Comment on Unity apologises.

• Aceticon@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Can you quickly tell me what’s the applicable jurisdition for this if say, a gamedev company based in Uruguay sells a game made with Unity (HQ US) via Apple Store (HQ US) to a user in China who installs it 3 times?

  At the very least it will cost you quite some legal fees to merelly figure out the jurisdiction because there are multiple legal angles to go after this (contract law, intellectual property) which might yield different jurisdictions (maybe it’s contract law and then maybe its the US, maybe Uruguay, or maybe it’s IP law and it’s all about the copy of the game to the device local storage - i.e. the installation - which defines the jurisdiction, making it be China because that’s were the user did it).

  Next you’ll have to figure out if it such retroactive pricing changes were legal there or not.

  For new projects I don’t think it’s worth it for a small gamedev company to spend time and money pursuing the “let’s clear the legal status of this so that I can use Unity” option rather than the “let’s use something else one”.

  It’s really only worth checking companies with existing or advanced projects on top of Unity were the income/potential-income from those projects justifies it (vs the option of just pulling the project out from distribution or redo it).

  I mean, sure, eventually somebody will have paid the legal costs of this and maybe its a decision broad enough and in the right jurisdiction for your company and it’s applicable … and then Unity just goes and comes up with some other shit that has to go through the legal rigmarole to figure out if they can.

  Meanwhile “Don’t use Unity on any future projects” is a pretty straighforward decision…

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  • gian@lemmy.grys.it ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Can you quickly tell me what’s the applicable jurisdition for this if say, a gamedev company based in Uruguay sells a game made with Unity (HQ US) via Apple Store (HQ US) to a user in China who installs it 3 times?

    Then Urugauay, since the contract for Unity is between Unity and the game studio in Uruguay, and is the game studio that must pay Unity, not the Chinese buyer (not sure if applicable by Uruguay’s law). In every country where you sell something, you need to follow the law applicable to the buyer, not the seller.

    If you change Uruguay with Italy (where I live) then it is illegal, for example no matter where the seller has the HQ and no matter where I sell the game. And I suspect in most of EU. If you sell me something then we have a contract, then both of us cannot change it retroactively unilaterally, I am not even sure if it is legal if both of us agree. Many US based company tried and failed.
    If Unity pull a stunt like this on an Italian game studio, the studio can simply avoid to pay and if Unity kill the current license agreeement the studio can sue them. Sure, Unity can then refuse to sell new or renew licenses to the studio, but that is another thing, the old license is still valid.

    At the very least it will cost you quite some legal fees to merelly figure out the jurisdiction because there are multiple legal angles to go after this (contract law, intellectual property) which might yield different jurisdictions (maybe it’s contract law and then maybe its the US, maybe Uruguay, or maybe it’s IP law and it’s the copy of the game to the device local storage i.e. the installation - that is treated as requiring licensing of the Unity IP, and it defines the jurisdiction as China because that’s were the user did it … or maybe the US because that’s what the IP owner is).

    True, but that is the cost of doing business in a foreign country. Why did you think Apple (US based) put the USB-C on the new IPhone ? To be nice ? Or because EU imposed it ? Is not this a price for Apple ?

    This “cleared up”, next you’ll have to figure out if it such retroactive pricing changes were legal there or not: maybe you’re lucky, maybe you’re screwed.

    That is another problem and, at least in Europe, Unity is on very thin ice. From the game studio perpective is a problem only if their local law allow for a retroactive change in a contract, else the new terms are void and Unity can say what they want.

    In Europe, if Unity can track retroactively the installations, then they tracked the users and if they (or the game studio ) did not notified the user it is a direct violation of the GDPR and all it need to is just one user that sue them. And before you say something, it is already happened before. The fines are pretty interesting btw…

    For new projects I don’t think it’s worth it for a small gamedev company to spend time and money pursuing the “let’s clear the legal status every way Unity can screw me in the future so that I can use Unity” option rather than the “let’s use something else” option.

    Completely agree on this.

    It’s really only worth checking it for companies with existing or advanced projects on top of Unity were the income/potential-income from those projects justifies it (vs the options of just pulling the project out from distribution or redo it with another framework).

    Again, nope. If it is illegal in the studio HQ country, then is not worth checking: the term cannot be changed.

    What can happen, in Italy, is that Unity can change unilaterally the contract for the future and in this case the game studio can simply modify the selling price of an already released game or put a adeguate price tag in any future game in a too advanced development stage to be redone with another game engine. And of course change the game engine for all the other projects.

    But there is no way that Unity can monetize past installation of a game based on a contract with certain conditions.

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    • Aceticon@lemmy.world ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Are you a lawyer?

      Because if there’s one thing I learned from my own contact with the Law (not being a lawyer myself) is that sometimes it is indeed exactly as it makes logical sense (in which case that’s basically as you describe) and sometimes it’s not.

      My point being that we won’t be sure until somebody gets legal clarification on this, maybe even gets their day in court over this, and after than all of us to whom it apply (and me being in the EU also, it would probably apply to my country as it does to Italy) until Unity tries something else.

      Meanwhile I’ll keep on slowly decoupling the code from its Unity dependencies on the project I have and trying out Godot and the Unreal Engine, just in case.

      Even this does get reversed (or shown illegal in the applical juridiction) and I do end up shipping the project with Unity, I’ll always keep on “looking over my shoulder” with them and quite likely will end up using Godot or Unreal on my next projects.

      In fact worst comes to worst this will have pushed me to properly give a chance to both Godot and Unreal, quite possibly convincing me to start using them if they’re better than Unity (at least in some use cases).

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      • millie@lemmy.film ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        I don’t really even trust Unreal until Unity takes a legal hit for this. What’s to stop Epic doing the same thing?

        Considering how locked into an engine a project can get, why risk a corporate engine unless you absolutely have to?

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      • gian@lemmy.grys.it ⁨9⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

        Are you a lawyer?

        Nope, but I know my rights. And as a buyer I have rights.

        Because if there’s one thing I learned from my own contact with the Law (not being a lawyer myself) is that sometimes it is indeed exactly as it makes logical sense (in which case it would basically be as you describe) and sometimes it’s not and depending in the jurisdiction you might even have to end up in Court to figure it out.

        I know, and I agree. But on this thing I am pretty sure for a couple of reasons:

        • I had to interact with a lawyers for something similar both while working and in private matters
        • In Italy there are precedents, and with big companies (true, maybe the process is a little slower than what it should be)
        • If you think about it, it anyone can change retroactively the contract, then contracts are useless garbage and no business could be done.

        I don’t know about you, but I won’t stake my company’s future on presuming the applicable Law matches common sense, even with the assurances from a non-lawyer on the Internet.

        My point being that we won’t be sure until somebody gets legal clarification on this, maybe even gets their day in Court over this, and after that then all of us to whom that legal clarification does apply (and me being in the EU also, it would probably apply to my country as it does to Italy) can rest easy (or not, depending on what the clarification says) … until Unity tries something else.

        Me neither, but I know what the law say in my country and I know that if I sign a contract, the seller cannot alter it after.
        I know for a fact that if we agree that you sell me something at 1 euro/month, you cannot decide in 2024 that the charge for 2023 is 2 euro/month. You can ask 2 euro/month for 2024 and sign a new contract, but 2023 it a done deal. And if you put a clause in the contract that state “the seller can change retroactively the charge and pretend the difference on arrears” the clause is automatically void since it is a vexatious terms that are forbidden by law by default.

        Maybe Unity can pull the trick in the US where, given the prohibitely high costs of the justice system, a small indie studio would pay and a big corporation can discuss, but in EU I don’t think Unity can really pull the trick. Or any of these kind of tricks.

        Meanwhile I’ll keep on slowly decoupling the code from its Unity dependencies on the project I have and trying out Godot and the Unreal Engine, just in case and because I have to, as I pointed out, protect myself from the risk of them pulling some other bullshit in the future.

        Even this does get reversed (or shown illegal in the applicable juridiction) and I do end up shipping the project with Unity, I’ll always keep on “looking over my shoulder” with them and this has definitelly made it more likely that I will end up using Godot or Unreal on my next projects, if only because it has pushed me to properly put time aside to seriously try both out and I’m pretty sure they’ll be better than Unity at least for some kinds of game.

        Yep, trust is way harder to gain and really easy to lose.

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