Today there seems to be a sentiment that a great evil has been slain. Alas! The evil DRM has been defeated! HURRAAAAAAAAH! Let us celebrate in triumph about how we now have the right to do whatever with a disc that we want!
Or it seems that way on the surface. But what is lost is something that we didn't have yet. Something that is desperately needed in an increasing digital world where discs are mattering less and less. Increasingly games are bought through non-physical means.
Entire things like steam and origin run purely on digital content and have no physical media support. Many games are now sold only by downloading off of playstation network or xbox arcade.
But games purchased this way have a severe flaw. You have no ownership of the game. You have a licence to play it, but you do not own it.
Can you pass on the license of a digital game after it has been played?
No.
Can you trade in a digital game that has been used?
No.
Can your friends access your digital games?
No.
Can I remove my ownership in any way?
No.
You do not have any consumer rights over digital games at all. You only can play games that you have bought...unless your account is banned. Then you can't play them at all.
So here enters the Xbox One previously. Here in a market where you have no rights over digital games they wanted to do something new. Something fresh. They were going to give you a chance to actually have consumer rights over digital games for once. For the first time you were going to be able to sell a digital product and to share it with people.
Part one: Sharing
Enter the family plan. When you bought an xbox one game, you recived a digital version of it. Essentially you did not buy a physical copy, but a digital copy with a data on a disc to install it if you had a shitty internet connection. This digital version was added to a library which is accessible to you AND ten people who you mark as family. As soon as you activated that digital version, any one of those people could access it. Any one of them could download it and play it. These people could be made up of anyone around the world. As long as you have known them for 30 days, your library would be accessible if they were tagged as your xbox family.
Of course, there were restrictions. The maximum people playing a copy would be limited to the owner and one family member. Two family members couldn't play the same copy. You as an owner would be able to at any time play your game and would never be restricted from playing because someone else was playing. I again repeat that one family member could access the game the owner was playing.
That means you could buy one copy of halo and then message your good friend Timmy. You would access your game and then Timmy can access your copy at the same time and PLAY WITH YOU. That meant that when you bought a game, other people you know can hop into multiplayer with you without having to buy a copy.
Now the same could happen with your friend Bob. But since Bob and Timmy are family members, Bob and Timmy can't use the copy in your library to play with eachother. But you can play with either Bob or Timmy as the owner.
The games you owned were shared with 10 friends. You essentially could let any one of 10 friends borrow a game and multiples can borrow different games at the same time.
Bob can play your version of CoD while Timmy plays Halo with you. You had a digital copy and you had a choice in being able to share that content with others. For once your digital copies could be shared!
It didn't stop there even. You could once per license transfer the license, making one of your friends an owner. Then he would share it with his family. That means that you can buy a game and 10 people would have access it, and then if you transfer it, up to 18 people would have had access to the full game in its lifespan!
Sure the licence could only be transferred once, but it has reached playability by a huge amount of people by the time it can't be transferred again.
Part two: Selling
Since you bought a digital game, you would need some way of deactivate the game to sell it. If you don't deactivate it, you would be able to sell a game and make money off of it while still being able to access the game still. Which isn't fair at all as when you sell something you are supposed to relinquish control over it.
You were going to be allowed to sell your digital license in exchange for money. You then can purchase a licence for another game, even with a used disc. This ensures that you have the right to sell games while at the same time ensuring a way for developers to get money off of every purchase due to having to generate a new license.
You won because you could sell the game and get money back from something you played.
The developers won because a new license meant they got money from it.
Everyone won. Except companies like gamestop because they don't get as huge of a cut anymore due to restrictions on pricing.
For the first time you could sell digital content. This is important because a main part of consumer rights is the ability to sell the things you have.
Part three: The DRM
Oooooh. Time to get to the scary part. The part that was so feared. RESTRICTIONS ARE EVIL!!!
Or not? Digital rights management can be a way of empowerment! It can be a way to ensure ownership and lost of ownership. Sharing and selling of digital content is impossible without digital rights management.
Is it inconvenient? Sure. In some cases it can lock you out of your content becuase of bad circumstances or from abuse.
In bad cases it is used to restrict people from playing to protect against pirating.
But not all DRM has to be bad. And in a second I will evaluate why the DRM that the Xbox One had was actually a good thing.
Because the Xbox One was a digital console primarily, that meant that the physical disc wasn't that useful. It was a way to download the data needed to play a game. Based upon the family sharing, your library was what you used to play your games, basically the same as steam.
Because of this, it is necessary to ensure that the person who is playing a copy of a game actually owns it. Since you didn't need the disc to play at all and 10 people can access it the same time, it changed the nature of the media.
The way it was set up, if you sold the disc without selling the license, you and 10 people still had full access to the game. This is the other side of selling, in that you lose access to something when you sell it.
It isn't fair at all to allow you sell something and still access it. It breaks the whole disadvantage of selling if you still have full access to the content.
To protect against this and to allow this sharing to work, the way a disc works had to change.
Normally in current games the license to play a game is tied to a disc. When you remove the disc you remove the license to play it. You no longer have access to the data.
But in the Xbox One's case, the license would be tied to an account, allowing for the playing without a disc and to share the data without a disc.
That meant that you had to activate the data on your account before you could play it. Otherwise you can play games you don't really own. And that isn't fair at all.
The other part was the once a day check in. This was vital as well to ensure that you still owned the game. This allowed for you to sell the license because it would update your library so that way you or other people can't access the sold game.
Without the check, someone can sell a game and then keep playing the game as long as they never went online again. You could essentially buy a whole bunch of games, activate the licenses, and then return them and still play them. Without a way to check in, it would be easy to abuse and would make the whole system impossible.
And again, you would be limited to who you can sell it to because you need someone who can transfer your license to the game. Your physical copy didn't matter and what mattered was the digital license.
Is it a pain to have the DRM? Yes. But can it grant you more rights to your content? Yes.
Part four: Speculation on what could have been/
What this all sets up is not only a way to sell the discs, but the purely digital copies as well. The ones bought online and not through a store. It would mean for once you could share and sell the digital content you bought digitally and not just a physical content. It would be the first rights to purely digital content.
If it had been successful, Valve, Sony and EA would be forced to re-evaluate how they handle digital content. They would have to contend with someone who offered the ability to sell purely digital content and to have a much greater sharing system.
But now there will be no encouragement for Valve, Sony, or EA to change.
Even worse is Nintendo who ties purely digital content to a system and not an account with no way to sell it.
There will be no progress on ownership of purely digital content. There will be the pure restrictions of one at a time playing of a physical content. If you buy a game, you can't instantly share the multiplayer with a friend to both play with them and give a chance for them to try the game.
Congratuations gaming community. Congratulation in killing the first progress in changing digital content ownership. Feel good now?
I'll be mourning the loss of change over here.
Or it seems that way on the surface. But what is lost is something that we didn't have yet. Something that is desperately needed in an increasing digital world where discs are mattering less and less. Increasingly games are bought through non-physical means.
Entire things like steam and origin run purely on digital content and have no physical media support. Many games are now sold only by downloading off of playstation network or xbox arcade.
But games purchased this way have a severe flaw. You have no ownership of the game. You have a licence to play it, but you do not own it.
Can you pass on the license of a digital game after it has been played?
No.
Can you trade in a digital game that has been used?
No.
Can your friends access your digital games?
No.
Can I remove my ownership in any way?
No.
You do not have any consumer rights over digital games at all. You only can play games that you have bought...unless your account is banned. Then you can't play them at all.
So here enters the Xbox One previously. Here in a market where you have no rights over digital games they wanted to do something new. Something fresh. They were going to give you a chance to actually have consumer rights over digital games for once. For the first time you were going to be able to sell a digital product and to share it with people.
Part one: Sharing
Enter the family plan. When you bought an xbox one game, you recived a digital version of it. Essentially you did not buy a physical copy, but a digital copy with a data on a disc to install it if you had a shitty internet connection. This digital version was added to a library which is accessible to you AND ten people who you mark as family. As soon as you activated that digital version, any one of those people could access it. Any one of them could download it and play it. These people could be made up of anyone around the world. As long as you have known them for 30 days, your library would be accessible if they were tagged as your xbox family.
Of course, there were restrictions. The maximum people playing a copy would be limited to the owner and one family member. Two family members couldn't play the same copy. You as an owner would be able to at any time play your game and would never be restricted from playing because someone else was playing. I again repeat that one family member could access the game the owner was playing.
That means you could buy one copy of halo and then message your good friend Timmy. You would access your game and then Timmy can access your copy at the same time and PLAY WITH YOU. That meant that when you bought a game, other people you know can hop into multiplayer with you without having to buy a copy.
Now the same could happen with your friend Bob. But since Bob and Timmy are family members, Bob and Timmy can't use the copy in your library to play with eachother. But you can play with either Bob or Timmy as the owner.
The games you owned were shared with 10 friends. You essentially could let any one of 10 friends borrow a game and multiples can borrow different games at the same time.
Bob can play your version of CoD while Timmy plays Halo with you. You had a digital copy and you had a choice in being able to share that content with others. For once your digital copies could be shared!
It didn't stop there even. You could once per license transfer the license, making one of your friends an owner. Then he would share it with his family. That means that you can buy a game and 10 people would have access it, and then if you transfer it, up to 18 people would have had access to the full game in its lifespan!
Sure the licence could only be transferred once, but it has reached playability by a huge amount of people by the time it can't be transferred again.
Part two: Selling
Since you bought a digital game, you would need some way of deactivate the game to sell it. If you don't deactivate it, you would be able to sell a game and make money off of it while still being able to access the game still. Which isn't fair at all as when you sell something you are supposed to relinquish control over it.
You were going to be allowed to sell your digital license in exchange for money. You then can purchase a licence for another game, even with a used disc. This ensures that you have the right to sell games while at the same time ensuring a way for developers to get money off of every purchase due to having to generate a new license.
You won because you could sell the game and get money back from something you played.
The developers won because a new license meant they got money from it.
Everyone won. Except companies like gamestop because they don't get as huge of a cut anymore due to restrictions on pricing.
For the first time you could sell digital content. This is important because a main part of consumer rights is the ability to sell the things you have.
Part three: The DRM
Oooooh. Time to get to the scary part. The part that was so feared. RESTRICTIONS ARE EVIL!!!
Or not? Digital rights management can be a way of empowerment! It can be a way to ensure ownership and lost of ownership. Sharing and selling of digital content is impossible without digital rights management.
Is it inconvenient? Sure. In some cases it can lock you out of your content becuase of bad circumstances or from abuse.
In bad cases it is used to restrict people from playing to protect against pirating.
But not all DRM has to be bad. And in a second I will evaluate why the DRM that the Xbox One had was actually a good thing.
Because the Xbox One was a digital console primarily, that meant that the physical disc wasn't that useful. It was a way to download the data needed to play a game. Based upon the family sharing, your library was what you used to play your games, basically the same as steam.
Because of this, it is necessary to ensure that the person who is playing a copy of a game actually owns it. Since you didn't need the disc to play at all and 10 people can access it the same time, it changed the nature of the media.
The way it was set up, if you sold the disc without selling the license, you and 10 people still had full access to the game. This is the other side of selling, in that you lose access to something when you sell it.
It isn't fair at all to allow you sell something and still access it. It breaks the whole disadvantage of selling if you still have full access to the content.
To protect against this and to allow this sharing to work, the way a disc works had to change.
Normally in current games the license to play a game is tied to a disc. When you remove the disc you remove the license to play it. You no longer have access to the data.
But in the Xbox One's case, the license would be tied to an account, allowing for the playing without a disc and to share the data without a disc.
That meant that you had to activate the data on your account before you could play it. Otherwise you can play games you don't really own. And that isn't fair at all.
The other part was the once a day check in. This was vital as well to ensure that you still owned the game. This allowed for you to sell the license because it would update your library so that way you or other people can't access the sold game.
Without the check, someone can sell a game and then keep playing the game as long as they never went online again. You could essentially buy a whole bunch of games, activate the licenses, and then return them and still play them. Without a way to check in, it would be easy to abuse and would make the whole system impossible.
And again, you would be limited to who you can sell it to because you need someone who can transfer your license to the game. Your physical copy didn't matter and what mattered was the digital license.
Is it a pain to have the DRM? Yes. But can it grant you more rights to your content? Yes.
Part four: Speculation on what could have been/
What this all sets up is not only a way to sell the discs, but the purely digital copies as well. The ones bought online and not through a store. It would mean for once you could share and sell the digital content you bought digitally and not just a physical content. It would be the first rights to purely digital content.
If it had been successful, Valve, Sony and EA would be forced to re-evaluate how they handle digital content. They would have to contend with someone who offered the ability to sell purely digital content and to have a much greater sharing system.
But now there will be no encouragement for Valve, Sony, or EA to change.
Even worse is Nintendo who ties purely digital content to a system and not an account with no way to sell it.
There will be no progress on ownership of purely digital content. There will be the pure restrictions of one at a time playing of a physical content. If you buy a game, you can't instantly share the multiplayer with a friend to both play with them and give a chance for them to try the game.
Congratuations gaming community. Congratulation in killing the first progress in changing digital content ownership. Feel good now?
I'll be mourning the loss of change over here.
