Origin/Sony PSN User Agreements

Wondering if anyone else has been paying attention to this? Sort of old news, not sure if it's been posted already.

Sony: You must agree, cannot sue Sony in a class suit.

Origin: EA takes it further by no trial by jury.

 

I know double post, but wanted to keep OP just about the topic. Second post is what I surmise from reading other sources.

This pretty much amounts to asking the user to waive their civil rights. As a US citizen, you have the right to a trial by jury of your peers. EA's new user agreements appears to be asking you to waive that right, that all citizens are given by the constitution.

Sony asking users to waive their right to bring forth a collective class action suit is pretty much asking their customers to whittle down their power in court. Sony can still bring forth their army of lawyers, while customers are limited now to their single power of one, facing off against a corporation and giant law firms. How fair is that? With class action suit, a collective power represented by a firm that is able and willing to face Sony's arsenal of lawyers is only fair.

 

to bad for them i never agreed to these therm and never will

 

Yes. But think of how many who have. If you don't agree, then you can't play BF3, Star Wars or use Sony's PSN.

I hope this isn't going to be trend in gaming where before playing any game, I have to waive my civil rights to play it.

 

those terms would not hold in this country. if you want to sue them, you certainly can. they may hold in some countries (few, if any). private companies do not control the court system and cannot (directly) change the law. (Large companies can pay lobbyists to influence law, but they can't rewrite laws in their terms of service and expect them to be upheld).

 

Wouldn't surprise me if Sony and EA can get away with this. I'm no lawyer, but pretty sure EA and Sony has an army of lawyers that helped to write these EULA changes.

 

I dont see the big deal about this at all.
Nearly all of the End User Agreements include crap like this.

Apple's EULA is pretty horrid too but its not cool enought to bash them anymore. xD

 

As it's been said, writing something an EULA is something and enforcing that in court is something else. I could Sony's stand depending on the judge since it doesn't prevent you from suing altogether. However i can't see how EA's will stand in the US or Canada.

 

You can write that you are allowed to kill your customers in numbers, that doesnt mean that you wont get faceplanted by SWAT and taken to jail if you do.

 

What you just said is idiotic. EA/Sony has lawyers that are this dumb? It's not even worth mentioning.

 

Who said its limited to Sony and EA?
What if for example Coca Cola wrote that if you drink a bottle of their mechandise, they own all the cells in your body?

 

They aren't dumb, but they might assume you are. If the EULA can't be enforced in court, but prevents people from suing because they think it can be, then it's still a win situation for Sony/EA.

 

I don't own a PS3 but i would never agreed to such a agreement. Was thinking about getting one but i'll get a 360 now..

 

The do say this.

You "cant" sue them for millions of dollars by agreeing with the eula. Every single one of those companies do it. Same goes for the privacy clause:

 

Yes, it is idiotic, but it's absolutely true. 90% of people though, would look at that clause and say "derp, I agreed not to sue them, guess I can't!"

 

LOL. I was going to say that. You can put whatever you want in a EULA, but it doesn't make it law, or even legal itself for that matter.

 

Thankfully EULAs have a good chance to flop if taken into court. Also, I read a few days ago that in the case of Sony's EULA you can mail them to disagree to that specific point without voiding the rest of the EULA.

 

Let's imagine a relatively farfetched scenario (sarcasm). Let's say, that due to negligence, your personal information is leaked by sony, and subsequently your identity is stolen. It takes you a year's worth of time to reclaim your identity, along with thousands of dollars.

Or, lets imagine an actually farfetched scenario. Let's say that sony releases their next big game (Killzone 6 / Gran Turismo 6 / Metal Gear Solid 6) and, for whatever reason, the disc has the effect of causing your PS3 to overheat and catch fire. It burns your house down, and all PS3's which run this disc will catch fire. You desire to start a suit against sony for damages, but you remember that you AGREED not to sue, so you decide you can't.

If you feel like suing sony at that point, it's not like the courts will just say "Derp- you AGREED to not sue! Sorry!" If you want to sue sony, more likely than not it is because sony broke their end of the agreement. Whether that is something specific and explicit (who do they share your personal information with?) or something implicit (sony implicitly agrees not to burn your house down with fire) - more likely than not Sony will break the agreement first.

 

well we will see whos laughing when i dont buy another EA product i pretty sure there are laws in some countrys were asking a consumer to wave all their rights is ilegal ( not to sure).

 

ugh...trying to explain this crap is futile.

if you're going to boycott ea over this, might as well boycott everyone.

 

Right. Pretty much every game or service has some EULA similar to this one. So you've likely already played games with a similar EULA.

 

But there are more reasons to hate EA than other companies. EULA's aside, EA still has a nasty habit of ruining anything they come into contact with.

 

Exactly. So why harp on stupid things that aren't unique to EA?

 

Still, it doesn't make it right. End of the day, people should try to stay in the know and speak with their money. Only way to be heard by these companies. Somehow I doubt people will though...

 

So the solution is to not buy video games because of an unenforceable EULA?

 

If I recall correctly, LindenLabs (the makers of Second Life) had a clause which stated that you had to use a mediator rather than the court system and that did not fly with the judge...

 

Defending your case in court isnt as simple as "do" or "dont". Sometimes you will have a good chance of winning the case, sometimes you wont but what does matter is your country laws, not some user agreement.

 

What people are saying about it making people less inclined to take them to court could be partly true, however there's also the fact that most people don't read the terms and so wouldn't know that they're supposedly not allowed to sue Sony/EA in the first place.

Has there ever actually been a case where an EULA has held up in court?

 

Apple v. Psystar, Vernor v. Autodesk.

 

And those are related to games and gaming consoles how? Those are for corporations trying to utilize the software on a for-sale basis on their hardware not an individual playing a game.

 

He asked if there was ever a case where a EULA held up to legal challenge in court. There are. Those relate more to DMCA provisions and have actual law backing them up, but still, the EULA was deemed to be enforceable.

This is a different situation, of course, but a question was asked and I answered it.

 

I for one only buy PSN cards now (as opposed to putting my CC online)

Sorry but anyone who has that many security problems is too irresponsible to handle my information.

As for EA, thanks for a heads up