[apparent]

I've wondered how they'll draw the line on this. If Amazon or Apple has a buy button and it means you get to have ongoing access to the content for as long as Amazon/Apple is around, then for a 30 year old person there's a decent chance that's as good as buying the thing. But if it's hazier, as in the case of Sony's revocation based on losing rights in later years, then you're obviously not getting the same thing. How does CA's law apply to this continuum of circumstances?

[amelius]

Buy only means buy if you can use the product as advertised after breaking all ties with the vendor.

Let's not broaden this definition in favor of the vendor.

[apparent]

Can customers continue to use the content Sony is removing from their accounts, if they have previously downloaded it? I assume that "buy" doesn't require the vendor to continuously maintain the content on their servers, to be available for free download, forever.

Of course, customers would also need a way to transfer the content from their existing devices to later-purchased devices. If that is possible now, but becomes impossible later (like if Sony goes bankrupt), then does that ruin the "buy" characterization that seemed legit at the beginning?

[amelius]

Basically, Sony is trying to couple the selling of the content to the renting of cloud space. That is a kind of tie-in sales that should not be permitted like that (the buyer should have the option to rent the cloud space for their product elsewhere).

[alt227]

Is this an official definition defined in law?

[confidantlake]

I'm sorry what? There isn't some super secret legal definition of every word. Buy means buy.

[throw101010]

What makes you think that this is "as good as" buying when the original post itself demonstrate clearly that it's nowhere close to actually buying something?

Is there something in Apple or Amazon terms which say they can't under any circumstances deprive you of accessing the content you have bought with their "Buy" buttons? I don't see why you are trying to assign a difference between them and Sony here?

We have words like leases, licenses, or renting for a reason and they are not new.

The companies which shifted their business model to renting in the digital age have perpetuated the "buy" buttons to make their customers think the transaction was the same as when they purchased a physical media... but clearly, and it's by far not the first case, these companies will deprive their customers of their "purchase" for many reasons that shouldn't be any concern for someone who actually "bought" something... like the companies suddenly deciding to stop paying for the rights of the thing that they alledgly "sold" to you.

So just as clearly, theses were not actual purchases but just licenses, non-transferable, allegedly "perpetual" but unilaterally revocable at any time with no refund.

I really don't see why you seem to think there is anything hazy about this, or hard to delineate. This law seems to cover the cases in which these companies abuse the language in question, Amazon and Apple are not "selling" you anything digital, you acquire a pretty limited license on all of these services.

[apparent]

I said "a decent chance that's as good as buying the thing". If these mega companies stick around and continue to offer access to the content, then it is as good as buying it (arguably better if you don't have to store it and can download onto many devices over decades). But note that this was all preceded by "a decent chance". There is also a chance that it won't turn out to be as good as buying, if the company goes under, gets out of that line of business, or loses access to the relevant rights.

One important question, which I don't know the answer to, is whether Sony is nuking stuff from your devices. If not, then they could claim that you bought the thing and can keep using it on your existing devices. If you can move the content from a PS5 to a PS6 in 5 years, then arguably it's fine to say you "bought" it. But if they're wiping the content from your local devices, then you've definitely not bought the thing.

[throw101010]

> I said "a decent chance that's as good as buying the thing".

I didn't think I would need to quote more of your message, its essence is that you think these kinds of licenses *can be* "as good as buying" when they demonstrably have never been close to it... and it's by design.

> If these mega companies stick around and continue to offer access to the content, then it is as good as buying it (arguably better if you don't have to store it and can download onto many devices over decades)

But the really don't, they regularly cut access to content they pretend to have "sold" to you with a "buy" button. They have redefined the words "buy" and "purchase" to match an old model of sales where you actually had an irrevocable access to the content. All this law says is that it should be made clear to the end user.

Currently companies hide this to customers in pages-long EULAs and behind misleading "Buy" buttons. It shouldn't be so hard to be honest about their business model... unless maybe they think people would reconsider "buying" all these things if they knew they can be taken away from them so easily, without refunds, often without even warning them.

> or loses access to the relevant rights.

In most cases the companies don't "lose" anything, they decide that continuing to pay the copyright holders for this content is not profitable for them anymore (or fail to negotiate it within their acceptable margins), so they stop paying, and remove the content from their catalog. Without any regard, consultation, or compensation for the customers who paid to access it.

> If you can move the content from a PS5 to a PS6 in 5 years, then arguably it's fine to say you "bought" it. But if they're wiping the content from your local devices, then you've definitely not bought the thing.

Many of these services stream the content to you on-demand and don't even allow local copies... or if they do, they gate the local copy behind online renewable keys limited in time. Sony does this by forcing you to connect your console every few days if you want to be able to continue to play "offline".

And to be honest Sony's case is interesting but not very significant, both Amazon and Apple have been caught removing content (removed books from Kindle, removed songs/albums from iTunes, if my memory serves me well, you can easily google the cases), they got class action lawsuits against them and both settled. More than once. They settle because they know their customers expectation of "buying" is not the one their EULAs guarantees, and they really don't want courts to rule on these EULAs or whether "Buy" is a misleading term. That's why lawmakers have to do it. It's really not a matter up for discussion that these companies will remove content sooner or later, the OP demonstrates so, the previous settled cases too... so unless you provide a framework in which these companies can offer an access that is actually as good as actually buying a physical media, it's just wishful thinking to believe they "can" do it, there is literally no incentive for them to do it and they've designed the current business model this way on purpose, removing all control from their customers.

[apparent]

> I didn't think I would need to quote more of your message, its essence is that you think these kinds of licenses can be "as good as buying" when they demonstrably have never been close to it... and it's by design.

You cut out a key part of what I said. When people do that, I don't read the rest of their really long replies. Good day.

[throw101010]

It is not a key part, I asked you multiple questions to clarify the side of your hypothetical ("if") in which these companies supposedly would act in a way they never have (sell anything close to permanent access to content their customer paid for).

That's the part I've quoted, because that's the questionable part. You just have no argument to support this idea.

So good day to you too, please, next time take a couple minutes to read the OP to see that your suggestion/idea of how things could work is exactly the opposite of reality, by design, by (among others) the two companies you suggest are acting differently and have both had to settle class-action lawsuits for the same deliberate and anti-consumer behavior.