Steam, banning players for being generous?

[Axeli]

Well, it's Valve's house. Either follow their rules or try to find the game elsewhere. Those are their rules, and since that person was in violation of said rules, they have every right to ban his account.

It never ceases to amaze me how ready people these days are to throw away all their consumer rights.

I mean really, lets just let the companies dictate the rules.

Dude, Steam is their platform, so, yeah, they can shut you down if you misbehave. There are usually many other platforms in which to buy games, be it in Retail or any other download service. If I want to smoke in a bar, I go to a bar that allows smoking. I don't go to another persons' bar that specifically says not to pull that shit and expect them to cow-tow to my demands.

I'm all for consumers having as much freedom as possible, so don't get righteous with me. I just understand if I'm using a service such as Steam, there will always be trade offs. If I find these trade offs unacceptable I get the game elsewhere. No one is requiring me or the OP to use Steam.

The difference there is that non-smoking areas or bars are quite justified. Smoking can disturb other customers who use that bar exactly because it doesn't allow smoking, or the bar might want to protect their employees from constant passive smoking.
There are valid reasons for non-smoking rules, hence the law does and should allow businesses to have them.

Allowing businesses to dictate their consumer's rights is another matter entirely. There's a reason for why EULAs are in no way legally binding in countries that have proper consumer rights. Also, this "just don't use that company then" line of thinking is pretty wide-eyed about free market's ability to govern itself through competition.

 

[Jeffro Tull]

What the fuck are you talking about? Valve was cheating the system in the first place by not adjusting the currency. They were essentially cheating European customers and when an American one decides to help them out Valve bans him.

It seems Valve isn't the paragon of virtue everyone though it was.

If they don't like the way the company works, then why even give money to them? Buy games off amazon or something instead of feeding something you hate while looking like a hypocrite at the same time.

That's kind of what I thought about the whole thing. I have no problem with Valve. I've been using Steam since I bought L4D years ago and have never had a issue with them. I would say that if they banned him he was obviously doing something questionable that would have been bad for them business wise. He must have been "gifting" these games a hell of a lot to warrant that kind of attention from Valve. Companies can have questionable practices from time to time, but the companies in question are not always the bad guys. I think a lot of my fellow PC gamers forget this... or blatantly ignore logic... one of the two.

 

[ThreeKneeNick]

He didn't do anything wrong or anything that should be wrong. There is nothing wrong with:

1. Giving money to someone
2. Buying games
3. Giving away games you own

He just completed the circle. There is no logical reason why that shouldn't be allowed. Steam recognized points 2 and 3 (point 1 is out of their jurisdiction) and incorporated it into their service, but at their sole discretion decided that it has a limit. But you can't decide that laws apply only as long as you want them to. Well in a private business you apparently can, but that's the point - its wrong.

 

[Chibz]

He didn't do anything wrong or anything that should be wrong. There is nothing wrong with:

1. Giving money to someone
2. Buying games
3. Giving away games you own

He just completed the circle. There is no logical reason why that shouldn't be allowed. Steam recognized points 2 and 3 (point 1 is out of their jurisdiction) and incorporated it into their service, but at their sole discretion decided that it has a limit. But you can't decide that laws apply only as long as you want them to. Well in a private business you apparently can, but that's the point - its wrong.

I'd like to personally congratulate you on being, seemingly, the only person who gets it.

 

[Holyeskimo]

Not so much "being generous" as deliberately trying to cheat the system. Valve and the publisher may still be making money off of it, but that's like jacking someone's car, but leaving them $10.

I kinda of want to do that now, but i agree with this statement

 

[Vanaron]

He didn't do anything wrong or anything that should be wrong. There is nothing wrong with:

1. Giving money to someone

There is if you do so to cheat your way out of paying taxes.

They have a licensing agreement WITH YOU. Not with the European gamer. Their purchase agreement states that you are purchasing the license to install and play this game to be bound to the Steam account you are making the purchase from, or to one other Steam account AS A GIFT and exclusively through their gifting system.

They can easily prove that these weren't gifts because he was taking money from them. By using their gifting service in the fashion, he's in breach of contract.

What I should be saying is that he didn't break the law, but he doesn't have any legal recourse to get his account back. But hey, you agreed to a contract by using Steam (likely a seperate one to use the store, too but I can't remember, it's been a long time since I set up my account.) Not to mention that if Valve were complicit in this, they could likely be in legal trouble in other countries for circumventing their tax or other commerce laws (which are likely the reasons that the prices are higher).

Actually, no. Usually things cost more in europe due to the costs involved with shipping. This is just the publishers being greedy.

If you're European I'd recommend picking up a non-american copy of a game and checking where it was produced.

 

[Chibz]

There is if you do so to cheat your way out of paying taxes.

Here's the best way to summarize it. If this is too complicated, then there's no hope of explaining.

Game X (Let's say Turtles in Time. I like Turtles in Time) costs $50 to buy where I live, new. But someone else has to pay $60. I have someone transfer money over to my bank account in order for me to buy it. They give me the exact change, I purchase the game on their behalf and mail it out. Savings had by them. The only person who got "cheated" is the store near where he lives.

Oh, and by the way? Private citizens exchanging goods/services aren't required, by law, to collect tax.

 

[Vanaron]

There is if you do so to cheat your way out of paying taxes.

Here's the best way to summarize it. If this is too complicated, then there's no hope of explaining.

Game X (Let's say Turtles in Time. I like Turtles in Time) costs $50 to buy where I live, new. But someone else has to pay $60. I have someone transfer money over to my bank account in order for me to buy it. They give me the exact change, I purchase the game on their behalf and mail it out. Savings had by them. The only person who got "cheated" is the store near where he lives.

Oh, and by the way? Private citizens exchanging goods/services aren't required, by law, to collect tax.

They are if the product gets shipped through international lines... Which happens to be the case.

 

[Chibz]

They are if the product gets shipped through international lines... Which happens to be the case.

Actually, no. They aren't. I import many things, and have never once had anything of the sort charged. Very rarely are private citizens expected to collect tax.

With my example I'd probably get charged S&H and shipping fees, but I wouldn't have to charge tax.

And do you silly people even know what a VAT is?

Value added tax, a consumption tax levied on value added

Here's the great thing. No value is added between me (in my example) or the fellow in the OP's story. VAT isn't applicable. He paid any VAT that applies in his own country. It's in the clear.

Valve should've been honest about their motivations. It was to avoid butthurt publishers.

 

[Arker]

They're fully within their right to do that as well, but you're forgetting that they do indeed have higher tax rates over there, as well as they likely have to pay for upkeep on things like servers to download purchases from, people to maintain these servers, offices for these people to work from, customer support representatives for these areas, etc etc etc which would all factor into costs.

In the end, it doesn't matter WHY there was a price difference. Valve made two different offers to two different people, one person sold the offer he was getting to other people and utilized a system for gifts to complete a sales transaction.

It's like this. We both enter a store, and they're selling... I don't know, a movie. You express interest in the movie. They offer it to me for $20 and you for $30. You really want the movie, so I take you to one side and offer to buy it for you. You give me the money, I buy the film. I hand it to you.

The store owner gets butthurt over you getting the film for $10 less and bans me from the store for life.

Perfect analogy.

 

[Chibz]

I think most of us have established that the this person did something wrong.

Publishers decide the price of STEAM games in Europe and non-American countries because if a game in Australia for example is really cheap on STEAM because it has the American digital distribution price (games in the US are much cheaper) then the retailers won't make as much money which the publishers don't want to let happen. Not sure where you got your facts from.

It's called competition. It makes capitalism work.

What this really comes down to is how much authority over your purchases you believe corporations should have. I firmly stand in the "Once I hand them the money they can zark right off" crowd. The control they have over my copy of the game should be exactly zero. I'm unwilling to compromise any consumer rights for their convenience.

Also completely ignore the fact I've proven the other "side" wrong consistantly then sure, we've established what you say.

 

[veloper]

They are if the product gets shipped through international lines... Which happens to be the case.

Actually, no. They aren't. I import many things, and have never once had anything of the sort charged. Very rarely are private citizens expected to collect tax.

With my example I'd probably get charged S&H and shipping fees, but I wouldn't have to charge tax.

It's a matter of scale.
Do it with alot of games at once and the authorities will take your money (import tax), provided they catch you.
The max value simply allowed through is around 20 euros, but most of the time small things just slip through anyway.
If it does happen, you may not agree, but that won't help you.

I reckon if it had been only a few games, the guy wouldn't have been banned from Steam either. Again not because Valve aren't allowed to, but because it wouldn't be worth the bother.

 

[Chibz]

Actually, no. They aren't. I import many things, and have never once had anything of the sort charged. Very rarely are private citizens expected to collect tax.

With my example I'd probably get charged S&H and shipping fees, but I wouldn't have to charge tax.

It's a matter of scale.
Do it with alot of games at once and the authorities will take your money (import tax), provided they catch you.
The max value simply allowed through is around 20 euros, but most of the time small things just slip through anyway.
If it does happen, you may not agree, but that won't help you.

I reckon if it had been only a few games, the guy wouldn't have been banned from Steam either. Again not because Valve aren't allowed to, but because it wouldn't be worth the bother.[/quote]

If it's OK to do once, it's OK to do several times. Again, it really comes down to greed. That and... People don't like to think of valve as anything other than a paragon of virtue. They aren't one, and their fanboys just need to deal with it.

They're wrong, they remain wrong.

 

[veloper]

Actually, no. They aren't. I import many things, and have never once had anything of the sort charged. Very rarely are private citizens expected to collect tax.

With my example I'd probably get charged S&H and shipping fees, but I wouldn't have to charge tax.

It's a matter of scale.
Do it with alot of games at once and the authorities will take your money (import tax), provided they catch you.
The max value simply allowed through is around 20 euros, but most of the time small things just slip through anyway.
If it does happen, you may not agree, but that won't help you.

I reckon if it had been only a few games, the guy wouldn't have been banned from Steam either. Again not because Valve aren't allowed to, but because it wouldn't be worth the bother.

If it's OK to do once, it's OK to do several times. Again, it really comes down to greed. That and... People don't like to think of valve as anything other than a paragon of virtue. They aren't one, and their fanboys just need to deal with it.

They're wrong, they remain wrong.[/quote]

You appear to have messed up the quotes there, but no, just because people usually get away with small things, don't even make them right.

 

[ComNetCom]

If a game costs ?50 in retail, and ?35 on steam, it's not really competitive anymore.

I'm guessing that (besides taxing), Steam has to up the price in order to allow retail to stay competitive.

Just a hunch though.

 

[Gralian]

I suppose being generous is cheating the system, but one has to ask two things in regards to steam's policies:

1) Why do prices vary so dramatically between European / British / American / Australian currency? Why can't games cost the same (roughly)? It can't be that hard to convert currency into a fair standard price.

2) If Valve don't want people using this method of getting games for cheaper by having friends purchase them internationally and then gifting them, why do they promote the idea of gifting games? In fact, why do they even allow international gifting? It really smacks of double standard. It's almost like if you saw a free sample tray, went to take a piece, then took more pieces before being thrown out of the store for taking too many free samples. Except in this case, the person giving the free samples is still paying money to the distributor and is happy to give away the free samples in the first place.

 

[deth2munkies]

Right then, I'm gonna go down to Mexico, buy a ton of X for cheaper than the US price, drive back, and sell it all. If the companies found out and had the gumption to, they could sue my ass off for re-selling their products specifically NOT intended for resale, especially if I classified all transactions as "gifts" to avoid taxes.

He got what he deserved.

 

[veloper]

I suppose being generous is cheating the system, but one has to ask two things in regards to steam's policies:

1) Why do prices vary so dramatically between European / British / American / Australian currency? Why can't games cost the same (roughly)? It can't be that hard to convert currency into a fair standard price.

The euro thing is for the greater part still due to VAT being included in the price in euroland, even with the weaker dollar there is now. This has been explained countless times before.
Generally, consumer prices don't follow the currency rates which fluctuate from day to day.

The Australian difference is inexplicable however.

2) If Valve don't want people using this method of getting games for cheaper by having friends purchase them internationally and then gifting them, why do they promote the idea of gifting games? In fact, why do they even allow international gifting? It really smacks of double standard. It's almost like if you saw a free sample tray, went to take a piece, then took more pieces before being thrown out of the store for taking too many free samples. Except in this case, the person giving the free samples is still paying money to the distributor and is happy to give away the free samples in the first place.

Ask Valve. Maybe they reckoned the actual gifting won't happen on a large scale, because people aren't very altruistic.

 

[Odbarc]

Not so much "being generous" as deliberately trying to cheat the system. Valve and the publisher may still be making money off of it, but that's like jacking someone's car, but leaving them $10.

Isn't more like stealing their car and leaving $20 000?

 

[Gralian]

The euro thing is for the greater part still due to VAT being included in the price in euroland, even with the weaker dollar there is now.

I appreciate the response, but i will say one thing. We have VAT added to our prices in jolly ol' England too and we pay in pounds sterling. Yet the difference in cost between Euro and Pound is still there. Not only that, but as far as i know, Scandinavians have to pay in their own currency too, i'm fairly sure Swedes have to pay in SEK. I don't know what their prices are like, but i'd bet their prices are even more wacky too.