[HN Gopher] Epic will pay off class-action loot-box settlement w...
___________________________________________________________________
Epic will pay off class-action loot-box settlement with in-game
currency
Author : pseudolus
Score : 206 points
Date : 2021-02-23 14:48 UTC (8 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (arstechnica.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (arstechnica.com)
| nico__ wrote:
| Maybe if loot-boxes are considered gambling it is because the
| digital asset has monetary value, therefore it could be used as
| reimbursement in this case? shady
| CivBase wrote:
| So as "punishment", Epic has to "pay" users in a fake currency
| which can only be redeemed for a limited set of Epic products and
| whose value is artificially controlled by Epic themselves. This
| sounds more like a marketing campaign than a legal settlement.
| say_it_as_it_is wrote:
| Do they also pay employees with company scrips?
| nrhodes wrote:
| Reminds me of the airline antitrust suit in the early 1990's. The
| settlement was 10% discount coupons (AirScrip) for seven of the
| airlines that were involved.
|
| Two airlines that weren't part of the suit (Alaska and America
| West) agreed to accept the coupons since they didn't want to get
| left out.
| bilekas wrote:
| wow.. I'm sure many companies facing class action law suits would
| love to reimburse people with in-store vouchers..
|
| How is this legal ? Isn't the whole loophole around in-game
| currency not receiving gambling regulation is because the
| currency is NOT redeemable ?
| Majromax wrote:
| > How is this legal ?
|
| Because this is a settlement of a lawsuit, rather than an
| independently-triggered regulatory action.
|
| The lawyers and representative plaintiffs may agree to this
| because an in-game-points payment inflates the notional value
| of the settlement and thus the legal fees, but that group would
| be paid in cash based on a fraction of the settlement value.
| teddyh wrote:
| Ticketmaster lost a class action suit in 2016, but managed to be
| allowed to pay the customers it unfairly charged not in money,
| but in _coupons for Ticketmaster_.
|
| http://www.billboard.com/articles/business/7370600/ticketmas...
| medicineman wrote:
| It has never been more obvious how lawyers and politicians run
| this country as a giant scam.
| FatalLogic wrote:
| There seem to be two beneficiaries from such class action cases:
| Lawyers who get paid, and prosecutors who get publicity.
|
| The deterrent effect on the guilty party is negligible, and the
| benefit to the public is nil.
| hn8788 wrote:
| I don't see why they'd be able to do this, considering that one
| of the main arguments for why lootboxes and virtual currency
| don't count as gambling is that they have no monetary value.
| fritzo wrote:
| Consider the two cases. If loot-boxes have no monetary value,
| then Epic won't be losing any monetary value in the settlement.
| If loot-boxes do have monetary value, then Epic should pay, and
| loot-boxes should be a valid form of payment. ;)
| istjohn wrote:
| Class action lawsuits should require a "class advocate" who is
| only paid a flat percentage of the total amount awarded to the
| class in a settlement or court victory. The advocate would
| represent the class and would have the power to hire, fire, and
| negotiate compensation for any lawyers, and any settlement would
| require the advocate's approval.
|
| The advocate could choose to fork over half of the settlement to
| the lawyers if they judge that that is it what is necessary to
| win, but they could also negotiate lower fees or hire another
| firm if they believe the lawyers are charging exhorbitant fees or
| otherwise not representing the best interests of the class.
|
| HT @MikeUt https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26238726
| jacquesm wrote:
| The degree of 'unethical' at play here is nothing short of epic.
| Loughla wrote:
| Can someone please explain to me how this is not just a complete
| travesty and perversion of settlements?
|
| >In a way, the digital giveaway could even be seen as an
| effective promotion, luring players back to the games and
| creating the potential for them to spend more on additional
| microtransactions down the road.
|
| That. That's the part I need explained to me. Get punished, but
| use the punishment to hook players even more. How is this
| allowed?
| jayd16 wrote:
| Is it even about punishment? This is a civil case about loot-
| boxes.
|
| The settlement is to pay off the lawyers and make the case go
| away.
|
| I'm not that morally opposed to loot boxes and I don't believe
| any laws were broken. What kind of punishment are you looking
| for?
| _Microft wrote:
| I hope the lawyers are also paid with in-game currency.
| alpaca128 wrote:
| Or exposure
| njharman wrote:
| A disincentive to continuing the activity the class action
| suit was brought for.
|
| In theory, class action lawsuits are either or both 1)
| compensate victims 2) "force" company to stop activity
| society deems "bad"
|
| Victims care about #1, the rest of us want #2 so we don't
| become victims in the future.
|
| In this case, stop exploiting addiction and other human
| psychology for profit via loot boxes.
| stuaxo wrote:
| The point of the settlement is to hit a company hard enough
| so they stop before doing something like this again.
|
| Using in game currency and not real money is absolutely not
| going to achieve this.
| ashtonkem wrote:
| Because the regulators are completely captured.
| ChicagoBoy11 wrote:
| What regulators, though? Class sued the company and agreed to
| these ridiculous terms. I'd see a role to question maybe the
| integrity of the lawyers accepting the deal, or the mechanics
| of entering/disputing/leaving class action lawsuits in this
| world where now class members can easily reach into the many,
| many millions. But, like another commenter posted, if these
| were just two parties agreeing to this (which in some sense
| it is), we wouldn't have a problem with this at all.
| chriswarbo wrote:
| > What regulators, though?
|
| Online gambling regulators.
| dang wrote:
| Please don't post ideological battle comments and flamebait
| to HN. There's no information here, just a trope repetition;
| that makes this strictly a discussion-lowering comment. We
| penalize accounts that post like this, so please don't.
|
| https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
| rhino369 wrote:
| >How is this allowed?
|
| You are pretty much assuming they are liable for the
| allegations in the complaint against them.
|
| Settlements for low value are a sign that plaintiffs view their
| chances of success (including being awarded substantial
| damages) as being low.
|
| So one way of looking at this is, Epic did nothing wrong, and
| they are giving away essentially nothing to make the plaintiff
| go away.
|
| If plaintiffs thought they had a good case, they wouldn't take
| monopoly money.
| jonas21 wrote:
| Notably, the attorneys aren't taking monopoly money.
|
| > _Additionally, the attorneys who brought the lawsuit (see
| FAQ 10) will ask the Court to award them attorney's fees and
| expenses in an amount not to exceed $11,300,000.00, for the
| time, expense and effort expended in investigating the facts,
| litigation, and negotiating the Settlement. The Class
| Representatives will also ask the Court for a payment of up
| to $75,000 collectively for their time, effort, and service
| in this matter._
|
| https://www.epiclootboxsettlement.com/Home/Faq
| ccleve wrote:
| The lawyers get real money, and the victims get fake money.
| That's the real scandal. Our tort system is broken.
| gruez wrote:
| Is the risk-adjusted price that the lawyers are being
| paid unusually high? Lawyers being expensive doesn't
| really mean "Our tort system is broken".
| freeone3000 wrote:
| It does, because it diverts money from the people who are
| actually harmed to people who advocate on their behalf;
| and raises the threshold for a class-action suit in
| general, as suits that are "too cheap" are not worth
| anyone's time.
| bostonsre wrote:
| The settlement could also be low because the lawyers on the
| plaintiff side were not acting in the best interests of the
| people they were representing, just in their own best
| interests.
| DevKoala wrote:
| They probably saw their chances of winning against EPIC's
| legal team being very low. That legal team is stacked atm.
| oliwarner wrote:
| The plaintiffs may just value what's being offered. It might
| be money they'd have otherwise spent.
|
| Not my cup of tea, but I run a mile from any game that
| requires I shovel cash into it to get ahead
| mc32 wrote:
| This would be like the big tobacco settlement being: big
| tobacco will pay smokers 100 billion tobacco bucks redeemable
| for cigarettes at an exchange rate of 100 tobacco bucks per
| cigarette.
| shagie wrote:
| With cigarettes, there's at least a real _product_ there that
| has some cost to the company that made it.
|
| With epic game currency, it's just a bunch of bits that could
| be created without any resource use by the company. They
| could create 10x more game currency at no more cost to the
| company.
| edoceo wrote:
| Some dev has to run an INSERT statement. And maybe a test
| case. Cheap.
| Cthulhu_ wrote:
| The question is whether the class action suit's intent is to
| punish them (as in, did they commit a crime?), or to get
| compensation for their behaviour. If the latter, then the suing
| parties probably agreed to them settling via in game currency.
| vmception wrote:
| This is common and there is some psychology involved in how to
| create these scenarios.
|
| Basically you can scare the government into thinking the
| state's actions will reduce competition (because your company
| wont exist anymore if you pay). The government uses so much
| energy trying to create/continue private sector competition
| that they don't want to be directly responsible for creating
| closer to a monopoly of the remaining companies in the sector.
|
| So they'll accept these consequence free settlements, or even
| get behind settlements that actually are advertisements.
|
| The court here is granting approval of the settlement.
| jka wrote:
| Similar strategies have been used before; seven or so years
| after opening a lawsuit about a data breach at Zappos,
| claimants were offered 10% coupons for the Zappos online store.
|
| https://www.zdnet.com/article/zappos-data-breach-settlement-...
| dr_orpheus wrote:
| Yep, I remember getting Ticketmaster credit for their class
| action lawsuit.
| ourmandave wrote:
| I owned an '76 Chevy pickup and GM sent a coupon worth
| $1000 off the purchase of a brand new pickup as a
| settlement.
|
| Never used it, but I assume Dealer Keeps All Incentives
| applied.
|
| (They had side-saddle gas tanks that increased the chances
| of a fire in an accident.)
|
| https://www.lieffcabraser.com/defect/gm-pickup-fuel-tanks/
| nodesocket wrote:
| Remember this next time the HN crowd gets their pitch forks out
| against Apple and their dispute with Epic. Who is really the
| "evil" company here.
| jpambrun wrote:
| They can both be evil.
| dmurray wrote:
| It's legal because both sides agreed to settle for it.
|
| If it was an individual suing Epic, and they agreed to go away
| in return for some shiny digital magic beans, you wouldn't see
| anything wrong with that. What's different if a million
| customers settle for it?
|
| Customers can opt out of the class action, or start their own
| competing one. What would be a real problem is if other
| customers opted out, sued Epic individually, didn't settle, and
| the judge used the "payout" from the previous settlement to
| decide what a fair compensation would be. That hasn't happened
| here.
| njharman wrote:
| There are lots of things that are still illegal even if both
| sides agree to it. Slavery for instance. Also all the things
| covered by consumer protection litigation, which top
| commenter is probably thinking of.
|
| The conditions/clauses of the agreement must not be illegal.
| A12-B wrote:
| Lol, I'm sure every single person in the class action suit
| agreed to the settlement, and otherwise would be able to
| afford to sue them again. Right.
|
| Settlements are decided by a single class representative, and
| other class members are often not given notice of their right
| to opt-out or counter-sue.
| sudhirj wrote:
| And that's why you'd opt into a class action in the first
| place. You have a problem, you elect someone to handle it
| for you, give them decision making power and accept the
| outcome they've been able to achieve. It's just democracy,
| no?
| Arubis wrote:
| All of this makes sense except for the bit about
| democracy. That's unrelated; this happens to be a process
| that's in use here, but it would work just as well in a
| monarchy.
| alasdair_ wrote:
| > It's legal because both sides agreed to settle for it.
|
| I bet the lawyers representing the class aren't getting paid
| in VBucks. There are really three sides - Epic, the
| consumers, and the lawyers.
|
| The fact that class actions are opt-out instead of opt-in is
| a big part of the problem.
| kemiller wrote:
| Hmm, I'm guessing the lawyers behind the suit aren't getting
| paid in loot.
| josho wrote:
| > Get punished
|
| But, this isn't even a punishment. In game currency isn't real.
| It doesn't cost the company anything. So, this is 'be found
| guilty and be forced to go back to your junkies and give them
| their next hit of crack for free.'
|
| I can imagine the ad banners: "Thousands of players will win
| new loot, will you be one? Play to find out".
| ajuc wrote:
| > In game currency isn't real
|
| It is exactly as real as bitcoin.
|
| > It doesn't cost the company anything.
|
| To see this isn't true let's imagine they give away billion
| points to each player at once. How will their profits from
| that game change? I expect a big drop.
| alpaca128 wrote:
| Ingame currency cannot be sold or transferred and is 100%
| lost if the publisher decides to ban you.
|
| In other words, it's not really comparable to any
| cryptocurrency. Heck, even Steam's stickers/pictures you
| can unlock by playing games are more of a currency as you
| can sell (and buy) them for real money.
| mattnewton wrote:
| It's far less real than Bitcoin if you can't trade it on an
| open market.
|
| This is like paying a settlement to employees in a company
| script instead of legal tender.
| MaxBarraclough wrote:
| > To see this isn't true let's imagine they give away
| billion points to each player at once. How will their
| profits from that game change? I expect a big drop.
|
| I wonder about that. The motive in the in-game economy is
| to have, and spend, more than other players, right? Handing
| out in-game money to _all_ participants might disrupt
| things in that everyone can now buy the fancy in-game
| items, but the competitive /relative component presumably
| remains. If you want even more in-game items than other
| players, the dynamic is still there: you still need to pay
| up.
| badRNG wrote:
| I mean, they could just devalue the in-game currency.
| Purchasing said currency would be cheaper, and in game
| items would be more expensive. It'd be a short-term
| disruption, but ultimately it wouldn't cost the company
| much directly, other than temporarily dissatisfied users.
|
| You could even mitigate the former by compensating
| players by providing them more currency in proportion to
| the pre-devaluation purchasing power of their virtual
| wallet.
| MaxBarraclough wrote:
| > they could just devalue the in-game currency
|
| Item prices are fixed by the developer, aren't they?
| _edit_ I suppose that just kicks the stone down the road.
| There would still be devaluation in the sense that scarce
| and expensive items become commonplace.
| falcolas wrote:
| The item prices could always be "re-fixed" by the
| developer. There's no reason they must to remain static,
| especially if there was some "give billions of the
| currency to everybody" that was somehow unable to be
| rolled back.
| zachrip wrote:
| Yes and no...their currency is in their playground. They
| can manipulate it however they want (though I wonder if
| that's even legal/would bring on another class action).
| They can't manipulate the dollar to reduce the impact,
| though.
| devonbleak wrote:
| Bitcoin supply is fixed. In-game currency gets created with
| a database query.
|
| And they're not giving everybody billions. They're forgoing
| some fraction of $.07B that represents the revenue they
| would have otherwise captured. My guess is the fraction of
| people who spend less on these games because they got a
| little free in-game currency is near-zero and they might
| actually see a bump in revenue because they can now send
| out a marketing blast telling inactive users they have a
| reason to come back.
| dantillberg wrote:
| It's actually less "real" than Bitcoin. I haven't read the
| Fortnite TOS, but game companies always grant themselves
| unilateral permission to create/destroy in-game items/etc
| whenever they please.
| ehsankia wrote:
| AFAIK know, there's no trading in Fortnite. Games like
| Hearthstone or League of Legends where there is no way to
| exchange your goods for anything outside the game (except
| maybe selling the account as a whole) are indeed nowhere
| as real as bitcoin. On the otherhand, if it was a Valve
| game where you can trade items or sell them on the market
| place, then yes, those have a real value. Although
| dumping $78m of items in such a market place would
| probably collapse the item economy?
|
| You can buy a car with bitcoin, but you cannot buy a car
| with fortnite bucks, that's generally the metric I use to
| tell how real a currency is and how usable it is.
| remram wrote:
| I'm being pedantic, but no currency is "real". This one
| allows players to buy thing, which they are likely to want to
| do since they have in the past (and cared enough to start a
| class action over). You deciding that those goods are "hits
| of crack" is entirely subjective.
|
| However it is true that it only costs Epic the lost revenue
| from selling those v-bucks. If a freely-tradable currency was
| emitted to cover debt, you'd have the penalty of devaluation,
| but that is not the case here. Of course that makes no
| difference for the players, that's only about _punishment_.
| joecot wrote:
| One time I bought a Nissan Versa. It had a Continuously
| Variable Transmission in it. They knew that they broke
| constantly, and they sold it anyway. They lied to me and
| said my transmission was fine a few months before the
| warranty was over, so they wouldn't have to replace it.
| Years after I traded that car in and it went immediately to
| a junk yard, Nissan settled a class action lawsuit over it.
| The compensation? A voucher for a few thousand towards a
| new Nissan.
|
| I promise that when I joined a class action lawsuit over
| Nissan screwing me over, my goal wasn't to buy more
| Nissans. I would hazard a guess that many players who felt
| cheated enough by Epic to join a lawsuit against them
| likely feel similar.
| Krasnol wrote:
| > I'm being pedantic, but no currency is "real".
|
| It is real in the sense that you can chose where you spend
| it. While this is like coupons. It may have value but that
| is very limited and therefore does not qualify as currency.
| Cookingboy wrote:
| >So, this is 'be found guilty and be forced to go back to
| your junkies and give them their next hit of crack for free.'
|
| It's worse, like you said, the in-game currency isn't even
| real, unlike a hit the dealer has to hand out for free...
| chaostheory wrote:
| It reminds me of how Nintendo settled US AG lawsuits on price
| fixing with coupons for Nintendo products. There's definitely a
| precedent.
|
| https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-07-26-fi-276-st...
| yebyen wrote:
| ...but I'm sure the lawyers who brought the case aren't being
| paid with in-game currency, amiright?
| vorpalhex wrote:
| How many loot llamas does it take to buy a suit or a rolex?
| wincy wrote:
| We'll just award each lawyer with an in game Tom Ford suit
| and an in-game Rolex.
| pests wrote:
| Loot llamas are the loot boxes. VBucks is the currency.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| that's what the 25M in real money is for. Pay the lawyers and
| the ridciulously small number of people who will fill out and
| submit a claim. You can't make this stuff up; the only way it
| could be more over the top would be if the settlement was for
| "get a 20% bonus on all new V-bucks purchases!"
| m463 wrote:
| https://dilbert.com/strip/2001-03-15
| thejoeflow wrote:
| I thought this was an Onion article. Wow.
| pjmlp wrote:
| This same Epic that is screaming to the world how Apple and
| Google are so bad boys.
|
| Good example of dual morals.
| Cloudef wrote:
| Tim sweeney is just a big asshole to be frank
| CivBase wrote:
| Never let yourself become loyal to a company. Companies are
| motivated by profit. The only "support" you should ever give a
| company is payment in exchange for a product or service. Bad
| companies support plenty of good causes. Support those causes,
| but don't confuse that with support for the company itself.
|
| I agree with Google about link taxes being bad, but I do not
| support Google itself.
|
| I agree with Apple about Facebook's privacy violations being
| bad, but I do not support Apple itself.
|
| I agree with Epic about Apple's restrictions regarding what
| users can do with their devices being bad, but I do not support
| Epic itself.
|
| Companies are not heroes.
| zepto wrote:
| It's not that simple - if you 'agree' with these companies,
| then you are _agreeing with their self-serving framing_ , and
| supporting them.
|
| You might think there are problems with each company (I
| certainly do), but that doesn't mean I need to agree with
| them in any way.
| im3w1l wrote:
| Just because it's self serving doesn't mean it's wrong.
| They can reach the right conclusion for the wrong reasons.
| zepto wrote:
| Possibly, but extraordinarily unlikely.
|
| They are working backwards to conclusions that benefit
| them in particular, and framing the problem in those
| terms.
|
| That is of course the right conclusion for _them_.
|
| The chances are that those are the right conclusions for
| everyone else, are next to zero, since they have a
| _systematic bias against reaching such a conclusion_.
|
| Also if their reasons are wrong, then their conclusion
| will be framed wrongly.
|
| We do sometimes say someone did the right thing for the
| wrong reasons, but by definition we _never_ say this
| while still ourselves buying into the logic they used to
| get there.
| r00fus wrote:
| I'll reply with a straightforward approach: "Reward good
| behavior. Punish bad behavior."
|
| Really it's that simple. There are no absolutely "good"
| humans or companies. They only have good and bad actions.
|
| If the action is good short-term but bad long-term, then
| the decision becomes more interesting/difficult, but is
| still a decision on the action, not the reasons.
| CivBase wrote:
| > they have a _systematic bias against reaching such a
| conclusion._
|
| No they don't. They have a bias for reaching conclusions
| which benefit them. Full stop. Those conclusions may
| coincidentally benefit others, even if that was not part
| of their motivation.
|
| What would you suggest? We should be in favor of a link
| tax purely to spite Google? We should surrender our
| privacy to Facebook just to stick it to Apple? We should
| protect Apple's ability to restrict what users can do
| with their devices as a display of contempt towards Epic?
| zepto wrote:
| > What would you suggest? We should be in favor of a link
| tax purely to spite Google? We should surrender our
| privacy to Facebook just to stick it to Apple? We should
| protect Apple's ability to restrict what users can do
| with their devices as a display of contempt towards Epic?
|
| Bizarre - I'm not sure what these suggestions have to do
| with me.
|
| Epic doesn't care about protecting users rights to do
| what they want with their devices.
|
| Nothing they are proposing is about that.
|
| All they are proposing is that they should be able to get
| a cut.
|
| If Epic gets to run an App Store or payment gateway,
| Apple's platform will still limit what users can do with
| their devices, so we can see that they don't care about
| that.
|
| Personally, I _am_ happy for Apple's customers to choose
| a closed platform if they like.
|
| But, I am not happy that we have no open alternative.
|
| Google promised us one, but reneged on that promise.
| Remember 'open always wins'?
|
| I don't think it's Apple's responsibility to provide
| people with an open platform, nor do I think we should
| force our views on people who want a curated platform.
|
| I think it's up to the rest of us to build an open
| platform, if we want one.
|
| 'The rest of us' would include Epic, if they had an
| interest in user freedom.
| CivBase wrote:
| > Epic doesn't care about protecting users rights to do
| what they want with their devices.
|
| I never said they do. They want users to be able to
| install iOS apps on from third party sources. Their
| motivation is that they simply want to avoid paying
| Apple's App Store fees. Our causes are aligned even
| though their intentions are entirely self-serving. They
| reached the right conclusion for the wrong reasons.
| zepto wrote:
| > they simply want to avoid paying Apple's App Store fees
|
| This is not true. They want a cut of those fees for
| themselves, which is why they want to run their own store
| and payment mechanism.
|
| This is definitely no more aligned with the users than
| Apple.
|
| Arguably it's less aligned, since they don't care what
| users experience with the platform is.
| colinmhayes wrote:
| Bad boys can still point out when others are behaving poorly,
| right?
| rodgerd wrote:
| "Apple won't let us do illegal gambling on their device. This
| is illegal monopoly!"
| wayneftw wrote:
| Imagine thinking that Epic's line of business is even half as
| impactful or important to the world as what Apple and Google
| provide.
|
| One of them makes games, the other two maintain a technological
| oligarchy that oversees our access to the entire population of
| smartphone users.
|
| A car dealership might rip me off, but if car dealerships start
| pushing for a 3 or 4 day work week I'll be their best friend.
| (The car dealerships representing Epic and the soul sucking
| 5-day work week representing Apple and Google.)
| [deleted]
| Macha wrote:
| I dislike Epic's approach to buying exclusivity and how it
| restricts consumer choice.
|
| I like Epic's challenge of the mandatory app store and what it
| means for making mobile phones closer to real general purpose
| computing.
|
| Don't expect consistency from companies, just treat them as
| actors with their own interests which sometimes align with
| yours and sometimes do not.
| zepto wrote:
| > I like Epic's challenge of the mandatory app store and what
| it means for making mobile phones closer to real general
| purpose computing.
|
| Ironically I dislike Epic's challenge because I think it will
| take us further away from a healthy general purpose computing
| platform.
| kowlo wrote:
| I thought this was a joke, sounds like the premise for a south
| park episode.
| raunakdag wrote:
| Interesting side-note - as a minor who plays the game, Epic is
| essentially discouraging you at all from participating in the
| cash-sided part of the settlement with the follow-up of contract
| stipulation - if you request cash due to being a minor at the
| time of playing, Epic will force you to close your Epic Games
| account, across all games.
| AlexandrB wrote:
| We really need more robust consumer protections for digital
| goods. This is like asking you to return every product you
| bought at WalMart with no compensation as a condition for
| accepting a settlement from a WalMart class action suit.
|
| Likewise, getting an account banned for ToS violations at a
| storefront such as the App Store should not immediately strip
| you of all goods purchased on that storefront.
| antiterra wrote:
| They are obligated to allow refund by contractual
| disaffirmation, which _must_ negate the contract in whole.
|
| It also makes sense that Epic also requires a subsequent
| replacement account to be opened by a non-minor.
| klmadfejno wrote:
| What's the actual claim behind the lawsuit?
|
| I hate lootboxes, but what's the basis for damages?
| hundchenkatze wrote:
| That loot boxes are the same as gambling, and encouraging
| minors to gamble.
|
| > Epic was faced with a class-action lawsuit alleging, among
| other things, that it had "psychologically manipulate[d] its
| young players into thinking they will 'get lucky.'"
| klmadfejno wrote:
| I guess I'm surprised that's illegal? They're hardly the only
| loot box offering company
| onepointsixC wrote:
| What an absolute travesty. Epic is running a casino, encouraging
| players to gamble, but not for something of value, but an
| infinitely repeatable digital good. To be able to "pay off", if
| you could even go as far to call it that, in digital goods at
| effectively no cost to them then we're just encouraging further
| bad behavior.
| mfost wrote:
| Don't let the drama fool you though. Epic only had those RNG
| loot boxes in the "Save the World" Fortnite game which is
| entirely different from the actual popular phenomena that is
| the battleroyal one. That and on Rocket League which they
| bought in that state while they were only implementing the
| standard TF2/Valve model of lootboxes. And when bought they
| made them switch to a non lootbox model.
|
| As such, that class action lawsuit is rather clickbait by
| itself. It rode on the popularity of "Fortnite BR" to make it
| look like Epic was selling tons of lootboxes to kids when the
| reality is they had so few players of Save The World it
| probably had a rather insignificant impact on kids getting
| exposed to gambling.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| At least in a casino they comp you physical goods and services
| that have a real value. Who knew the mob and wall street were
| the good guys?
| _0ffh wrote:
| "Even though it's settling a US lawsuit, Epic says this same deal
| will apply to all Fortnite players globally."
|
| They wish! This can be no more than an offer which must be
| accepted before it "applies". I just don't know if anyone will
| actually bring this to court rather than accept the offer.
| Macha wrote:
| Ethics of paying off class actions with promotional/discount
| rewards aside, I'm kind of surprised they did settle. While many
| EU regulators have held loot boxes to be in violation of rules
| regarding licensed gambling or marketing gambling to kids, I'd
| always assumed the US would be more open to letting whales be
| eaten by the sharks based on their attitude towards free markets.
| istjohn wrote:
| Of course they settled. The only way the settlement could have
| been more favorable for them is if the plaintiffs agreed to pay
| Epic.
| jandrese wrote:
| While this is probably not the case, this could be a subversive
| attack on potential competitors if Epic is planning to release
| a MMO in the near future that doesn't have Gamble Boxes. Many
| many competitors would be in danger of a similar lawsuit and
| could find themselves cut off at the knees right as Epic
| launches their own MMO or F2P mobile game.
|
| This is probably too Machiavellian, but it's not like the
| industry isn't rife with Gamble Boxes. There are a lot of
| companies that are basically dependent on gambling for the
| majority of their income.
| oceanghost wrote:
| American citizens attitudes and what our political/court system
| do are often very different.
| falcolas wrote:
| If there's a chance of setting a poor precedent for them, even
| a minuscule chance, they'll often settle after racking up the
| opponent's legal bills.
| skeeter2020 wrote:
| Class action lawsuits rarely go to trial. Did you note the 25
| million in real cash that's included? The settlement is
| camouflage for the true goal, which was getting big fees for
| the lawyers. Their strategy is to take these cases as close to
| trial as possible without ever having to prepare for a
| courtroom. They ran this one to perfection.
| fingerlocks wrote:
| Can someone explain to a non-gamer what this is all about?
| Specifically, what's the legal issue here? The article doesn't
| really say.
|
| Was Epic lying about the probabilities of getting rare items in
| these loot boxes? Or is it because "gambling" was marketed to
| children, in general? If the latter, why is this any different
| from similar non-online activities, like sweepstakes and raffles
| for children's toys?
| jandrese wrote:
| They were encouraging children to gamble with real money.
|
| I don't know how every MMO operator isn't clenching their butts
| at the outcome of this lawsuit. There are loads of Korean MMOs
| that really only have two things: Grind and Gamble Boxes. Three
| things if you count the Anime titties.
| endisneigh wrote:
| Is it possible to liquidate in-game currency for cash at the same
| price it would've cost to purchase it to begin with? If not the
| settlement cost Epic basically nothing.
| croon wrote:
| Hey now, it probably cost a couple of man hours to compile the
| lists and some compute time on the database cluster.
| ttt0 wrote:
| The best part is that they will shut down this game once people
| move on to something else and it's no longer profitable
| meibo wrote:
| No, it's not - but you can buy funny dances with it!
| rogual wrote:
| Misleading, baity headline.
|
| Yes, the in-game currency settlement is awful, but the Ars
| Technica headline writer is making it sound more awful than it
| really is, because, quote:
|
| In addition to the virtual currency, Epic will also be providing
| "up to $26.5 million in cash and other benefits to U.S.-based
| Fortnite and Rocket League players" to settle the claims.
| LeifCarrotson wrote:
| Nonsense, it's a perfectly valid headline. The lawyers get
| first dibs on that $26.5M, players mostly get in-game currency.
|
| > Each Settlement Class Member who timely submits a valid Claim
| Form will be entitled to receive their choice of either a cash
| award (up to $50 ...
|
| The claim form isn't posted yet on the website. It has to be
| physically mailed in to the lawyers, with all your personal
| info. Of 10 million Rocket League and Fortnite players, how
| many do you think will actually mail that in? They're betting
| it's less than 1 in 20. I'd wager it's going to be more like 1
| in 2000, which costs Epic just $0.25M, leaving $26.25M for the
| lawyers.
|
| > Upon receipt of a Claim Form, the Settlement Administrator
| will determine your eligibility to receive an award. Depending
| on the number of Approved Claims, it is possible that each
| Settlement Class Member's award will be reduced on a pro-rata
| basis after payment of settlement administration costs,
| attorney's fees and expenses, and Incentive Awards to the
| Plaintiffs.
|
| Even if the number of approved claims is not already small, the
| cash is for the lawyers first, Epic is paying the players
| primarily with in-game currency.
|
| https://www.epiclootboxsettlement.com/Home/Faq
| alasdair_ wrote:
| >In addition to the virtual currency, Epic will also be
| providing "up to $26.5 million in cash and other benefits to
| U.S.-based Fortnite and Rocket League players" to settle the
| claims.
|
| How much did the lawyers get paid?
| dantillberg wrote:
| You make a good point, but for cash benefit, each individual
| person must fill out the claim form at [0]. It's not clear up
| front how Byzantine that process might be, but they're at least
| asking for detailed documentation of records Epic _must_
| already have on file. Payments are _capped_ at $50 per person.
| $26.5 million is merely an upper limit on the total of all
| payments, but that requires at least 530,000 people
| successfully completing max-value claims.
|
| 0: https://www.epiclootboxsettlement.com/Home/SubmitClaim
| exabrial wrote:
| Class action lawsuits are turning out to be a scam. It should be
| law that lawyers can't have more than something like 5% of the
| settlement, and companies should have to pay out as cash
| equivelant.
|
| Reminds me of the Equifax settlement which was a total scam.
| "Free Credit Monitoring" was BS, as Equifax was going to pay
| itself for the product, and everyone in the USA already has "Free
| Credit Monitoring" anyway. For leaking all of my personal
| details, I'd love to be paid for the time and money I've had to
| spend cleaning up their mistakes after Equifax hired a music
| major as the head of Information Security.
| MikeUt wrote:
| > It should be law that lawyers can't have more than something
| like 5% of the settlement
|
| Then finding a lawyer willing to go through the long and
| complex class action lawsuit will be even harder and/or more
| expensive, resulting in fewer class-action suits, meaning the
| punishment for these scams will be even more unlikely than it
| is now.
|
| Even if lawyers got 100% of the settlement, class actions would
| still be worth it as deterrent.
| istjohn wrote:
| But this isn't a punishment at all. I just don't believe that
| it's not possible to more closely align the interests of
| class action lawyers with that of the classes they represent.
| It doesn't seem like it's difficult to find lawyers willing
| to initiate class action lawsuits today. They just never seem
| to amount to much more than a pay day for the lawyers.
| MikeUt wrote:
| > I just don't believe that it's not possible to more
| closely align the interests of class action lawyers with
| that of the classes they represent.
|
| But how does capping the settlement % that goes to the
| lawyers achieve that?
| istjohn wrote:
| Yeah, I'm not sure that's the right solution either.
| Perhaps there could be a third party "class advocate"
| that receives 1% of all proceeds awarded to the class in
| the case of a settlement or trial victory who has
| unilatteral power to veto any settlement agreement. Then
| their incentives would be aligned to ensure the maximum
| settlement while taking into account the probability of
| winning in court and the costs of prolonged delay, etc.
| If the class gets nothing, the class advocate gets
| nothing. If the lawyers make bank, but the class gets a
| pittance, the class advocate gets a pittance. The class
| advocate could also negotiate reasonable attorney fees
| for the class.
| exabrial wrote:
| correct: right now the interests of the lawyers are aligned
| with the people they're suing, not the people they're
| representing.
| dwohnitmok wrote:
| > Class action lawsuits are turning out to be a scam.
|
| Anybody have a good idea of what proportion of class action
| lawsuits end up as "bad/not good enough for class members?"
|
| Because anecdotally I think of a couple that had fairly
| reasonable-sounding payouts for class members. One was the Dow
| Corning breast implant settlement that ended up bankrupting Dow
| Corning and resulted in payments of $12,000 to $300,000 to
| class members depending on the exact symptoms suffered. Another
| was Collins v. United States which was settled for full back
| pay for all U.S. military veterans discharged under Don't Ask
| Don't Tell since 2004.
| microtherion wrote:
| The anti-poaching class action settlement also paid me a
| handsome, if not enormous, sum for depriving me of the
| opportunity of working for companies that I had no intent of
| working for.
| neolog wrote:
| Many of the best developers I can think of didn't major in cs;
| many didn't go to university at all.
| 93po wrote:
| I wasn't even able to get the free monitoring, they
| intentionally broke their website to not work
| jandrese wrote:
| Turning out? These lawsuits have been seen as "lawyers make
| millions, you get a coupon for your suffering" for many years
| now.
|
| I remember discussions of this back on Slashdot during the Zip
| Drive click of death lawsuit where I eventually got a coupon
| for like $10 off my next IOMega purchase or something. Total
| bullshit.
|
| The counter argument is that the companies need to be punished
| for their behavior, even if the victims aren't the ones who get
| the compensation in the end. I've thought that seems rather
| mercenary.
|
| There was a "take the cash" option for that Equifax settlement,
| but nobody I know who opted for that ever saw a dime. I think
| they eventually weaseled out by saying that you had to prove in
| arbitration you were financially harmed by the breach to
| receive the cash or something.
| RapidFire wrote:
| Hey! That "music major" must have at least been well connected!
| She was just "managing" people anyways; not like she needed to
| know what she was doing.
| CivBase wrote:
| > It should be law that lawyers can't have more than something
| like 5% of the settlement
|
| The settlement wasn't even cash, though. Did the lawyers get
| paid in V-Bucks? They should have been.
| y-c-o-m-b wrote:
| I agree, they seem to be a scam that once again benefits the
| rich (lawyers) over the poor (class/clients). More often than
| not I see the US courts as an extension of elitism and crony
| capitalism than a system of serving justice. Maybe that's
| vastly oversimplifying things, but I'd like to see a reasonable
| justification for this seemingly despicable process of lawyers
| getting rich off the backs of victims they represent.
| gruez wrote:
| >I agree, they seem to be a scam that once again benefits the
| rich (lawyers) over the poor (class/clients).
|
| Can you elaborate on this? The ones being paid are "the
| rich", but so are the people paying. The poor aren't getting
| much out of this, but it's not like they were going to get
| anything without a class action. After all, if you thought
| you could get more, you can always opt out of the class
| action and sue individually.
| jrockway wrote:
| Is there any effect on the game industry as a whole here? As far
| as I can tell, Overwatch has exactly the same loot box model. Is
| anyone suing Blizzard over this? Or is there some particular
| miniscule detail that made Epic's actions illegal, but selling
| randomized loot boxes in general is still OK?
| AcerbicZero wrote:
| Can I pay my taxes with special in-country vouchers?
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