Good. This should have been clarified years ago, and not just in California. I've bought too much content that is no longer accessible. For instance, from the Wii store...
this post was submitted on 28 Sep 2024
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The Wii store remains my go-to example when talking to people who actually believe they own their digital purchases.
Like, Nah fam.
Which is why I will never buy a modern console. Once the company making them shutdowns the servers, the hardware will be useless. Unlike retro consoles that use physical media, which are highly sought after today.
Nintendo usually doesn't do the right thing, but they kept the wii shop working for around 15 years after the console released, which seems reasonable enough, though for how much hosting costs they should still be offering downloads. IIRC you could store downloaded games on an SD cars so you could make a backup. Now the WiiU and 3DS, their online stuff shuttered too early. If I had bought Mariokart 8 digitally for my WiiU and wanted to redownload it, I would be unable, yet Nindendo still sells the same game on their newer switch store. The only Nintendo games I can say I own are the ones decrypted on my NAS that work with FOSS emulators.
You can still buy and play snes games. Could you imagine if the Mona Lisa was gone because 15 years was a reasonable amount of time to keep it?
tl;dr
California's new law will require digital storefronts to clarify that consumers are buying licenses, not outright ownership of digital goods.
The law forces companies to use distinct language when selling digital media to specify license terms to avoid false advertising fines.
The law goes into effect next yea, but won't apply to companies that offer “permanent offline downloads” of digital goods.
“permanent offline downloads”
How can anyone offer that?
It shouldn't be that hard, gog.com manages to do it
Google play music used to offer it as well.
Sail the high seas for life