Sony announces UMD to Digital License Transfer for PS Vita

[Bojay1997]

Tell me about it. I wasn't given the option to transfer my licence of "Popeye" starring Robin Williams from CED to LaserDisc. Thanks to this thread I am starting to feel like I was ripped off. I DEMAND REPARATIONS!!!1!

Seriously, Frankie_Says_Relax is the voice of reason in this thread. Sure, Sony could have probably handled this more gracefully, but no one is being wronged here. No one is having their games taken away, you are just being minorly inconvenienced by having to keep your PSP so you can play your PSP game.

I think you're missing the other perspective. Did RCA or Pioneer ever tell you they were working on a solution to get you access to the materials you had already purchased and could no longer use on newer 100% backwards compatible hardware because of the fact that they wanted to cut costs and encourage digital sales to cut out the retailers from the equation? That's essentially what Sony has done here and they want to charge you for the privilege. It's as if Pioneer and RCA decided to release 100% hardware compatible versions of Laserdisc and CED but decided they were going to slightly change the disc format with no improvement of quality whatsoever for the older movies, solely so they could sell you the exact same library of movies again and so they could prevent retailers from seeing any of the profit for distributing software. Yes, it's legal and it's not "morally" outrageous, it's just really crummy for the consumer and reflects poorly on them as a company.

Will it impact sales of the Vita either way? Probably not, but it's just one more vestige of the old way of selling media that Sony is trying to hold onto in a desperate attempt to dig itself out of a very precarious financial situation. It also makes me sad as someone who has exclusively purchased Sony TVs and receivers for the past 25 years and bought every Sony console or handheld at launch. I just feel like it would have been very easy for them to make digital versions of first party titles that I had already bought available to me in digital format for a buck or two.

[RP2A03]

Yes, it's legal and it's not "morally" outrageous, it's just really crummy for the consumer and reflects poorly on them as a company.

That is why I can only think "meh" when i hear about this. Sure, it's not a good deal for the consumer, but you are in no real way being harmed or penalized for not buying into some half-baked idea. You are merely being minorly inconvenienced.

[Gameguy]

Sony had to pay licensing fees to sell the physical copy. They have to pay licensing fees to sell the digital copy. Technically, they're two entirely different forms of media. The PSP can play both UMD PSP games and digital PSP games while the Vita can only play digital PSP games. All previous purchased digital PSP games can be played on the Vita. This is exactly the same as the Wii, as all games on the Virtual Console also have to be relicensed before they can be sold.

I'm a bit confused by these licensing fees, wouldn't the developers or publishers have to pay Sony a licensing fee for their games to be available on Sony's hardware? That seemed to be the case with NES games, people had to pay licensing fees to Nintendo. That's why some companies chose to release their games unlicensed, just to save on the licensing fees(or to release unsuitable content like adult games which Nintendo wouldn't allow back then).

The terms for these licenses could have been negotiated better by Sony. It's like how old TV shows have to have their music changed when released on home video or DVD, now companies negotiate that the music is licensed for both TV airings and home releases, before these companies only licensed the music for TV airings so they're in trouble when they end up trying to release it on DVD. This was Sony's service and distribution method, they could have come up with something better when they created it.

Just as an example to the types of licenses Sony produces;

B. LICENSE FOR USER GENERATED CONTENT

If you post, upload or make available any User Generated Content on our Sites, you will still own the User Generated Content (assuming you have rights to own it) but you are giving us the right to use your User Generated Content. If you create, transfer, share, send, submit, post or upload any User Generated Content to our Sites, you grant us certain rights to use it (described below) without getting your further permission or having to pay you for it.

In legal terms, by transferring, sharing, sending, submitting, posting, uploading or making available User Generated Content on these Sites, you grant SCEA a worldwide, royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable, non-exclusive right and fully sub-licensable license to use, copy, reproduce, distribute, publish, publicly perform, publicly display, modify, adapt, translate, archive, store, and create derivative works from your User Generated Content, in any form, format or medium of any kind now known or later developed, both on these Sites and other online locations, and in other forms or media off the Internet. You waive any moral rights you might have with respect to any User Generated Content you provide to us.

In addition, by transferring, sharing, sending, submitting, posting, uploading or making available User Generated Content on these Sites, you acknowledge that other users of the Sites may use your User Generated Content. SCEA is not responsible for enforcing any rights you may have with respect to your User Generated Content against other users. If you have a dispute with another user of the Sites, you are responsible for contacting the other user directly; do not contact SCEA.

With that agreement you still own your content, only Sony can do whatever they want with it and they won't help you if someone else screws you over by infringing on your rights. That's a pretty sweet deal for Sony. Sony could basically do whatever they want if they included it into the license agreement between them and the game makers. If they could give a price discount to those who already own the games, they could have given them for free also if they really wanted to. I really think Sony just didn't want to do it, it's not that they couldn't do it.

But like someone else and I said previously. If you want to digital copies for "free," in a sense. Use the license transfer, purchase the games on the PSN. Put your PSP games on Ebay, come out richer than you were and still obtain the rights to all games except in digital form. What's the problem there?

Wouldn't that be piracy? If you install software on your computer you aren't allowed to sell the discs unless you're no longer using the software. Why would you be allowed to sell the UMDs while still using the games? I'm sure you could get around it and transfer the games yourself the same way a person could play their own PS1 games on a PSP but it wouldn't be approved of by Sony. You wouldn't be buying another license, you just transfered your existing license.

So, yeah, I'm still trying to follow the logic of ownership/entitlement going on in here ...

... forget about all my LP records, books on cassette and NES Cartridges, what about all the PC CD ROM games that I own?

Why do I have to pay to buy those again on Good Old Games and/or Steam?
Why????

Why can't I have those for free???

With buying games on Steam or GOG you're paying for another license for essentially another copy, not transfering an already existing one. You do get that there's a difference between buying a new license and just transfering an existing one right?

And why would you need to buy it again? You can use your CD-ROMs on current PCs and still access the software you already have just fine. I know with Sam and Max Hit the Road there was an updated executable available so the original CD-ROM could play on Windows XP just fine. This new executable came on new physical copies of the game(reprinted in Europe as there was demand for new physical copies), and this executable was available for download so it could be used with original copies of the game. It was freely available like other patches are, they didn't force you to buy a new version just to play it on XP. This was an official update by LucasArts, I'm not talking about ScummVM or any of the other means of getting old software running on new systems.


As for people just keeping their PSPs, that's fine but what about people who want to travel with portable systems? Should they carry a backpack full of portable systems so they can play whatever they want? Most people would only travel with one system at a time, if they're stuck taking along their old PSP to play their UMD games why bother buying the new system at all?

[kupomogli]

Wouldn't that be piracy? If you install software on your computer you aren't allowed to sell the discs unless you're no longer using the software. Why would you be allowed to sell the UMDs while still using the games? I'm sure you could get around it and transfer the games yourself the same way a person could play their own PS1 games on a PSP but it wouldn't be approved of by Sony. You wouldn't be buying another license, you just transfered your existing license.

It's not piracy. This is software you're purchasing at a discount on a different format for owning the UMD versions. Just like you can purchase a digital copy at regular price and it's not piracy if you don't have a UMD copy. You can do whatever you want with your UMD copies after you have ownership of the digital copies.

[dgdgagdae]

It's not piracy. This is software you're purchasing at a discount on a different format for owning the UMD versions. Just like you can purchase a digital copy at regular price and it's not piracy if you don't have a UMD copy. You can do whatever you want with your UMD copies after you have ownership of the digital copies.

I can't seem to find anything official from Sony in English about the UMD passport program. I assume this is a license transfer situation, and that you would be legally obligated to keep your UMDs if you want to play the discounted downloaded program. But Kupo could be right, it could be a reward type discount program for previous owners, with no requirement to keep the UMD media.

[Frankie_Says_Relax]

... And why would you need to buy it again? You can use your CD-ROMs on current PCs and still access the software you already have just fine ...

The "Why would you need to?" argument is completely moot in all of these debates. This is about people with a strong desire to access their existing owned software on their newer compatible devices.

"WHY?" simply doesn't enter into the equation.

And, as far as the logic that all PC software plays fine and dandy on all modern setups is not universally true for all software and all PC and/or Mac rigs.

And then there's the issue of convenience, some Software downloaded on Steam may be wrapped in minor code/tools/exes which allows for immediate optimization/compatibility with a current version of Windows.

And then there's the issue of hardware limitations, which is VERY similar to the PSP/Vita compatibility vs. hardware divide.

What if I own a CD-Rom version of Day of the Tentacle, but my newest (and only) computer doesn't have any manner of Disc/Optical Drive, but I DO have internet access, Steam and the proper specs to play the game?

NOW, it should be clear that I don't personally subscribe to this logic, but it appears to me that many people here are taking great issue with the fact that the base code of the game is identical so we should be entitled, regardless of the limitations of what physical media is compatible with what device to a free copy of that game on the newer device.

There have been some who were kind enough to discuss their views with me in private, and I really appreciate that, but as long as people are still interested in probing the logic of this all here, I believe that the above scenario makes good sense.

If Steam or GOG is doing little to nothing other than providing an 99% or 100% identical bit of software code for download, shouldn't those who purchased the original versions be entitled to a free version or at the very least a lower point of entry on the download?

[punkoffgirl]

Okay, I've waded through several pages of this thread, and just keep seeing more and more people throwing around veiled and not-so-veiled insults. I think it's time for a lock and a cooling off period.