Sony deletes more movies from the accounts of people who ‘bought’ them

jmclnx

And yet Sony wonders why people pirate their movies. In this case here the owners who had their movies stolen should be able to steal them back.

robin_reala

Obviously media permanence is the best solution, but in the absence of that we just need laws that say that if the purchase isn’t time limited to something a reasonable user would consider a rental (48hrs? a week?) then companies that withdraw access rights need to refund in full the purchase cost.

pluralmonad

Hopefully most of these folks that have been scammed know how to sail the high seas.

lemoncookiechip

If they offered refunds this would still be terrible. They don't even offer refunds.

trencedamp

I read recently that PlayStation users are moving to PC en masse, and also Xbox has been gutted by layoffs, and there's a backlash against Nintendo for the switch 2 pricing. Is the age of the console finally coming to an end?

CafeRacer

I've sold my PS5 several months ago. You can get a pretty gameable laptop and gog/steam prices are better. And I can install mods. Tree Sentinel Thomas Mod for example.

mortenjorck

As bad as this is, it’s worth noting that this is the same incident that was widely reported earlier this month. Sony has only rugpulled hundreds of purchased titles from customers once this year. So far.

cubefox

Interesting also that even this article doesn't mention "DRM" anywhere despite the fact that this is exactly the worst case scenario DRM critics have always warned about. (Personally I would consider DRM okay if Sony's behavior here was illegal without a full refund.)

goldenarm

IANAL, but is it illegal to have a "Buy" button that is just a disguised "Rent" button? If not, should we change the law?

acd

Isnt there an issue with "Buy" and different countries marketing laws? Ie it implies "Hold" or "TemporaryKeep". Guess it will be an upswing of BlueRay movies. Already happening with LPs and CDs

bogometer

if you cant hold it your hands, you don't own it. used dvd and bluray on ebay are cheaper anyway. another underutilized resource - the public library - mine has a huge catalog of movies you can borrow for free.

WalterGR

For more recent takes: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48747389 - "Sony Deletes 551 Movies PlayStation Owners Paid For" (reclaimthenet.org) 636 points | 15 days ago | 304 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48730904 - "Sony erases digital content from libraries" (arstechnica.com) 184 points | 16 days ago | 76 comments

CommanderData

Everyone of these stories makes a great case for piracy. Torrents or illegal online streaming sites.

xvxvx

They removed ‘A Shaun The Sheep Movie: Farmageddon’. OK Sony, this is war.

chaostheory

I guess they want the masses to start sailing the high seas again

butterfi

Its all a bit hand wavy nonsense. Own a physical copy? How long until its unplayable because either the media corrupts or the player isn't available? The only real "ownership" is the IP, everything else is just renting.

shevy-java

Well - I actually think the problem is not Sony being malicious here, per se, but the legislation. There has to be a guarantee as if it were a physical copy, as-is. The right to repair movement has the same cause ultimately. You purchase something, you own it, no matter what counter-legalese is tried. The USA really needs to stop being a corporate-country. Weren't the republicans all about the people at one point in time? Now they are all about the billionaires and family dynasties pillaging what they can, with the forerunner the mad orange king pillaging the most. And starting wars he loses by default, after promising to not start wars.

21asdffdsa12

Once its deleted it becomes a indefinite p(irate) license.

MYEUHD

Previous discussions: Sony Deletes 551 Movies PlayStation Owners Paid For (294 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48747389 Sony erases digital content from libraries (74 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48730904

xpct

If you bought movies on a digital platform that would later go under (could be Sony one day), what would happen to your collection? Is it transferable in any way? If not, it's already a risk no matter which platform you use.