Sony tells court reasonable consumers wouldn't believe they own digital games
List of references on Sony websites to players "owning" their digital games
Four California PlayStation buyers sued Sony in June 2026, claiming the store's 'Buy Now' and 'Confirm Purchase' language misled them into thinking they owned digital games, when they actually received a revocable license. Sony moved to compel arbitration and dismiss the case, arguing that no reasonable consumer could believe they owned a digital game. The complaint cites California's digital-goods transparency law and seeks over $5 million in damages. A hearing is set for October 1, 2026.
In the digital age, it is not plausible to allege that reasonable consumers believed they were obtaining 'ownership' of a digital game.
- tancop
> The motion says the PlayStation Terms of Service put a binding arbitration agreement and a class action waiver in Section 14, and quotes the opt-out clause: ...
> The clause requires a user who does not wish to be bound to notify Sony in writing within 30 days of accepting the agreement.
Binding arbitration on individuals should be illegal, full stop. The only use case is taking away people's rights as consumers and workers. Or dodging responsibility for deadly mistakes like the Disney+ incident.
This "opt out" mechanism is made to let Sony lawyers argue that accepting it was your choice so it can't be struck down as forced, even if 99% of users have no idea it exists, by design. Evil all the way down.
- voidUpdate
> "Were that the case, then Plaintiff Edward Heycock would not have been able to obtain the game Resident Evil Requiem on February 25, 2026 for $69.99 from the PlayStation Store after Plaintiff Jason Mendoza had obtained Resident Evil Requiem on February 14, 2026, because Mr. Mendoza, not Sony, would have owned it then"
I buy a book. I now own the copy of that book. My friend buys the book. They also own a copy of that book. We do not own the same copy of that book
- buran77
> "Were that the case, then Plaintiff Edward Heycock would not have been able to obtain the game Resident Evil Requiem on February 25, 2026 for $69.99 from the PlayStation Store after Plaintiff Jason Mendoza had obtained Resident Evil Requiem on February 14, 2026, because Mr. Mendoza, not Sony, would have owned it then"
That's a very interesting defense. I wonder if it opens up a door maybe Sony would rather keep shut. If I can't own a copy of content because someone else has another copy, how does this play out for piracy? According to Sony's own argument, pirating a copy of the content is fine because others can/do still "buy" or "own" (rent/lease) it.
- dofm
I am deeply ambivalent about Sony.
I have had three mirrorless Sony cameras (albeit two secondhand), and I think they made what is one of the low-key best hobbyist cameras of its class ever [0], and I don't even much mind their current camera software, which I installed somewhat reluctantly.
But back on the distributable content side, this is a company that hacked customers' PCs with a rootkit. They are a big enough and clumsy enough company to make bad decisions regularly.
[0] the NEX-6, a true joy that I would recommend to anyone who wanted an old knockabout camera even now, though even fourteen years since it was released, its used prices hold up almost too well because I am clearly not the only person who thinks it is lovely
- gwbas1c
Seems like we need some copyright reform WRT issues like this. We need a true way to have digital ownership; including putting assets in escrow and a way for access to continue after the store is shut down or the item removed from the store.
- haunter
HN trunks the url
https://consumerrights.wiki/w/Sony_PlayStation_digital_game_...
- rf15
Sony's lawyers really picked a strange hill to die on here... even if they win, the precedence will screw over Sony, at least in marketing.
- titzer
If 30 years ago someone suggested breaking into your house to take away your Nintendo games or remotely disabling them by sending something over the network to the console, it would have absolutely been beyond the pale.
But 30 years of boiling the frog and now we have a megacorp that has absolutely no qualms about maximizing their profits by doing the moral equivalent. The popular conception of what constitutes a transaction, what constitutes ownership, and what is fair use has swung so far away from what consumers want and expect, that I can't believe they're arguing, stupidly, in court, that ownership is "not possible" because one person can buy a game, and then a second person can!
Whatever happened, I dunno. I hate that consumers have become so powerless in the face of relentless erosion of basic transactional norms.
It just reinforces how much I will not be participating in that economy.