Valve breached Australian Consumer Law says ruling

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30-03-2016, 09:33 AM
HEXUS

Valve breached Australian Consumer Law says ruling

Quote:

When the court case opened, in 2014, Steam didn't have any refund policy in place.

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30-03-2016, 10:02 AM
aniilv

Re: Valve breached Australian Consumer Law says ruling

This is as stupid as France saying google needs to erase half of internet because they said so.

Edited for language
30-03-2016, 10:26 AM
Corky34

Re: Valve breached Australian Consumer Law says ruling

Quote:

Originally Posted by aniilv

Edited for language

Isn't the flip side of that everyone having to know what the local laws are for the company they deal with?
Personally I'm more in favor of the company complying with the laws of the country that their customers live in and if they don't agree with those laws don't sell to that country, seems preferable to millions of people having to learn all the different consumer laws of the businesses they buy stuff from.
30-03-2016, 02:50 PM
outwar6010

Re: Valve breached Australian Consumer Law says ruling

Generally in most of the world minus america we have pretty good consumer protection laws etc that steam origin uplay etc all ignore.
30-03-2016, 05:31 PM
Luke7

Re: Valve breached Australian Consumer Law says ruling

Quote:

Originally Posted by Corky34

Quote:

Originally Posted by aniilv

Edited for language

Isn't the flip side of that everyone having to know what the local laws are for the company they deal with?
Personally I'm more in favor of the company complying with the laws of the country that their customers live in and if they don't agree with those laws don't sell to that country, seems preferable to millions of people having to learn all the different consumer laws of the businesses they buy stuff from.

Nah. There should be a standard created for all internet consumption, not tied to a physical country, as the internet itself is not necessarily tied to a certain landmass. IMO the internet should not be ruled by petty governments with tautological authority over a given landmass. All these rulings ever achieve is further complication and frustration for everyone concerned.
30-03-2016, 05:45 PM
MonkeyL

Re: Valve breached Australian Consumer Law says ruling

Quote:

Originally Posted by Luke7

All these rulings ever achieve is further complication and frustration for everyone concerned.

In this case it seems like a totally logical ruling. I'm not sure which bit of it you find complicated or frustrating.
30-03-2016, 06:48 PM
Corky34

Re: Valve breached Australian Consumer Law says ruling

Quote:

Originally Posted by Luke7

Nah. There should be a standard created for all internet consumption, not tied to a physical country, as the internet itself is not necessarily tied to a certain landmass. IMO the internet should not be ruled by petty governments with tautological authority over a given landmass. All these rulings ever achieve is further complication and frustration for everyone concerned.

While the idea of a standard set of rules/laws governing the internet maybe a good idea in theory i can't see every country in the world managing to agree, and even if they did it would be a mishmash of half-baked ideas trying to cover everyone and probably end up covering nothing.
30-03-2016, 09:44 PM
peterb

Re: Valve breached Australian Consumer Law says ruling

Quote:

Originally Posted by Luke7

Nah. There should be a standard created for all internet consumption, not tied to a physical country, as the internet itself is not necessarily tied to a certain landmass. IMO the internet should not be ruled by petty governments with tautological authority over a given landmass. All these rulings ever achieve is further complication and frustration for everyone concerned.

The internet is only a communications medium. The content is provided from servers that will be located on a physical landmass. The owners of that content are bound by the laws where the server is located, and may also be bound by the laws of the country or territory where that content is consumed.

That is exactly the same as purchasing a physical product, and there is no reason why an Internet or digital purchase should be any different.
31-03-2016, 01:40 AM
Saracen

Re: Valve breached Australian Consumer Law says ruling

Quote:

Originally Posted by peterb

The internet is only a communications medium. The content is provided from servers that will be located on a physical landmass. The owners of that content are bound by the laws where the server is located, and may also be bound by the laws of the country or territory where that content is consumed.

That is exactly the same as purchasing a physical product, and there is no reason why an Internet or digital purchase should be any different.

Well, there are a number of different ways of determining where a transaction legally takes place when it's done over the internet. A UK company selling goods to a UK citizen isn't exempt from UK consumer law because it's servers are in the Ukraine.

One very strong argument is what when a company sells something on the internet, they do so based on the terms and conditions they put up, and that accepting any offer to buy is contingent on the buyer agreeing to them. If the buyer doesn't agree, the seller won't sell. And any company with an IQ above 3 specifies "jurisdiction" in those T&Cs. Of course, any company operating from Country A but with a physical operation in Country B can also be held to relevant laws of Country B.