WP8 store and the stealing of apps

[John20212]

First off, you don't own the app; you only have a license to use it. Secondly, if you read the legalese it's not Microsoft who kills the apps; that's totally on the app publisher. The license exists as long as the publisher publishes the app. Once they pull it, the license ends. Microsoft simply acts as a... distribution center of sorts, with their own license to use and distribute from the publisher.

Reading the terms in full [http://www.windowsphone.com/en-us/store/terms-of-service] they are actually rather vague on pulling applications from the marketplace, consumer license duration and type, recourse when an application is terminated, difference between a paid and free applications, etc...; all that the terms state is that: "If Microsoft disables the ability to use the applications on your devices pursuant to your agreement with Microsoft, any associated license rights will terminate."

But the key part when reading any overall vague statements like that is: "Unless applicable law gives you more rights despite this limitation" so in other words the laws you need to consider are the consumer protection laws and contract laws of your country.
And as I mentioned above "a license that can be revoked at any time for any reason whatsoever"; is extremely unlikely to stand up to legal scrutiny, as far as UK (and most likely EU, but would have to check the relevant Directives) consumer protection legislation goes. At the very least the consumer should be entitled to a refund in cases of paid applications being terminated, because the license terms do not expressly stipulate any limits to the license duration, except that it can be revoked by Microsoft at will, which most likely would fall under the designation of an unconscionable term.
On the other hand countries like the US where the consumer pretty much gets what is in the contract and where the consumer is not as protected, it might be a slightly different story, however I do not recall any consumer protection specific legislation from when I was studying NY state law few years ago.

[disclaimer: the above is not legal advice, just opinion and facts purely for informational purposes]

The bottom line is pulling applications from the marketplace without having a system in place for past users to re-install them is just a bad business practice and it does nothing to build consumer trust in the WP marketplace. Nobody wants a store where bought software disappears without warning, causing problems for people who depended and enjoyed it.

If Microsoft wants to build consumer trust in its WP and Windows 8 stores, this is not the way to do it.

 

[marcomura]

You should read the legalese. The license can expire at any time as dictated by the app publisher. This is what you agreed to by purchasing and/or downloading the app. It doesn't really matter what you expect, that's the terms of the license.

If that's not OK with you, your only option is to not purchase and/or download apps.

EDIT: Note I'm making no judgment as to whether that's good or bad or whatever. It is what it is.

YOU should read the legalese, it seems that you talk for assumptions without have effectively read it.
As John20212 has pointed out, the terms about use license are very vague and it doesn't mention at all the variability of the user license time-duration caused by pulling off the app from the store. It covers only the case when Microsoft decides to disable an app (I don't know if it ever did that).
In other words, it doesn't say neither directly or indirectly that "The license can expire at any time as dictated by the app publisher".

Also, again as John20212 has pointed out, it say "Unless applicable law gives you more rights despite this limitation, you may use the application only as expressly permitted in this agreement." and I think that all the modern and civilized countries have laws to protect people for being fraud by buying an unspecified-time license that can be expire without forewarning 2 hours later.
But this is only my assumption, I don't feel like reading my country's laws.

 

[neo158]

Microsoft needs to put in safeguards so that nobody can completely pull an app from the store and deprive people who already bought it (or downloaded it for free apps) from using it.

Nothing short of a court order should be sufficient to steal apps from people who bought them. And in case of a court order people who paid for them should be fully refunded when the app is pulled without having to ask for a refund.

If it's in your purchase history on windowsphone.com then you can reinstall it, I did that with the BBC News app that was pulled from the store.

 

[marcomura]

If it's in your purchase history on windowsphone.com then you can reinstall it, I did that with the BBC News app that was pulled from the store.

After an app has been pulled off, you can't reinstall it. In the purchase history, there is a label "App is no longer published" instead of the link "Reinstall".
Probably you tried with a hidden app.

 

[stickyshocker]

Can i just add a few to the mix, ill name a few apps one a long time ago sky mobile then it was pulled as sky wanted the name changed then when it was put back on the marketplace it was now a free app but it cost me 79p so who cares. Next swapchat i paid for that it got pulled as whoever didn't want it on there, now should i then screw over the app developer for my money back because i cant download it again? No it wasn't their fault it got pulled and i want them to continue developing apps. Next example i paid for splinter cell on wp7 but cant use it on wp8 shall i ask for my money back as most wp7 apps still work no i changed my phone so i got over it. Do you really want to download a app that for instance gets pulled and 2 years later no longer works with the latest os update? Or would you ask for your money back then?

 

[John20212]

For those who think that this Microsoft practice is acceptable or even legal, try to put it into perspective.

Would you say the same if your Office or Windows license just stopped working? Or if Steam just decided one day to take away your library of 100+ games worth hundreds of dollars?

Just because mobile apps cost just few dollars or cents does not make it ok for Microsoft to just take them away.

Also you have the same rights when it comes to purely digital software as you have when you buy software on a CD or DVD.
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Additionally a further issue worth noting is that ideally there should also be a way for a user to roll back to a previous version of an app, to cover situations where apps are updated and on rare occasions major bugs make it through and a user loses app functionality or simply does not like the update.

This is not rocket science, this is how all software throughout the existence of Windows PC's works, and that is what users expect when they buy 'mobile software' or so called apps. Ability to re-install what they buy at will, and ability to roll back to previous software version if desired.

The only variation to this long standing status quo is with subscription software like Anti-virus or now Office 365 where the license clearly states that you are buying the right to use the software for a specific time duration, there is nothing that clearly tell the consumer that the WP apps are bought under license for a limited period of time.

 

[John20212]

[1]Can i just add a few to the mix, ill name a few apps one a long time ago sky mobile then it was pulled as sky wanted the name changed then when it was put back on the marketplace it was now a free app but it cost me 79p so who cares.
[2]Next swapchat i paid for that it got pulled as whoever didn't want it on there, now should i then screw over the app developer for my money back because i cant download it again? No it wasn't their fault it got pulled and i want them to continue developing apps.
[3]Next example i paid for splinter cell on wp7 but cant use it on wp8 shall i ask for my money back as most wp7 apps still work no i changed my phone so i got over it. Do you really want to download a app that for instance gets pulled and 2 years later no longer works with the latest os update? Or would you ask for your money back then?

[1] As long as you have access to what you originally paid for, it should not be an issue, this is where the ability for users to access older iterations of the app would be useful. A user that bought the old version of the app should have an option to either install that version, or if the publisher permits to update to the new version for free. If it's a service support app like Sky that depends on backend servers, it should have a different license agreement that clearly makes the user aware that the functionality of the app depends on the availability of the publishers servers.
This type of app should be distinguished from lets say a simple calendar app that does not depend for functionality on external resources.

[2] If it got pulled for legal reasons then the users that bought it and no longer can legally use it, should be automatically refunded. If the developer made an app that infringes on the legal rights of others than clearly he is not entitled to profit from that; and your opinion about wanting to keep him in business is beside the point.

[3] That is the same as if you bought a PC game that worked fine on Windows 98 or XP but no longer works on newer operating systems like Windows 7 or Windows 8. BUT the original app for WP7 should not be pulled even 10 years later because people who still have a WP7 and bought it still should be able to download and install it, as mentioned earlier in this thread apps should only be pulled if there is a way for users to back them up and reinstall them later irrespective of what the store status of that app is, that however is not possible at the moment.

Then what slightly muddies the waters in regards to the WP7 -> WP8 switch are apps like Angry Birds or Fruit Ninja where the publisher just decided to pull the old WP7 version(Angry Birds on WP7 with Xbox) and republish the same app slightly modified under a different store ID, in effect requiring both WP7 and WP8 users to repurchase the same app.

 

[Dave Blake]

I'm pretty certain that the T&Cs to which you agree when you purchase an app (and I'm also referring to those you purchase for $0.00) state that the app can be pulled from the Store at any time. It's kind-of hard to provide legal protection to prevent something to which you explicitly agreed.

I wouldn't be surprised if the legalese actually said that your license for the software (since I'm pretty sure with Microsoft you never actually own any software, you're only purchasing a license to use it) expires should an app get pulled from the Store. I think I'm going to have to research that.

This /\

 

[John20212]

This /\

You should really read this Terms of Use | Windows Phone Apps+Games Store (United States) and some of the comments made after the one you quoted addressing the vagueness of the terms and conditions when it comes to WP store apps.

 

[Dave Blake]

You should really read this Terms of Use | Windows Phone Apps+Games Store (United States) and some of the comments made after the one you quoted addressing the vagueness of the terms and conditions when it comes to WP store apps.

I have read it. YAWN

Microsoft has the ability to wipe apps right off your phone. This is to prevent apps from causing problems with your device. They have actually done this before. I think it's wrong that you can pay for an app that the developer can abandon and you out the money but that's the developers fault. Microsoft has to maintain the the store this won't always please everyone. Its far from a perfect system but rather have this than nothing. There is room for improvement that's for sure.

 

[TechFreak1]

This is why MS needs to implement a full back up.. not just apps list & settings + contact + text messages. My major gripe with the back up system is that the text message back up is faulty, if you have a group text the back up will get stuck unless you go into your ms account, find the offending text and delete it!... but for some of us the messaging history folder is buggy and does not work, I can't even navigate beyond the first page.

My work often entails solving disputes and sometimes people back track at the dispute stage when they had in fact agreed to it earlier via a text message. It is nigh on impossible to export all the text messages from the phone or from your MS Account let alone screenshotting every single text message conversation you may have.."just in case I need them later" is not viable.

To those who are wondering how you can access your sms history, see below:

1. 
   Once logged into your MS account, click on the gear icon on top right hand side
   More email settings
   Click on - "Group by conversation and pre-load messages"
   Select "Group messages by conversation"
   Select "Pre-load messages to speed up reading" and save
   Click on the outlook logo on the top left hand side to go back to your inbox
   Under quick view click on Documents
   Your address bar should contain "fid=&qvid=63", at the end
   Change "fid=&qvid=63" to "fid=&qvid=3" and press enter.

You should now be able to browse through the text messages albeit one page a time..

If the above does not work, try the following (Credit to Smaus - taken from Outlook.com Messaging History Folder message counter issue - Microsoft Community)

"fid indicates the Folder
qvid is the Quick View
fltid is the Filter

fid=b is the Messages History folder. Several sites indicates to remove the "b" but this doesn't show me anything
qvid=3 is a view that's supposed to show me text messages but I can't get it to work
fltid=-3 is Text Messages but I can't get this to work either.

?fid=b&qvid=3 returns just my IM messages (I don't use FB chat)
?fid=&qvid=3 returns an error
?fid=b&qvid=3&fltid=-3 returns just my IM messages
?fid=&qvid=3&fltid=-3 returns nothing"

 

[iamtim]

Really? I need to read the legalese? Check App Developer Agreement (Windows) - this is the full text of the App Developer Agreement an app publisher makes with Microsoft.

In section 3(a), it clearly states, "You, not Microsoft, will license the right to install and use each app to customers." In summary, it further states that if you do not provide a specific license to the end-user, that which is presented as Exhibit A on that page will be enforced.

Exhibit A clearly states, "BY DOWNLOADING OR USING THE APPLICATION, OR ATTEMPTING TO DO ANY OF THESE, YOU ACCEPT THESE TERMS. IF YOU DO NOT ACCEPT THEM, YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO AND MUST NOT DOWNLOAD OR USE THE APPLICATION. " It also says, " The application is licensed, not sold. This agreement only gives you some rights to use the application."

It ain't Microsoft folks. It's the app publisher. All right there, all black and white. You don't own a single application you download from the Store, unless you wrote it. Hell, I'm pretty sure you don't even own the Windows Phone OS on your phone; I'm pretty sure Microsoft licenses - not sells - every piece of software they produce.

EDIT: Note I am not talking about Microsoft's ability to pull an app from the store for legal and/or technical reasons. Of course they're going to have the ability to do that, and if they do it for technical or legal reasons I would expect that the app shouldn't be made available after that.

 

[marcomura]

Can you please stop saying that we don't own the software but only a license to use it?
Even monkeys know that, and you just look someone without anything useful to say continuing pointing out this.

 

[marcomura]

I have read it. YAWN

Microsoft has the ability to wipe apps right off your phone. This is to prevent apps from causing problems with your device. They have actually done this before. I think it's wrong that you can pay for an app that the developer can abandon and you out the money but that's the developers fault. Microsoft has to maintain the the store this won't always please everyone. Its far from a perfect system but rather have this than nothing. There is room for improvement that's for sure.

Microsoft has the ability to do so, correct. But I don't think has the legal right to do so, leaving users without any option to reacquire the software they paid for.
But even if they have the legal right to do so (and this depends on the country laws), doing this is obiously a bad conduct.

About what you think is wrong... I don't see this as developers fault. They have the right to remove their applications to avoid *new customers* buying them. And developers don't have any option for doing that without preventing old customers to redownload their applications again.
This is a Microsoft fault. Microsoft (which continue detaining the xap files) should continue providing the softwares to whom already purchase them after the developers pull off their app from the store. Period.

(the steam example John20212 did is perfect to understand why Microsoft is wrong here)

 

[mrappbrain]

The bottom line is that the app publisher can decide to unpublish an app, and you wouldn't be able to reinstall it.

 

[11B1P]

You are not backing up your apps, you are backing up your apps list. The list of the apps you have installed.
This doesn't allow you to reinstall an app after it has been pulled from the store. This is what you're missing in that equation.

This is a screen shot from my Purchase History from windowsphone.com.



Clicking on the app takes you to the info/review page, but clearly you see, there is no option to download the app again.

 

[Reflexx]

If an app makers stops publishing a paid app, the right thing to do would be to "hide" it so that people who bought it could reinstall it. I believe that this happens with many app developers already.

Some apps require server support so those dont need to be hidden. They can just be taken away because they are not functional.

I think that apps and games that need some sort of server support should be forced to continue support for at least a year after their app or game is delisted from the store. (unless the company is out of business) The makers of these apps and games should explicitly state these conditions to any potential buyers.

A big problem occurs when a game is published with a license to use 3rd party intellectual property. Like if there was a Power Rangers game. If the publisher's license to use Power Rangers expires, they can no longer legally sell that game. And they probably can't distribute it either even to those who paid for it. So it would be good for consumers to be able to back up their apps and games.

I hate the argument of "read the license agreement." That does nothing towards finding a solution that is the right thing to do.

It's the same thing Google says when they steal your data.

 

[ChMar]

Still this complain is mute. You don't buy the piece of software. you buy a license to use it. Software is intellectual property like a book song etc. You don't own it by buying it. You buy a license to use it. If in that license it is stated as in all EULA licenses that there is no guaranty of any kind all complains are mute.

 

[marcomura]

If an app makers stops publishing a paid app, the right thing to do would be to "hide" it so that people who bought it could reinstall it. I believe that this happens with many app developers already.

Unfortunately no, this is not a solution.
Making the app "hidden" don't prevent new people finding and purchasing it. It cannot be found searching through the store, but it can be found in other ways: direct url through forums, searching on google, etc.

 

[Lendo]

I must say that I'm impressed with how civil this discussion has gone. I've been involved with a few discussions as of late about downloading and using apps, none of which have gone this way. Bravo my WPC friends. Now with that said, you do only pay for the license to use the app and you don't actually own the software, that's reserved as intellectual property of the developer.