The days of selling your used video games back to retail stores may be over sooner than we thought. The SF-based 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals recently made a ruling in the case of Vernor vs. Autodesk (LOL) that software publishers have the right to restrict the resale of their products to another users.
In the same way that many software companies require second round users to re-register for access, the ruling is major news for companies that buy back and sell video games, DVDs, books, and music.
But GameStop is definitely one of the bigger companies affected, as used game sales make up 46-percent of the company’s gross income of $260 million per quarter. We knew the demise of GameSpot would happen eventually, but thought it would because of games moving into the cloud.
And here’s yet another reason not to join Facebook, if you haven’t already. If you live in Victoria, Australia, police now have the court’s approval to serve you papers via Facebook as a last attempt following prior attempts to contact you.
The subpoena comes in the form of a private message and even includes a video shot of the order that reads “as if the Respondent was being directly spoken to.” They can also serve via text message as well, so just don’t commit any heinous crimes and you’ll be fine.
Tune into the rest of today’s episode of The 404 Podcast to hear some personal stories about our high school jobs (yes, one of us was a dishwasher), as well as a long overdue Calls From the Public!
Episode 691
Listen now:
Download today’s podcast
Subscribe in iTunes audio | Suscribe to iTunes (video) | Subscribe in RSS Audio | Subscribe in RSS Video
Originally posted at The 404 Podcast
Post a Comment