Steam, banning players for being generous?

[CCountZero]

Technically they ARE losing something. They can't rip off non-american gamers quite as easily if people do this. Part of why I won't have anything to do with Steam.

GamersGate, Impulse & Direct2Drive do the exact same thing. As does Retail.

Personally, I agree with your sentiment that it's total BS.

I can understand it from a Retail perspective, as the cost of shipping the product overseas does factor in, but there's no cost difference when shipping the games via the interwebz.

But yeah, as stated above, if you really take issue with it to the point of not wanting to use Steam, then there's not really any place that I know of for you to buy Digital

 

[Zannah]

If you were to send the money for them to do it, then yes. Sending a few games to friends in EU won't bring up alarm bells. Selling games wholesale to EU people will.

The thing is, as long as there's no contracts being signed, there's no legal connection between "gifting people games" and "sending a dude money over paypal". He didn't open an internet store, he helped a few people out. Connecting the two, is a conclusion that valve is jumping to, and by no means a legal basis to act on. Does "innocent until proven guilty" ring a bell to anyone?
Of course we all know, he did it, but it can't be legally proven, and therefore he did nothing illegal, nor did Valve risk anything aside from undeserved profits.

And of course, what he did, even when technically bordering the illegal, was still you know... nice, social and morally right. The only harm done, is that a company couldn't pull a fast one on a dozen european gamers, for a few extra bucks. So my original point stands, how can anyone in their right mind side with the greedy corporation here?

 

[Pyro Paul]

I'm astonished people actually side with steam here, saying "If they want to rip off people that isn't me, sure let them". Way to go people, way to go.
But hey, a gamer social enough to protect fellow gamers from being ripped off is clearly a first rate criminal, and Valve should totally be allowed to light his house on fire.

Tax Evasion is a FELONY.
You Support protecting FELONS that are clearly violating the Rule of Law?

He wasn't being Generious gifting people games in lands far away.
He was Being Paid to Bypass Local Laws and Taxes.

 

[Pyro Paul]

Breaking local tax laws. This has been explained over and over again throughout the course of this thread. :/

So if my family back in the Us would buy me a game for christmas, and send it over here to sweden, that'd be breaking tax laws how exactly?

It would not break any laws.

that is a Gift.
you do not send Money back to your family in order to obtain said game.
however, even if this where an import (say buying from a US retailer) said game has to pay Import Taxes, tarifs, and several other Fees in order to reach your door step, which doesn't bypass taxes any ways.

gifting games across steam is also perfectly legal and does not give you a steam ban.
Getting Paid to Gift a Specific game so that the receiving party doesn't have to pay VAT or Import Taxes IS illegal.

 

[Zannah]

Tax Evasion is a FELONY.
You Support protecting FELONS that are clearly violating the Rule of Law?

He wasn't being Generious gifting people games in lands far away.
He was Being Paid to Bypass Local Laws and Taxes.

Yes, I support people accused of Felony with out any means of ever being proven, if what they do is the right thing, that just happens to be illegal. Also, ripping of customers in digital retail, is not happening due to taxes and laws, it's happening due to plain old greed.

But anyway, I rest my case. People believe what they want to believed, too bad no one seems to be willing to phrase why they want to believe that.

 

[Souplex]

This is one of the reasons digital distribution is bad people.
It puts you completely at the mercy of whoever's running the service, and you can't trust Valve to do the right thing.

 

[dontlooknow]

Is there really that much difference between prices anyway? I can only relate it to UK games' prices, but a quick look through the Gamestop site seems to suggest that US prices are more or less the same as we have it here - Black Ops £30-40 and $40-$50 depending on format. A few older games (Red Dead Redemption / Metal Gear 4 etc) are a bit cheaper, but is it really worth the hassle for fiver?

And what are prices like other places?

Either way, more of the arguments against Valve here are just hot air - this sort of thing happens with tons of other things in the international market and in every currency. Look at the car industry, the housing industry, the arts industry, the fashion industry, even the food industry - prices vary depending thousands of different parameters, one of which is the buying habits of the society. Steam doesn't charge more than the price of the games on my high-street, in fact, they're often cheaper, which encourages me to buy from them, well, that and being lazy not to walk into town.

I could move to Australia and buy a 42 acre estate with the money I get from selling my poxy little apartment in Yorkshire (okay, slight exaggeration) but I'd have to pay twice the price for my games. I don't think it's 'fair', but at the same time, it's healthier to have an individual market for each country, rather than depending on some fellow 2000 miles away to tighten the purse-strings of a business exclusive to, and who contributes more money to my own country.

 

[Pyro Paul]

Tax Evasion is a FELONY.
You Support protecting FELONS that are clearly violating the Rule of Law?

He wasn't being Generious gifting people games in lands far away.
He was Being Paid to Bypass Local Laws and Taxes.

Yes, I support people accused of Felony with out any means of ever being proven, if what they do is the right thing, that just happens to be illegal. Also, ripping of customers in digital retail, is not happening due to taxes and laws, it's happening due to plain old greed.

But anyway, I rest my case. People believe what they want to believed, too bad no one seems to be willing to phrase why they want to believe that.

You're supporting Greed more so then people defending valve.

the Greed of people that don't want to Pay.
the Greed of people that 'believe' that it is over priced.
the individuals whom know nothing about the world economy and its mechanics and care only for THEIR wallet and how much it Costs THEM.

You believe that they are 'morally right' to be so selfish.
that the rule of law should bend to Them and their own Greed ignoring all others.

 

[Zer_]

If you were to send the money for them to do it, then yes. Sending a few games to friends in EU won't bring up alarm bells. Selling games wholesale to EU people will.

The thing is, as long as there's no contracts being signed, there's no legal connection between "gifting people games" and "sending a dude money over paypal". He didn't open an internet store, he helped a few people out. Connecting the two, is a conclusion that valve is jumping to, and by no means a legal basis to act on. Does "innocent until proven guilty" ring a bell to anyone?
Of course we all know, he did it, but it can't be legally proven, and therefore he did nothing illegal, nor did Valve risk anything aside from undeserved profits.

And of course, what he did, even when technically bordering the illegal, was still you know... nice, social and morally right. The only harm done, is that a company couldn't pull a fast one on a dozen european gamers, for a few extra bucks. So my original point stands, how can anyone in their right mind side with the greedy corporation here?

Just because there are no contracts, doesn't mean it's not illegal. Second, I side with Valve because if anything like this was brought to light, where Valve did NOT react to fix the problem, then Valve risks losing the ability to sell their product in some EU countries. Valve may also have to pay a significant fine for assisting in tax evasion. They made this move to protect their business, and keep selling games in the European countries.

Second, Valve rarely sets the price for the products sold on Steam. Publishers have control of this. Valve suggests a price, and publishers set the price. If the publishers didn't have control over their own prices, they wouldn't use Steam, they'd use their own service.

The only thing that could make this easier for all of us is if Valve implemented a system where the end user could track the number of games gifted to EU users every year. Say having a hard cap of 10-20 a year per account. It may seem restrictive, but at least it gives us a way of avoiding such incidents as this. Giving users a clear warning before banning would also help.

 

[Nikolaz72]

I don't know... That anology would be more correct if the care was say, 30,000 USD in America but 50,000 USD in Europe and the person who stole the car only gave 30,000 USD.

Edit: You paying for an agreed price on a game; be it that the price was lower than the price for the person it was given to...

Actually, for a better analogy: Ever bought something overseas because it was cheaper than buying it here? Steam just banned him for that (Apparently)

Okay, perhaps a better analogy would be someone importing a bunch of dvds from china or something, and then selling them inside a local electronics store at half price. I'd say that the store owners are right within their legal/moral grounds to kick the guy out of the store.

No. With that analogy you are saying that if someone in Australia imported a game because it was cheaper than buying it in the local retail they should be banned from their country?

 

[chinomareno]

I'm astonished people actually side with steam here, saying "If they want to rip off people that isn't me, sure let them". Way to go people, way to go.
But hey, a gamer social enough to protect fellow gamers from being ripped off is clearly a first rate criminal, and Valve should totally be allowed to light his house on fire.

Tax Evasion is a FELONY.
You Support protecting FELONS that are clearly violating the Rule of Law?

He wasn't being Generious gifting people games in lands far away.
He was Being Paid to Bypass Local Laws and Taxes.

Taxes can't be charged on online purchases due to admin overheads in most countries, few countries have mechanisms for this. This is not illegal in anyway, there are American businesses that buy by proxy to bypass manufacturer's restrictions on exporting. There is no legal recourse manufacturers or publishers can take can take to stop this and the only reason suppliers comply with export restrictions is to maintain supply.

The real problem is though, you are not paying for a product but a license. The license can have completely unfair conditions of use and can be withheld at anytime due to any breach. Spending your money in the US to avoid sales tax is legitimate. Valve could care less as they get a cut of all sales but maintaining regional pricing is a luxury publishers want so they can rip foreigners off on a case by case basis.

This guy either raised too many flags in Steam's system or has done something more he's not saying. If true I think he's done something else.

 

[Fleischer]

]I'd agree but that seems like a MASSIVE effort for one guy... that is unless he was doing this gifting on a huge scale. tbh I don't see why he didn't just open a new steam account for it if that was the case though, then he wouldn't lose his games. Although they'd probably see through that and close down his other accounts. EDIT: also, I think you mean "Valve".

Yeppah. I shouldn't post before I eat my breakfast...

amergift someone gained Valve's attention. Unless Value or amergift wants to get into more specifics with the public, we won't know how egregious the tax evasion was.

 

[Chibz]

But yeah, as stated above, if you really take issue with it to the point of not wanting to use Steam, then there's not really any place that I know of for you to buy Digital

As a Canadian I DL games off XBLA the PSN and Wii Shop Channel. I actually find that even though Microsoft charges us 12.5% more (through giving 200 points fewer per $20 spent) they rip us off less than real stores. Nintendo sometimes sells stuff for LESS because they sell their points for the same amount, and our store is the US store.

Just because there are no contracts, doesn't mean it's not illegal. Second, I side with Valve because if anything like this was brought to light, where Valve did NOT react to fix the problem, then Valve risks losing the ability to sell their product in some EU countries. Valve may also have to pay a significant fine for assisting in tax evasion. They made this move to protect their business, and keep selling games in the European countries.

Why do you people keep bringing up Tax Evasion? That's a completely irrelevant and flawed point that has been ripped apart by myself repeatedly. If anything Valve (and the publishers) were upset that they were, personally, losing money. So, to defend that extra bit of profit, they "dealt with" the guy.

Unless you're a Valve fanboy, in which case... Glorious Valve Can Do No Wrong!

 

[Chibz]

... Ugh. Way too early for this.

 

[WolfLordAndy]

I'm astonished people actually side with steam here, saying "If they want to rip off people that isn't me, sure let them". Way to go people, way to go.
But hey, a gamer social enough to protect fellow gamers from being ripped off is clearly a first rate criminal, and Valve should totally be allowed to light his house on fire.

Tax Evasion is a FELONY.
You Support protecting FELONS that are clearly violating the Rule of Law?

He wasn't being Generious gifting people games in lands far away.
He was Being Paid to Bypass Local Laws and Taxes.

Taxes can't be charged on online purchases due to admin overheads in most countries, few countries have mechanisms for this. This is not illegal in anyway, there are American businesses that buy by proxy to bypass manufacturer's restrictions on exporting. There is no legal recourse manufacturers or publishers can take can take to stop this and the only reason suppliers comply with export restrictions is to maintain supply.

The real problem is though, you are not paying for a product but a license. The license can have completely unfair conditions of use and can be withheld at anytime due to any breach. Spending your money in the US to avoid sales tax is legitimate. Valve could care less as they get a cut of all sales but maintaining regional pricing is a luxury publishers want so they can rip foreigners off on a case by case basis.

This guy either raised too many flags in Steam's system or has done something more he's not saying. If true I think he's done something else.

In the UK, we have our VAT (value added tax) applied to all purchases, including online digital purchases, which is why we pay a fair bit higher in GBP then the countries right next to use do in Euros. So sorry but yes, taxes are applied to steam games.

If we were to import goods from the US, we'd have to pay whatever customs charges are required, this is little different.

 

[Jfswift]

Steam needs to fix their store

 

[Zer_]

But yeah, as stated above, if you really take issue with it to the point of not wanting to use Steam, then there's not really any place that I know of for you to buy Digital

As a Canadian I DL games off XBLA the PSN and Wii Shop Channel. I actually find that even though Microsoft charges us 12.5% more (through giving 200 points fewer per $20 spent) they rip us off less than real stores. Nintendo sometimes sells stuff for LESS because they sell their points for the same amount, and our store is the US store.

Just because there are no contracts, doesn't mean it's not illegal. Second, I side with Valve because if anything like this was brought to light, where Valve did NOT react to fix the problem, then Valve risks losing the ability to sell their product in some EU countries. Valve may also have to pay a significant fine for assisting in tax evasion. They made this move to protect their business, and keep selling games in the European countries.

Why do you people keep bringing up Tax Evasion? That's a completely irrelevant and flawed point that has been ripped apart by myself repeatedly. If anything Valve (and the publishers) were upset that they were, personally, losing money. So, to defend that extra bit of profit, they "dealt with" the guy.

Unless you're a Valve fanboy, in which case... Glorious Valve Can Do No Wrong!

I said potential tax evasion. Valve is covering their ass here. It's not hard to comprehend. Also you didn't address the tax issue at all. I had to point it out that VAT was included in the Steam prices. Regional taxes were not. Either way, they're avoiding one tax or another.

 

[LadyMint]

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.

Well this prettymuch answers my question. I was curious as to why it would be more expensive outside of the U.S. If this is the reason, then I prettymuch agree that it's tax evasion which is against the law.

I still wonder how they put taxes on digital items. Or why. Just because they can, or because they're using foreign internet travel space to deliver it to the person? I'm only guessing the latter because, having worked for a wireless phone company, I know the whole reason you get charged Roaming is because you're using the mobile phone towers of another company to carry your signal, and your phone company has to pay for that privilege. Is it something similar to this when you tax a digital product?