from the finally dept
We talk a lot here about the concept of “ownership” of what we spend money on, particularly as it relates to purchases that are digital or have some reliance on internet connectivity. Despite being related, those two categories are actually quite distinct.
On the one hand, you have situations where a company may go out of business, or a business may no longer “support” a product it sold, where backend infrastructure also gets shut down and results in sold products no longer having the same functionality or, in some cases, becoming expensive paperweights. Some advocate groups have already pressed the FTC to do something, anything about all of this, such that some consumer rights are conferred to the victims of this behavior.
Then there are the purely digital “purchases,” wherein the public is typically not actually buying a “thing,” but rather a limited license to access said thing. Video games, digital music files, and eBooks all come to mind here. Nobody has done all that much on that front, save for some platforms aiming to force sellers to disclose some ownership rights and some companies being a tad more public about how it isn’t actually selling “things” like the public thought.
Senator Ron Wyden appears to be interested in changing that. He has written to the FTC, urging them to require companies to be far more transparent before and during the sale of digital goods as to what ownership rights the buyer actually has.
Wyden’s letter, shared with The Verge, requests guidance to “ensure that consumers who purchase or license digital goods can make informed decisions and understand what ownership rights they are obtaining.”
Wyden wants the guidance to include how long a license lasts, what circumstances might expire or revoke the license, and if a consumer can transfer or resell the license. The letter also calls for the information “before and at the point of sale” in a way that’s easily understandable. “To put it simply, prior to agreeing to any transaction, consumers should understand what they are paying for and what is guaranteed after the sale,” Wyden says.
This simply isn’t a position that should come with much controversy. Consumers knowing what they’re actually buying based on clear and transparent language isn’t a big ask. Hell, it should have been considered table stakes from the beginning. And any pushback from anyone in the digital industries would be very, very telling.
Why would you want to fight back against a requirement that your customers know what they’re buying from you, after all?
“The shift from physical to digital goods presents some complex legal questions,” Wyden says in the letter. “One thing is clear, however: consumers deserve transparency about their ownership rights in digital goods. Guidance from the FTC on this issue will help ensure that digital goods sellers are aware of best practices and that American consumers can make informed buying decisions.”
This should be an absolute slam dunk of a request. And if some ground rules about disclosure can finally be put in place, perhaps we’ll finally have an end to the shock in some cases when a person’s purchases are suddenly whisked away without recourse.
Filed Under: digital goods, ftc, ownership, ron wyden
