretty much everything goes - unless proven otherwise after somebody spent millions in a court case - so an obscure clause in an EULA de facto suffices in pretty much all but the State were Sony America has its HQ.
There is. That’s what I’m telling you. The agreement between the customer and Sony stipulates that the license can be revoked by the license holder at any time and in that case their purchases will not be reimbursed. That language is there specifically to protect them.
But either way you’re failing to take the main point into account which is that WB is not facing backlash for this, but Sony is. Both of them should face this backlash together.
“SONY grants you a limited, non-exclusive, personal, non-transferable license to use the SOFTWARE solely in connection with your compatible device (including, but not limited to, SONY’s products which the SOFTWARE is embedded in or bundled with) (“DEVICE”) solely in accordance with this EULA and the usage instructions as may be made available to you by SONY or the THIRD-PARTY SUPPLIERS. SONY and the THIRD-PARTY SUPPLIERS expressly reserve all rights, title and interest (including, but not limited to, all intellectual property rights) in and to the SOFTWARE that this EULA does not specifically grant to you.”
The license is revoked and is not transferable. Believe me when I say that none of the companies that have had this issue previously have reimbursed their customers in any countries that I can find due to riders like this.
This is an article from the last time this happened with Sony.
https://www.pcmag.com/news/studio-canal-movies-purchased-on-playstation-store-get-deleted-aug-31#:~:text=This means that anyone who,for the content being removed.
TL;DR summary: WB had a contract with Sony, both of which have expensive legal teams and knew exactly what they were getting themselves into, so Sony knowingly chose the cheaper option (a shorter lock-in of the right to make that content available). Sony had contracts (implied and possibly with an agreement, part or all of which might not even be valid in various legal jurisdictions due to Consumer Protection Legislation) between legally-well-armed Sony and zero-legal-knowledge retail customers which, at minimum was portrayed by Sony in so unclear terms (at worse, purposefully to deceive) that said zero-legal-knowledge retail customers thought they were buying something when contractually it was a rental. How exactly would WB - who negotiated with a legal expert counterparty who knew exactly what they were doing - to blame rather than Sony - who took advantage of the legal naivity of retail customers and quite possibly is leveraging the high costs of legal action against them so as not to have to refund said customers? The legally expert and very well funded counterparty - Sony - taking advantage of a non-expert and much less well funded counterparty - retail customers - seems a vastly most likely place for shennennigans than the one between two well funded companies with their own legal experts, Sony and WB.
Sony chose to sign a contract with WB where it did not lock-in WB to certain responsabilities for a large time period - say 20 years - and instead chose a shorter time period (which both Business 101 and Asset Pricing Theory indicate as a cheaper option - locking-in certain rights contractually tends to cost more the longer the lock-in period) and per what you say, covered its liability on the client side with clausules in the user licence agreement that essentially meant they could take away any content their customer purchased.
Even putting aside the legality of those clauses and of the EULA itself (if* it was presented to the client after the client paid, it’s legally deemed is void and null per the legislation in most of the World because it’s considered an attempt at changing the terms of a contract after it has been closed), I don’t see which WB is to blame for Sony having chosen a contract length in their agreement with WB that did not guarantee that Sony’s own clients would not be removed access to the digital media they had been led to believe they bought.
It seems to me that WB had a contractual arrangement with Sony (NOT with Sony’s client’s) with which Sony agreeded (and, having lots of expensive lawyers, it can hardly be claimed that Sony did not fully understood the implications of that contract) and they fullfilled their end of the contract, whilsy Sony on the other hand had a contractual relation with retail customers (which are not expected to be anywhere as good in understanding the ins and outs of that contract as Sony’s Lawyers) and which led many if not most of the retail clients to believe they had purchased something which was not in fact sold and if the EULA was only presented to said retail clients after they paid, it wasn’t even backed by a valid contract.
It seems to me that it was Sony that deceived their clients and (if having done so purposefully, it might amount to Fraud, something a Court Of Law would have to rule on), possibly using clauses which are invalid when used with retail clients or not making it sufficiently clear to said retail clients that the nature of the transaction was not a sale but a rental for an indetermined period (both of these depending very much on the legislation of country that retail client is based) and possibly using means that are not even a valid contract in most jurisdiction (i.e. an EULA which is presented post-payment).
In summary, the WB-Sony contract was between two sets of legal experts of big companies, hence both knew perfectly well what they were getting themselves into, whilst the Sony-Retail_Customer contract was between one set of legal experts and individuals most of which with no legal expertise at all and no access to cheap enough legal expertise to analyse all such contract, and which further, had clauses going against several consumer protection laws in several countrues and possibly (if they did it by that order, which I don’t really know) using an EULA presented to the customer after the sale, something which is null and void in contract terms in most of the World because it’s an unilateral attempt at forcing a change in contract terms after the implied contract of the sale has been closed.
How exactly does it make sense to conclude that its WB - the guys that entered into a clear contract with a legally well advised counterparty - who are to blame, rather than Sony who seem to at the very least misportrayed the nature of the sale they were making to retail costumers (who are not legal experts) possibly using means which aren’t even valid under contract law or due to customer protections?
I mean, I can see how you can claim that Sony’s actions were within their contractual terms with the Retail Customers (especially in the Fuck-You-Pleb US with its nearly non-existent consumer protections) so maybe it is all legal, but blaming WB who had a contractual relationship with Sony, who most definitelly have the lawyers to make sure that contract was exactly as they wanted to is ridiculous - Sony absolutelly had the power to pay more and get a contract with WB which, say, would guaranteed that media sold to consumers by Sony would remain available forever and only new sales would stop at the end of a certain period if WB did not renew the contract, they just chose not to pay more and rely on the expectation that they could screw their own retail customers who would be de facto unable to be compensated because of the cost of pursuing a legal case against Sony to get that compensated.
Did you take into account that WB just merged discovery with HBO which means those shows will more than likely be on the HBO streaming platform which is why WB is not renewing Sony’s licensing agreement?
Those terms (EULA) are included at least twice. The first time when you set up a Sony system such as a PlayStation, and again when you download a streaming app, and again once you decide to purchase something. So there is no “it only showed up after a consumer paid” excuse here. Meaning When these consumers downloaded the discover app they agreed to WB’s TOS or EULA.
You don’t have any proof that they chose a legal contract that was cheaper or that the specified time limit was Sony’s rather than WB’s. You make a lot of assumptions here.
https://www.playstation.com/en-gb/legal/psn-terms-of-service/
https://www.playstation.com/en-us/legal/psn-terms-of-service/
https://www.ign.com/articles/hbo-maxs-cut-content-to-shift-to-other-streaming-services-as-warner-bros-discovery-prepares-relaunch
https://nofilmschool.com/warner-bros-deleting-purchased-digital-content
Disney did this same thing before they launched Disney+. Paramount and other license holders have done the same.
It’s not the responsability of Customers to make sure what Sony’s chosen contractual relationships elsewhere are - Sony can engage in whatever contractual relationships it wants in whichever way it wants (and thus maximize their profits), but if it breaks their side of contract it has to pay the penalties for it, quite independently of why.
This is how Contract Law is designed exactly because otherwised it would make it impossible to Trade: if a purchaser had to track all contractual relationships of each supplier, then as those too were linked to the contracts of their own suppliers, of the supplier of the supplier and so on. So Contract Law neatly isolates each Contract relationship from all the rest and legal responsability starts and stops at that Contract (including the implied Contract in a Retail Sale) and only betwee the parties of that Contract unless very explicitly stated otherwise in the Contract.
So, have customers in this case entered into a Contractual Relationship where Sony gets to pull the plug whenever it feels like for any reason (which are probably invalid contractual conditions for retails customers in plenty of countries, though probably not the US which has near-zero consumer protections) in which case the problem is of the customers, or have they not in which case Sony is the one with the responsability (probably of refunding their customers) and it’s up to Sony to exercise whatever contract clauses they had with WB and claim compensation from them for their own breach of contract, if Sony had such clauses in their contract (if not, it was their own choice, so tough luck)?