Steam, banning players for being generous?

omicron1

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Mar 26, 2008
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Valve. The longer you use them, the better grip they gain on your throat.
They've got a $1000 weight hanging over my head right now, so you betcha I'm staying on their good side. I really like their good side, though, so I'm not complaining. :)
 

Blue_vision

Elite Member
Mar 31, 2009
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AndyFromMonday said:
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.
 

XzarTheMad

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Oct 10, 2008
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What part of this surprises people? You circumvent a system and cost them money. You aren't allowed to sell Steam games, end of story. There's nothing "generous" about this, sure, it may seem generous of this guy to do it, but ultimately it should come as no surprise that what he's doing is wrong. No matter what people might think, there are reasons why the games are more expensive in Europe than in America. I don't agree with their "1 euro = 1 dollar" deal, but I simply cannot comprehend how ANYONE could be surprised that this guy would get the axe.

If he had simply gifted the games I would have wondered what was up, but selling games when it's been proven time and time again to be against the rules.. come on, people.

Also, VAC bans =/= Steam Ban. If your Steam acc. is banned, it's bye-bye games. VAC is just their secure servers. Simple enough.
 

PunkyMcGee

A Clever Title
Apr 5, 2010
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Zer_ said:
Gather said:
http://www.reddit.com/r/gaming/comments/fk90z/steam_support_bans_my_account_for_gifting/

Can't help but pray and think it's a hoax but;

http://i.imgur.com/r6zVW.png

A little introduction. During the Christmas sales of 2010, I gifted many non-American users Steam games at the American prices (Steam prices in USD for most games is a lot cheaper than the EUR/GBP price). The non-US person Paypals me X USD (X = the price of the game in USD), and I gift them the game. I did with around 20 people or so. Everyone is happy; the non-US player saves money, and Valve/the publisher is still getting paid for the game. I guess Valve wasn't so happy, however...

Has this ever happened to anyone here who helped European gamers save some cash by gifting them the games for cheaper? I am mainly surprised since I see nothing about it in their ToS, etc. (though I may have missed it). Valve and the publishers are technically not losing anything. Based on my account being banned, do you think the prices are just raised for non-US "because they can"? If it was due to currency conversion, why would they ban me? Just some food for thought...
(Taken from the link)
Maybe you should read a little further. The guy was circumventing Steam. He was receiving money through PayPal (in USD) so he can use that money and purchase games for Europeans. He wasn't really gifting them anything. Buying a game, and gifting overseas is perfectly fine (The Steam TOS says so). What this user was doing is against the terms of service.
this

you sign a contract every time you buy a game, It's not steams fault that he checked the box without reading it.
 

Antari

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Nov 4, 2009
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If you were doing it with a large number of people this equates to tax evasion. The difference in prices for the EU games are import taxes. Because Valve/Steam is American. Either they get mad at you, or both governments gets mad at them when tax season rolls around and they add up all the numbers.
 

AndyFromMonday

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Feb 5, 2009
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Blue_vision said:
AndyFromMonday said:
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.
Are you actually supporting a company that purposely cheats their customers?

Antari said:
The difference in prices for the EU games are import taxes.
There's import tax on digital data now? Are you serious?
 

alittlepepper

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Feb 14, 2010
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I've gifted cross-continent before, once or twice. I imagine it's just that he did so much of it at once that it set up a flag in the system. Steam was kind of dickish about the whole thing though, I agree. Dude was just being nice and trying to share games; they get their money either way, why ban the guy?
 

Zer_

Rocket Scientist
Feb 7, 2008
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AndyFromMonday said:
Blue_vision said:
AndyFromMonday said:
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.
Are you actually supporting a company that purposely cheats their customers?

Antari said:
The difference in prices for the EU games are import taxes.
There's import tax on digital data now? Are you serious?
Yes, there are. It's there by law. Nobody can circumvent VAT taxes. Any attempts to do so can be considered tax evasion (which is what this user could have easily been providing to people).

Shit people, why are you all surprised by this? He was breaking the TOS and possibly breaking the law.

A little introduction. During the Christmas sales of 2010, I gifted many non-American users Steam games at the American prices (Steam prices in USD for most games is a lot cheaper than the EUR/GBP price). The non-US person Paypals me X USD (X = the price of the game in USD), and I gift them the game. I did with around 20 people or so. Everyone is happy; the non-US player saves money, and Valve/the publisher is still getting paid for the game. I guess Valve wasn't so happy, however...
Yeah, the bolded part. Read. Comprehend before posting.
 
Sep 14, 2009
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Antari said:
If you were doing it with a large number of people this equates to tax evasion. The difference in prices for the EU games are import taxes. Because Valve/Steam is American. Either they get mad at you, or both governments gets mad at them when tax season rolls around and they add up all the numbers.

this.

unfortunately, its all numbers, and if you get caught going around the system, you will get squashed, end of story.
 
Feb 13, 2008
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Of course, we can perfectly believe the OP (OoP) that he hadn't done anything else wrong...just like the autism kid and the 4 year old Smurfberry case.

Legally, he's broke the ToS, so they have a right to withdraw them as he's broken the contract.

Whether they're right to do that is a different matter, but they are fully allowed to do it.
 

Antari

Music Slave
Nov 4, 2009
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AndyFromMonday said:
Blue_vision said:
AndyFromMonday said:
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.
Are you actually supporting a company that purposely cheats their customers?

Antari said:
The difference in prices for the EU games are import taxes.
There's import tax on digital data now? Are you serious?
If its imported and they can tax it .. you can bet they will. But yes .. Digital Downloads are considered a physical item as far as the tax man is concerned.
 

Blue_vision

Elite Member
Mar 31, 2009
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AndyFromMonday said:
Are you actually supporting a company that purposely cheats their customers?
Are you actually avoiding answering directly?

Again, if you don't like the business practice of a company, it generally doesn't make sense to continue to pay for their service, especially when other options exist.
This guy was liberating the poor European gamers from Steam's iron grip? Well, that's okay... so long as Valve's destroyed every electronics store in Europe, and blocked all other online games retailers. Otherwise, this guy's a hypocrite. "I don't like the business practices of this company, but I'll still pay them large sums of money to get my elsewhere easily acquired merchandise, but I'll just be snarky about it."
 

V8 Ninja

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May 15, 2010
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While this may first seem like Valve being complete dicks, you have got to look at what was happening in the grand scheme; European users were paying the American user, who then gifted the games to the European users. Who is to say that the American user couldn't (and didn't) lie to the European users and say that the games were more expensive then they actually were? The American user could have been profiting off of the European users through Steam, and I'm sure Valve doesn't want something like this to be happening behind-the-scenes.
 

AndyFromMonday

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Feb 5, 2009
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Blue_vision said:
AndyFromMonday said:
Are you actually supporting a company that purposely cheats their customers?
Are you actually avoiding answering directly
No, I'm not. You asked me a question and I decided to answer your question with another question. And since you know I use Steam it should be pretty obvious I've only bought 2 games on there, Left 4 Dead 2 and Call of Duty 4. I have not been continuously supplying that company with money but that's besides the point. The point is, this business practice is deplorable and giving your attitude I'm going to assume you're American since you seem to not give a fuck about people who are affected by this.

Antari said:
If its imported and they can tax it .. you can bet they will. But yes .. Digital Downloads are considered a physical item as far as the tax man is concerned.
That is complete and utter bullshit. It's a digital item with absolutely no manufacturing costs. I'm fairly sure VAT isn't added to that. That would be illegal, wouldn't it?
 

KhaoticOne

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Apr 29, 2010
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Isnt there a reason theres a price change between regions? Like to try to set a specific value towards a product (games in this sense), and different currency is worth more or less than others.

But going back on topic, this seems to be more or less like a Loophole, and Valve do not like that. Like with the Halos on TF2.

I feel both parties are wrong in some sense.
 

Troublesome Lagomorph

The Deadliest Bunny
May 26, 2009
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Gindil said:
Bobic said:
If your steam account gets banned do you lose access to all the games you bought for yourself?
No. You just lose access to Steam secured servers.
Wrong. Having been banned myself, I assure you, you lose EVERYTHING.
OT: I say wtf at this. I have not seen any currency conversion where I live (non-US resident).

Then again... we use the American dollar down here, so I probably don't apply.
 

Antari

Music Slave
Nov 4, 2009
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AndyFromMonday said:
Blue_vision said:
AndyFromMonday said:
snip.
Antari said:
If its imported and they can tax it .. you can bet they will. But yes .. Digital Downloads are considered a physical item as far as the tax man is concerned.
That is complete and utter bullshit. It's a digital item with absolutely no manufacturing costs. I'm fairly sure VAT isn't added to that. That would be illegal, wouldn't it?
The government makes the laws ... They make the taxes. I'm quite sure its legal for them to do it to us. Taxes are rarely designed to be fair to anyone but the people who made them.
 

FarleShadow

New member
Oct 31, 2008
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No sympathy here.
Reality check people, you don't shit where you play and when you've got a steam account with all your games and then TRY AND RIP OFF STEAM you deserve the righteous asskicking of bannhaaammmmaaarr.

Summary:
Idiot rips off steam, loses account, cries. Internet points and laughs.