Used games

[Entitled]

Used games do not only not contribute anything to the industry (as far as I am aware?)

Advertisement. There are numerous people who got into series, or genre, or developer or something, some even into gaming in general, because they got a cheap second hand game first to show them the way in.

Wouldn't the same also be true for piracy? There is a larger than zero number of people who might have bought it thanks to such access, and that number might even be bigger than the hypothetical lost sales, therefore it is plausible that this institution of access benefits the industry.

Excuse me if I'm mixing you up with someone else, but weren't you one of the vocal piracy opponents?

 

[Entitled]

Can someone tell me a good reason why the developer or anyone should earn from second hand sales?
Every other industry has second hand sales, so what's so different about games?

Not in every industry, only in the ones that sell physical products. Information is not a product, it's an abstract concept with no real scarcity, but potentially infinite access for everyone.


When you download a game, you are not getting "a copy", you are getting the permission to create a copy.

We might give it a certain artificial scarcity to give some distribution monopolies to the publisher, but why these monopolies should be granted in a way to semi-accurately mimick physical property, is not self-evident.

 

[OldNewNewOld]

Can someone tell me a good reason why the developer or anyone should earn from second hand sales?
Every other industry has second hand sales, so what's so different about games?

Not in every industry, only in the ones that sell physical products. Information is not a product, it's an abstract concept with no real scarcity, but potentially infinite access for everyone.


When you download a game, you are not getting "a copy", you are getting the permission to create a copy.

We might give it a certain artificial scarcity to give some distribution monopolies to the publisher, but why these monopolies should be granted in a way to semi-accurately mimick physical property, is not self-evident.

That's not how Europe works. If I buy something, it's mine, including licences.
So whether I got a copy of the game, or a licence to use the game, i'm allowed to sell it. And information is a product, just not a physical. Everything you sell is a product or a service. Since games are obviously not a service, it's a product.

Why should GAME be able to push sales of used game before sales of new games ? They aren't looking out for you guys they are looking out for themselves, If they were they wouldn't offer you a tiny amount for a game only to sell it at over 100% mark up....

Because it's their store and they have the right to operate the store however they want? And even if they aren't looking out for us, the way they are looking out for themselves is helping us as well, unlike the way publisher look out for themselves.
Ya know, I would rather pick the smaller of the two evils. Certainly not the bigger.

 

[Childe]

I look at it this way: Some games will be bought more if they are used then if they are new. There are many people that play games and not all of them can afford new games. Selling games used means that they will not be full priced which allows more people to buy a game they otherwise wouldn't. In addition I agree with Jim in that human greed will, more likely then not, take over and we will see games being charged more rather then less if there are no longer used games. Because of course, corporations cannot bear to face their own faults. If something is doing badly the fault MUST be something other then us because WE are doing EVERYTHING right. One thing i don't agree with Jim on is what developers will do if they slay all their dragons. I don't believe that they will realize their own mistakes because that would be going against human nature. Most of us refuse to look the truth in the face even if their is nothing else to look at. We would rather close our eyes then see what we don't want to see. If all the dragons are slain i think that developers will give birth to a new dragon: the consumers themselves. At which point there won't be games anymore. Well thats just my two cents.

 

[badgersprite]

I fundamentally support used games for a number of reasons, and I'm going to list just a couple:

Firstly, because property rights are one of the basic cornerstones of our whole social and economic structure. If you buy a book, you can give it away to someone else for free once you've finished reading it. If you buy a car, you can sell it to someone else. The idea that we should treat games differently is absolutely ludicrous to me. Arguing against the freedom of people to dispose of the games they purchase and give them to other people when they're done with them is arguing against one of the very cornerstones of ownership. If game companies keep advancing this agenda, what's to stop other companies following suit?

Secondly, because it's consumer-friendly. We don't live in a very good economy, and the world is comprised of huge divisions between the rich and the poor. The ability to buy and sell used games is in effect the only way that some people are able to afford to play games at all. Furthermore, we private individuals are just as entitled as big business to our ability to make economically rational decisions. That's one of the basic rules of our society. If people seriously think that only big businesses and game sellers should be lauded for making money-smart decisions that hurt consumers and yet condemn individual people for making money-smart decisions because they "hurt the industry" then there's a level of cognitive dissonance there that I can't even deal with.

Thirdly, because other industries have been able to respond to questions like this by adapting and changing their models in ways that don't harm consumers. If used game sales are really hurting the industry so badly, then, instead of banning used games, the industry should adapt to it and find ways of accommodating for it, or even find different ways of selling games that are more consumer friendly. The onus shouldn't be on consumers to change their behaviour - consumers aren't a single, organised entity. We don't have control over what happens in the industry. But the industry itself can change. Whether you make games on lower budgets or simply find a way of selling games that gives more incentives to people who buy them new than just DLC, if there's a problem with the model of how games are sold, then the onus should be on the industry itself to change that model and adapt it to the problems that exist.

Fourthly, because used games are one of the primary means of keeping old games alive. The thing about games is that new copies eventually just stop being made and retailers stop carrying them. They move on to the next title or the next console. A lot of things have never been or never will be put up for digital download. So, pretty much the only way people are going to be able to experience games that are simply out of date is to buy them used. Games are like books in that not everyone buys them or wants to experience them at the same time. People are always going to be getting games years after their release, not out of any kind of malice or deliberate attempt to screw the industry over, but because that's just when they happen to get interested in that title.

At some point, the reality simply becomes that there are no new copies. The used market keeps PS2 games and original Gameboy games and N64 games and SNES games alive and in circulation. Isn't it more fair that I should pay those people who cared enough to sell their past games and keep them in circulation than pay money to a corporation that is completely different from when these games were made and no longer cares to make them? Isn't that like saying that if I buy a classic Ford Model T that was painstakingly restored by a classic car enthusiast, that instead of paying the guy who sold me the car, I have to pay Ford instead?

Instead of blacklisting the idea of used games altogether, game companies need to find a way to provide better services that encourage gamers to buy their titles new, instead of putting a gun to their head and forcing them to buy new. Don't blame game consumers for making the most economically rational decision. Make your option fairer and more enticing and people will choose it.

 

[Ranorak]

I dislike the argument that used sales give nothing to the publisher.
Here is why;

A retail store invests in games. They buy, say, 100 copies of Game X from Publisher X at a lower cost.
Then, they sale those games with a increase in the cost for them to make a profit.
If they sold all the 100 copies, they would have not only played even on their investment, but made a little profit as well. Some of that money they earned goes into the wages of employees, monthly costs, and not to mention, the boss's pocket. The rest gets invested in more games to sell.

Now used games give the store a lot of profit, because they spend 10 dollars buying it from you and sell it for 30.
But, those 20 dollars don't go anywhere different than the normal profits.
Some of it goes to the employees, monthly costs and yes the boss's pocket.
But a part of that money from used sales will also be used to buy additional games to sell.
It can also spend that money on advertisement, getting more costumers to buy the games.

Besides, the chances are high that the person who sold the game to the store, is going to use that money to buy a different game at that store.

So, the money from used games usually finds it's way back in the industry.
I guess what most publishers don't like is that there is no guarantee that the second hand sale of an Activision game, is actually going back to Activision, instead of, say, EA.

Now, I could be completely off the mark here, because I don't work in a game store. But I know that no other industry is crying so much foul over second hand sales, besides maybe the movie industry, but they're known for their great insight in the industry, so no worries there...

 

[Baldr]

Can someone tell me a good reason why the developer or anyone should earn from second hand sales?
Every other industry has second hand sales, so what's so different about games? What makes developer/publisher entitled to the money of the second sale? They sold the product, it's not theirs anymore. They aren't entitled to more money from that sale.

It's rather depressing how the big publisher managed to brainwash such a huge part of the consumer base to stop looking out for themselves and look out for the weak and poor publisher. Anyone who is against second hand sales is nothing but brainwashed.
The publisher are a business, not a charity organization. You DON'T need to look out for them. They look out for themselves. However, you need to care about yourself because the publisher certainly won't. They will milk you as much as they can and once they are done, they will trow you away. And believing their bullshit PR and fake numbers is just naive.

Your telling me, you shouldn't pay people to entertain, keep support, and everything functioning for you because they are some greedy organization?

 

[jnixon]

Why should GAME be able to push sales of used game before sales of new games ? They aren't looking out for you guys they are looking out for themselves, If they were they wouldn't offer you a tiny amount for a game only to sell it at over 100% mark up....

For one GAME massively pushes new games with things like GAME exclusive pre-order bonuses and double new game deals (such as the monster hunter wii u and nintendo 3ds deal you could buy both games with a £10 reduction or something) it's interesting to see that places like game back up new sales even though they take minimum profits yet publishers try and destroy the very places that help new sales (massive criticisms of gamestop) and yes you could say that online sales cut out the middle man but a large proportion of gamers prefer their games to be a physical copy, me being one of them. I'm not saying that GAME are looking out for the consumer but they have a lot less shitty practices than publishers and very often have good deals on that are genuinely good for solely the consumer. When is the last time EA have come out with something genuinely good for the consumer with no strings attached or no price tag, it's not often you see people going "oh i'm so glad they locked them characters off my disk" but you will hear many people talking about "good deals at GAME, HMV, gamestop etc" It's good of stores to not just take these minimal profits on new games and be content with them, that they're selling 2nd hand games so we can have them cheaper. It shows a backbone that the gamer community have been severely lacking recently

 

[CaptQuakers]

Because it's their store and they have the right to operate the store however they want? And even if they aren't looking out for us, the way they are looking out for themselves is helping us as well, unlike the way publisher look out for themselves.
Ya know, I would rather pick the smaller of the two evils. Certainly not the bigger.

Is it really helping us ?,So them demanding games be full price on Steam and on Xbox live so they don't lose out is "Looking out for us" ? The gaming industry no longer needs them to survive, As long as Steam and services like it are around they are becoming obsolete they are holding the market back.

 

[Imperioratorex Caprae]

Having a PC inoculated me against used games. Granted you *can* buy secondhand retail games but there's no guarantee you'll get the Serial with it and in today's market you may not get a serial key that works due to someone already having registered it.
It was convenient to be able to trade in console games when I first found out about companies like GameStop. I didn't really like the idea though after thinking about it and seeing how much the trade-in values were gouged compared to sales prices. Pay $60 for a game and decide you don't like it, trade it in for 1/2 of the value or less depending on how long it was since you bought it and also how popular the game is. If you want cash instead of credit you lose about 13-20% more and don't get any of the beneficial coupons or trade-in specials.
As it stands now I tend to keep my games for my collection and have little to no use for trading them in or buying used unless they are games you can no longer buy retail or digital download.
Also a side note, GameStop has a bad habit of rejecting slightly scuffed or light scratched games but has tried to sell me games that look like the disc was chewed on by a dog or heavily scuffed/scratched. Hypocrite much?
I also have trouble forgiving GameStop for buying out a really cool store that sold older games and game guides I was collecting. I had been saving up for a few of the Final Fantasy guides for my collection and the day I went to buy them the store had "re-opened" without notice to me as a GameStop and they forced the old store to tear up or destroy any products that were not in GameStop's inventory.
I felt that a little slice of gaming history was murdered on the day I saw them snap an unopened copy of Castlevania SOTN into multiple pieces.

 

[Baldr]

I dislike the argument that used sales give nothing to the publisher.
Here is why;

A retail store invests in games. They buy, say, 100 copies of Game X from Publisher X at a lower cost.
Then, they sale those games with a increase in the cost for them to make a profit.
If they sold all the 100 copies, they would have not only played even on their investment, but made a little profit as well. Some of that money they earned goes into the wages of employees, monthly costs, and not to mention, the boss's pocket. The rest gets invested in more games to sell.

Now used games give the store a lot of profit, because they spend 10 dollars buying it from you and sell it for 30.
But, those 20 dollars don't go anywhere different than the normal profits.
Some of it goes to the employees, monthly costs and yes the boss's pocket.
But a part of that money from used sales will also be used to buy additional games to sell.
It can also spend that money on advertisement, getting more costumers to buy the games.

Besides, the chances are high that the person who sold the game to the store, is going to use that money to buy a different game at that store.

So, the money from used games usually finds it's way back in the industry.
I guess what most publishers don't like is that there is no guarantee that the second hand sale of an Activision game, is actually going back to Activision, instead of, say, EA.

Now, I could be completely off the mark here, because I don't work in a game store. But I know that no other industry is crying so much foul over second hand sales, besides maybe the movie industry, but they're known for their great insight in the industry, so no worries there...

Go back and watch the Totalbuscuit video posted in the OP, he clearly explains how the movie industry and other industries are clearly different than the game industries in a number of factors, and why selling used copies of other things is not hurting their industries.

 

[badgersprite]

Can someone tell me a good reason why the developer or anyone should earn from second hand sales?
Every other industry has second hand sales, so what's so different about games? What makes developer/publisher entitled to the money of the second sale? They sold the product, it's not theirs anymore. They aren't entitled to more money from that sale.

It's rather depressing how the big publisher managed to brainwash such a huge part of the consumer base to stop looking out for themselves and look out for the weak and poor publisher. Anyone who is against second hand sales is nothing but brainwashed.
The publisher are a business, not a charity organization. You DON'T need to look out for them. They look out for themselves. However, you need to care about yourself because the publisher certainly won't. They will milk you as much as they can and once they are done, they will trow you away. And believing their bullshit PR and fake numbers is just naive.

Your telling me, you shouldn't pay people to entertain, keep support, and everything functioning for you because they are some greedy organization?

When you buy a house from somebody, who do you pay for it? Do you pay the people who live in the house and who sold it to you or the people who originally built the house in the first place? The people you're buying the house from didn't do anything to create the house or design it or provide you with the warmth and shelter that exists, did they? But you pay them because they're the ones who own that property. They're the ones who are selling it to you. You don't pay someone who built the house twice for the same object.

Ownership, property and the ability to re-sell things we have purchased is fundamental to our economy. It seriously baffles me that so many people are so keen to argue against one of the most basic property rights capitalism affords to us.

 

[OldNewNewOld]

Can someone tell me a good reason why the developer or anyone should earn from second hand sales?
Every other industry has second hand sales, so what's so different about games? What makes developer/publisher entitled to the money of the second sale? They sold the product, it's not theirs anymore. They aren't entitled to more money from that sale.

It's rather depressing how the big publisher managed to brainwash such a huge part of the consumer base to stop looking out for themselves and look out for the weak and poor publisher. Anyone who is against second hand sales is nothing but brainwashed.
The publisher are a business, not a charity organization. You DON'T need to look out for them. They look out for themselves. However, you need to care about yourself because the publisher certainly won't. They will milk you as much as they can and once they are done, they will trow you away. And believing their bullshit PR and fake numbers is just naive.

Your telling me, you shouldn't pay people to entertain, keep support, and everything functioning for you because they are some greedy organization?

Can you point out where I said you shouldn't pay them?
I said they aren't entitled the the money from second hand sales. That means, they already got payed. They won't get payed twice for one service/product. If you want to support them, but new, however, don't force other or try to make other look bad for using one of their basic rights as consumer.
If I buy something, I own it. No one has the right to tell me whether I can resell it, or even worse, take a cut from my sale. Once the initial transaction is complete, the publisher has absolutely no right to interfere with my product in anyway unless I want them to do so. And I certainly don't want them to interfere with me reselling the game.

Your telling me, you shouldn't pay people to make new cars, keep support and everything functioning for you because they are some greedy organization?
Now insert pretty much anything instead of "cars". I don't see the furniture industry complaining about second hand sales.

Because it's their store and they have the right to operate the store however they want? And even if they aren't looking out for us, the way they are looking out for themselves is helping us as well, unlike the way publisher look out for themselves.
Ya know, I would rather pick the smaller of the two evils. Certainly not the bigger.

Is it really helping us ?,So them demanding games be full price on Steam and on Xbox live so they don't lose out is "Looking out for us" ? The gaming industry no longer needs them to survive, As long as Steam and services like it are around they are becoming obsolete they are holding the market back.

I didn't say they look out for us. As I said, they way they look out for themselves is helping us.
And how the hell are they forcing full prices on Steam? Did you see the amount of PC games? Do you really think that they can say "we will put less PC games on the shelf if steam has lower prices!!!" They don't affect Steam at all.

And about Xbox live... really? Do you really think that MS would lower the prices of games if they didn't have the competition of second hand sales? Is that the reason why games that are over a year old are still selling at full price simply because they are "on demand"?

They CAN'T force the publisher to have equal prices. They simply can't. Do you really think they are so stupid to get in a fight with the big publisher? They would go bankrupt in a month. No matter what you have read or heard, GAME and co. need the publisher more than the publisher needs the big stores. They aren't retarded to go bankrupt out of principle.
And if the publisher gave a bigger cut to retails, while asking to lower the prices, the retails would be happy to do so.

I'm not saying retails are good. However, second hand sales are my right, and the retails own the stores and have the right to do whatever they want to do. Out of the evils, the retail stores are by far the smaller evil than the publisher.

 

[CaptQuakers]

Why should GAME be able to push sales of used game before sales of new games ? They aren't looking out for you guys they are looking out for themselves, If they were they wouldn't offer you a tiny amount for a game only to sell it at over 100% mark up....

For one GAME massively pushes new games with things like GAME exclusive pre-order bonuses and double new game deals (such as the monster hunter wii u and nintendo 3ds deal you could buy both games with a £10 reduction or something) it's interesting to see that places like game back up new sales even though they take minimum profits yet publishers try and destroy the very places that help new sales (massive criticisms of gamestop) and yes you could say that online sales cut out the middle man but a large proportion of gamers prefer their games to be a physical copy, me being one of them. I'm not saying that GAME are looking out for the consumer but they have a lot less shitty practices than publishers and very often have good deals on that are genuinely good for solely the consumer. When is the last time EA have come out with something genuinely good for the consumer with no strings attached or no price tag, it's not often you see people going "oh i'm so glad they locked them characters off my disk" but you will hear many people talking about "good deals at GAME, HMV, gamestop etc" It's good of stores to not just take these minimal profits on new games and be content with them, that they're selling 2nd hand games so we can have them cheaper. It shows a backbone that the gamer community have been severely lacking recently

Game stores pretty much demand those pre-order bonuses from the publishers and dev's, The new Metro is a perfect example of this. They had to put the ranger difficulty as a DLC because the stores demanded it....

 

[Entitled]

Can someone tell me a good reason why the developer or anyone should earn from second hand sales?
Every other industry has second hand sales, so what's so different about games?

Not in every industry, only in the ones that sell physical products. Information is not a product, it's an abstract concept with no real scarcity, but potentially infinite access for everyone.


When you download a game, you are not getting "a copy", you are getting the permission to create a copy.

We might give it a certain artificial scarcity to give some distribution monopolies to the publisher, but why these monopolies should be granted in a way to semi-accurately mimick physical property, is not self-evident.

That's not how Europe works. If I buy something, it's mine, including licences.
So whether I got a copy of the game, or a licence to use the game, i'm allowed to sell it. And information is a product, just not a physical. Everything you sell is a product or a service. Since games are obviously not a service, it's a product.

You were asking for reasons why second hand sales SHOULD be controlled. Not legal statements for why it IS conrolled.

Europe can declare information to be a sellable product, and that won't make it so any more than if they would declare "faith in humanity" to be a sellable product, or the wetness of the ocean to be a separately sellable content, or fire on the top of a torch to be the property of the torch's holder, that they can move to another one's torch exactly once.

Information is different from property. Fundamentally. In it's very nature, it's something else. Products are defined by being physical.

When you have a milkshake, you can point at something and say "this is the milkshake".

When you have a story, there is nothing to point at, because "the story" doesn't even equal any of the copies that are made about it, but the very act of ideas and knowledge getting arranged in a particular pattern.

 

[CaptQuakers]

Snip.

Your telling me, you shouldn't pay people to entertain, keep support, and everything functioning for you because they are some greedy organization?

When you buy a house from somebody, who do you pay for it? Do you pay the people who live in the house and who sold it to you or the people who originally built the house in the first place? The people you're buying the house from didn't do anything to create the house or design it or provide you with the warmth and shelter that exists, did they? But you pay them because they're the ones who own that property. They're the ones who are selling it to you. You don't pay someone who built the house twice for the same object.

Ownership, property and the ability to re-sell things we have purchased is fundamental to our economy. It seriously baffles me that so many people are so keen to argue against one of the most basic property rights capitalism affords to us.

If the game is an online game then the people who run the game are still paying for you to play it, In your given scenario that would be like the people you bought the house of paying for your gas and heating bill. Is that fair ?

 

[Baldr]

Can someone tell me a good reason why the developer or anyone should earn from second hand sales?
Every other industry has second hand sales, so what's so different about games? What makes developer/publisher entitled to the money of the second sale? They sold the product, it's not theirs anymore. They aren't entitled to more money from that sale.

It's rather depressing how the big publisher managed to brainwash such a huge part of the consumer base to stop looking out for themselves and look out for the weak and poor publisher. Anyone who is against second hand sales is nothing but brainwashed.
The publisher are a business, not a charity organization. You DON'T need to look out for them. They look out for themselves. However, you need to care about yourself because the publisher certainly won't. They will milk you as much as they can and once they are done, they will trow you away. And believing their bullshit PR and fake numbers is just naive.

Your telling me, you shouldn't pay people to entertain, keep support, and everything functioning for you because they are some greedy organization?

Can you point out where I said you shouldn't pay them?
I said they aren't entitled the the money from second hand sales. That means, they already got payed. They won't get payed twice for one service/product. If you want to support them, but new, however, don't force other or try to make other look bad for using one of their basic rights as consumer.
If I buy something, I own it. No one has the right to tell me whether I can resell it, or even worse, take a cut from my sale. Once the initial transaction is complete, the publisher has absolutely no right to interfere with my product in anyway unless I want them to do so. And I certainly don't want them to interfere with me reselling the game.

Your telling me, you shouldn't pay people to make new cars, keep support and everything functioning for you because they are some greedy organization?
Now insert pretty much anything instead of "cars". I don't see the furniture industry complaining about second hand sales.

They are undercutting new game sales, for a matter of $1-$2. So instead of selling 2 or 3 games, they are selling 1 game to 2-3 people for that $1-$2 the customer saves, the publisher loses $8-$10. That adds up over thousands of sales. It is not economically helpful to anyone. Game develop lose money on projects and things that would be beneficial to players. Games would be cheaper. If you clearly don't see this, then there is something wrong.

 

[Haakmed]

Used games are fine. I buy most of my console games used because most games are not worth my $60 bucks. My PC library well...steam.... But I do have all my old physical games in a few boxes in my closet. Now here is the problem with the way games are sold. MOST of that 60 bucks you pay for a new game goes to other people than the retailer. I don't think game stores would survive without the used market that exists for games. The part of Mr. Biscuit's argument that I really do not agree with is part about where he goes about how game devs do not have alternate revenue streams. Ya ok but if I'm not allowed to do with my merchandise as I please because the devs can't afford me doing that. That seems to me that he is taking pity on publishers for not being able to provide alternate means of revenue. Off the top of my head I can think of a few. Companies need to figure out how to keep people buying their products so they can stay in business, if you can't your company is going to die.

 

[jnixon]

Why should GAME be able to push sales of used game before sales of new games ? They aren't looking out for you guys they are looking out for themselves, If they were they wouldn't offer you a tiny amount for a game only to sell it at over 100% mark up....

For one GAME massively pushes new games with things like GAME exclusive pre-order bonuses and double new game deals (such as the monster hunter wii u and nintendo 3ds deal you could buy both games with a £10 reduction or something) it's interesting to see that places like game back up new sales even though they take minimum profits yet publishers try and destroy the very places that help new sales (massive criticisms of gamestop) and yes you could say that online sales cut out the middle man but a large proportion of gamers prefer their games to be a physical copy, me being one of them. I'm not saying that GAME are looking out for the consumer but they have a lot less shitty practices than publishers and very often have good deals on that are genuinely good for solely the consumer. When is the last time EA have come out with something genuinely good for the consumer with no strings attached or no price tag, it's not often you see people going "oh i'm so glad they locked them characters off my disk" but you will hear many people talking about "good deals at GAME, HMV, gamestop etc" It's good of stores to not just take these minimal profits on new games and be content with them, that they're selling 2nd hand games so we can have them cheaper. It shows a backbone that the gamer community have been severely lacking recently

Game stores pretty much demand those pre-order bonuses from the publishers and dev's, The new Metro is a perfect example of this. They had to put the ranger difficulty as a DLC because the stores demanded it....

So? the publishers completely benefit from every other aspect of the whole game, they get 99% (more or less) of the profit, they get all the charged DLC after it which the store sees nothing of, they get all the digital games sale. I think a store asking for some incentive for people to buy from their shop to get their own fair share of the profits is a fair enough ask especially due to them getting the worst end of the stick in every aspect. And this is taking the view that the publishers don't want the pre-order sales and incentives for these sales (remembering that these are guaranteeing money before the games criticisms come out) maybe the stores do have to twist their arm for these but i bet they don't have to twist hard

 

[badgersprite]

Can someone tell me a good reason why the developer or anyone should earn from second hand sales?
Every other industry has second hand sales, so what's so different about games?

Not in every industry, only in the ones that sell physical products. Information is not a product, it's an abstract concept with no real scarcity, but potentially infinite access for everyone.


When you download a game, you are not getting "a copy", you are getting the permission to create a copy.

We might give it a certain artificial scarcity to give some distribution monopolies to the publisher, but why these monopolies should be granted in a way to semi-accurately mimick physical property, is not self-evident.

That's not how Europe works. If I buy something, it's mine, including licences.
So whether I got a copy of the game, or a licence to use the game, i'm allowed to sell it. And information is a product, just not a physical. Everything you sell is a product or a service. Since games are obviously not a service, it's a product.

You were asking for reasons why second hand sales SHOULD be controlled. Not legal statements for why it IS conrolled.

Europe can declare information to be a sellable product, and that won't make it so any more than if they would declare "faith in humanity" to be a sellable product, or the wetness of the ocean to be a separately sellable content, or fire on the top of a torch to be the property of the torch's holder, that they can move to another one's torch exactly once.

Information is different from property. Fundamentally. In it's very nature, it's something else. Products are defined by being physical.

When you have a milkshake, you can point at something and say "this is the milkshake".

When you have a story, there is nothing to point at, because "the story" doesn't even equal any of the copies that are made about it, but the very act of ideas and knowledge getting arranged in a particular pattern.

Intellectual property is different from the form the property is contained in, though.

If I buy a book, I have absolutely no ownership over the words within that book, and that is completely fair and how it should be. I have no ownership over that story. Can I still give that book to a friend for free? Yes. I absolutely can, because I own that book. I can absolutely sell that book and the information contained within. I cannot take that information out of the book and create a copy by myself and then sell that copy because that infringes copyright laws. But the physical paper and ink? I own it.

Why should games be any different?

If I have a disc with game information on it, that's no different from a book. The information the disc allows you to access is contained within that disc. It physically exists within that copy. That data is completely real. I can point at that disc or point at the file on my hard-drive and say, "This is the game." So why are games any different from a book?

I am totally within my rights to sell a copy of a game that I possess to someone else. I am not creating any additional copies of that game. I am not depriving the game company of a sale. I am simply disposing of my purchase to someone else. I no longer have any ownership of the game. I no longer have a copy. I have given my license to that service to someone else while depriving myself of the ability to play that game. Nothing has been lost to the game company.

Seriously, do you have to pay the author of a book every time you borrow a book from a library and read it? No, you don't, because that would be totally asinine and stupid. Intellectual property doesn't trump actual property rights.