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Posts tagged PlayStation Network
Global Geek News Podcast #45
Nov 24th
Here are the shownotes for episode #45 for the Global Geek News Podcast.
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Stories:
- Smoking near Apple computers creates biohazard, voids warranty
- Netbooks have higher failure rates than laptops
- Google’s Chrome OS, the next big thing or Google’s great blunder?
- Microsoft: Azure to go live in January, for pay in February
- Bing captures 10% of the search market in the US
- Banned Xbox 360 modders unite with a class action lawsuit against Microsoft
- New York tests Xbox-based alert system
- Sony to expand the PlayStation Network into Sony Online Service, sell music, books and videos
- “Unfriend” declared word of the year
- Digg CEO Adelson: “I don’t think people expect to pay for news anymore”
Tip of the week: Office 2010 Professional beta available for download (FREE!)
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Host: Jeremy Bray & Wesley Faulkner
Special Guest: Randall Bennett from TechVi.com
For more news, check out the Global Geek News Blog
Global Geek News #10
Oct 21st
Here are the shownotes for episode #10 for the Global Geek News Podcast.
Global Geek News #10
Podcast Feed: 
- P2P traffic to grow by 400% in 5 years
- P2P compliance: Schools seeing red as they shell out the green
- Global Anti-Piracy Day
- Sony says all your actions are belong to us
- Google releases Android source code
- E3 goes back to the big show, opens up to the public
- iList debuts social classifieds
- Kentucky judge upholds state’s gambling domain grab
- New PSP units suffer from major interlacing problem
- Microsoft proposes phones that tap and rub to get your attention
Host: Jeremy “pcnerd37″ Bray – Follow me on Twitter!
The PlayStation Network Terms of Service: Revisited!
Oct 21st
Greetings Readers!
After the huge response I have received from my post yesterday about Sony’s updated Terms of Service/User Agreement for the PlayStation Network, I have decided that I should write a follow-up post addressing some of the points that have been brought up. I was trying to get in contact with somebody at Sony who could respond, but like Gamespot, I have not had any luck. Before I get into this post, I would like to thank everybody that shared the link for yesterday’s post as it is now the third most viewed post on the Global Geek News Blog behind the Twitter Etiquette and Twitter Etiquette 2 posts. OK, here we go.
Probably the biggest comment I have received so far is in regards to the protection of children from online predators. This is certainly a valid point, which lead to Sony adding the following statement to the new Terms of Service.
You may not provide anyone with your name or any other personally identifying information other than your own Online ID, or the name, password or personally identifying information of any other person or business through any means, including messaging, chat or any other form of PSN communication.
While I agree with the purpose behind this statement, I think it goes a bit too far. I think giving this information should be up to the users and their own personal judgment or that of their guardians. I have met countless people online, and if I was restricted by this rule, I would not have many of the great friends I have today. I also play online with friends, and I don’t to risk banning because I refer to somebody by their actual name rather than their Online ID. Protecting the children is a honorable goal, but restricting everybody to protect a few is going too far.
Another popular opinion that I have seen is that this Terms of Service is no worse than most of them that are out there. When I am bored, I am known to read Terms of Service type documents, so I know this is not the case. While I will agree that many Terms of Service are overly restrictive and often rarely enforced, to say this is no worse than others is just plain wrong. When Google did something very similar when they launched Chrome, trying to say that everything created through their browser was essentially theirs, they were immediately called out on it and they backed off. That is what needs to happen here. It is time that Terms of Service are not so one sided, and many such documents are beginning to reflect that as technology becomes more open. I know that my legal section for this site is nowhere near as ugly as this terms of service. In the interest of fairness and to show that I am not out to destroy Sony, I will be reviewing the ToS of the other consoles and writing about them later this week.
Another hot button topic seems to be the giving of information to third parties. From what I have read, many people seem to be against it, especially when they realize that it is personal information that is being given. Personally, I generally don’t much care if companies gather anonymous usage statistics on things I do. As long as no personally identifying information about me is not sent, especially in an insecure manner, I don’t mind contributing to make a product better by allowing companies to see how I am using a product for future improvements or what bugs I am running into that need fixed. When my personal information is sent, especially to third parties who can also distribute it to whomever they choose, that is when I have a problem. It is even worse when there is no way to opt out of such a policy. With the way it stands now, if I don’t agree, I don’t get to use my PS3 or PSP, and that is that. Giving personal information out in such a manner is a huge security and privacy problem. The more people that have your information, the higher your chances of identity theft. Also, such information transfer is illegal in some places.
The last major point that has been made that I want to talk about is that these are just meant to cover Sony’s butt if somebody decides they want to sue them. While I will agree with that, I believe they went much farther than that, especially when they refuse to do anything about lost data purchased from the PlayStation Store, even when they are the one to have caused the problem. As I stated before, protecting children and stupid people in general is certainly an admirable goal, but there are better ways to go about it than doing something like this. Courts have thrown out Terms of Service in the past because they are overly restrictive and just plain bad that no reasonable person would accept them, something that could very easily happen in this case. A balance must be struck between Sony protecting its hardware, network, and contracts and the consumer and allowing them to use their system in the way that they choose.
Don’t forget to check back later this week as I will talk bout the Terms of Service that come with the other consoles and the possibility of comment from Sony on this issue! I am also likely to talk about this on the next Global Geek News Podcast, so keep an eye on that! Like always, follow me on Twitter or Friendfeed if you want to be notified of when new posts go up. Until next time, don’t forget to comment (And be a constructive commenter)!
-Jeremy “pcnerd37″ Bray
Sony Says All Your Actions Are Belong to Us!
Oct 20th
Greetings Readers!
Being a member of the Playstation Network and various Playstation related programs (Gamers Advisory Panel), I recieved an email on Friday informing me of changes to the Terms of Service and User Agreement for the Playstation Network. Since it was a slow day at work, I decided to read the changes to the service, most of which are beyond disgusting.
While these agreements are made primarily for the company to cover its butt in the biggest way possible so that it can avoid dumb lawsuits from Jack Thompson impersonators, the new changes went much farther than that. There are a few new rules in there that are to be expected, basically trying to keep people from exchanging personal information and trying to protect children which is all well and good, but they did not stop there.
Lets get right into the bad stuff with the fact that basically you no longer have any privacy on the PlayStation Network.
However, SCEA reserves the right to monitor and record any online activity and communication throughout PSN and you give SCEA your express consent to monitor and record your activities. SCEA reserves the right to remove any content and communication from PSN at SCEA’s sole discretion without further notice to you. Any data collected in this way, including the content of your communications, the time and location of your activities, your Online ID and IP address and other related information may be used by us to enforce this Agreement or protect the interests of SCEA, its users, or licensors.
Unless you want to risk termination of your service and have very little functionality out of your PS3, you will now have to be very careful about what you do as Sony is watching and listening for TOS violations so they can disable your account. But, if you thought that this is all they are using your information for, you would be wrong. It is being shared with third parties.
Third parties, including publishers may administer access to some content, including delivery, gameplay or customer service. To enable third parties to provide such access to you, we must provide them with your personal information. If you do not consent to allow us to share your personal information with third parties for the purpose of providing you with access to PSN content, you will not be able to participate in PSN.
So now, all of your private information is now at the hands of third parties and whatever they choose to do with it. You have no say in what personal information they get, and if you don’t like it, you aren’t allowed to use the PlayStation Network. I suspect this is the first step in finding ads on the PlayStation Network outside of promoting new items in the store.
Of course the fun doesn’t stop there. Stories have been floating around for some time about the horrible DRM and stuff related to downloading store content and that you basically get one shot with content and thats it, but now, if something happens, even if its Sony’s fault, you are out of luck.
You bear all risk of loss for completing the download of any content and for any loss of content you have downloaded, including any loss due to a file corruption or hard drive crash.You are solely responsible for the storage and safekeeping of your content. SCEA is not responsible for providing you with replacement copies for any reason.
If that doesn’t sound bad enough, they state earlier in the terms that they can update your system at any time and can remove functionality or cause data loss, leaving you with nothing to do but twittle your thumbs.
Some content may be provided automatically without notice when you sign into PSN. Such content may include automatic updates or upgrades which may change your current operating system, cause a loss of data or content or cause a loss of functionalities or utilities.
So if Sony fails to properly test an update and it hoses your console, you can kiss all your downloaded content goodbye. If you want it back, you will have to buy it all over again.
Speaking of DRM, hacking your PS3 or PSP to give yourself more control over your content is no longer allowed.
You may not bypass, disable, or circumvent any encryption, security, digital rights management or authentication mechanism in connection with PSN or any of the content offered through PSN.
Nope, we still aren’t done yet, there is even more bad news. Sony has also decided to pull what Google did with Chrome and own everything you create.
To the extent permitted by law, You authorize and license SCEA a royalty free and perpetual right to use, distribute, copy, modify, display, and publish your User Material for any reason without any restrictions or payments to you or any third parties. You further agree that SCEA may sublicense its rights to any third party, including its affiliates and subsidiaries.
These are the biggest problems with the updated Terms of Service for the PlayStation Network, but certainly not all of them. If you are a PSP or PS3 owner, or just really care about privacy and consumer rights, I highly recommend reading the rest of the Terms of Serivce here. The updates are all in red.
The changes are disgusting on many levels and should be fought. The more attention this issue gets, the better the chance we have of changing it, so make sure to forward this to everybody you know! Until then, all your actions are belong to Sony! Don’t forget to post your thought in the comments as well.
-Jeremy “pcnerd37″ Bray
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