Selling my Pro / Android Pro / iOS Pro - before you say "WTF?!" take a look inside

Heya,

I want to sell my Unity 4 Pro License, which includes Android Pro / iOS pro as well.
You want to say that Unity doesn´t allow license transfers, but this is not really true. I got this response from them:

So if you are interested then please make me an offer. Either via PM or mail ( tf -at- zappadong.de)
I know that I can´t take too much for the licenses, because Unity 5 seems to be around the corner.

Best regards,

Torsten

 

Exceptions typically mean a small start-up has been bought by a larger company, and the software needs to be transferred into the name of the new owner. Or an employee has bought their own license, and have left the company they work for, and the company want to maintain ownership of the license. (That typically means the employee bought the license, and was paid for it by their employer. So the employer believes they own the license.)

"I bought a license and don't want it anymore" is not an exception.

 

Well, I don´t think so (And the European Court of Justice doesn´t think so, too). Here is the complete quote:

 

Actually, that's not the complete quote and there is no source. How do we know you didn't just write that yourself?

Second, even if the quote is true, a Unity Asset would violate the second point. By refusing to unlist your Enhanced Auto Save asset in the store, Unity3d forces you to effectively fail to meet the requirements outlined in your own quote.

Just pointing out the obvious.

 

Urgh, edit is broken again.

A third point is that your quote would hold about as much water in court as a noodle strainer. The language is way too ambiguous. A "game"? What if I sell "activities"? So I could continue to sell my "activities" long after I sell off my Unity license?

I don't think so.

 

Technically as things stand currently in the US at least if you have a license then first-sale doctrine is not applicable with software : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vernor_v._Autodesk,_Inc.

Initially Autodesk got the slapdown but the 9th circuit reversed the decision, the arguments on both sides were extremely tenuous and greed driven, however AD did have one real argument in there which was the instrument of delivery had no real value, just the code itself and all that was proffered was a license to use said code, i.e. licensee relationship which is in law non-transferable.

 

It seems to me that you either need to get a lawyer or drop it. Seems to me you won't be able to sell it and the quote from unity support has dropped the value of buying to pretty much zero because of the risk involved.

Without support backing you up, the market for a buyer is zero.

 

Yeah... if you really think you are an exception to the standard license agreement you should have worked it out with Unity 1st instead of posting an 'in your face I'm doing what I want to' thread in public.

 

Well I can only repeat the response that I got from Unity (From Alex McCredie, Account Executive, EMEA, Unity Technologies). If you want to verify his statement then send me a pm, so I can send you his email adress.

Actually my Assets in the asset store were published with Unity 3.5 free, so this won´t be a problem.
Also not I´m an exception to the standard license agreement, but every Unity Customer in the EU is.

 

Actually, with Unity 5 on the way, a free version of Unity 4 with pre-orders, and the interest in UE4, I think this leaky ship is sinking fast.

I'd rather buy Unity 5 and get Unity 4 for free instead of buying a reduced rate Unity 4 and then a full price Unity 5.

Also, the chance that Unity will blacklist the license and leave me with nothing means a very strong no thank you and a recommendation to everyone else to stay away.

 

Under certain conditions.... which you failed to mention in your OP.

 

As an EU corporation concerning an EU citizen you have to follow the ECJ ruling in the Oracle decision. Licenses can be transferred at will.

http://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2012-07/cp120094en.pdf

You don't have to facilitate it, but you can't prevent any EU citizen from selling his or her license. EULA stipulations to this are simply invalid.

 

Europe have some interesting laws.

 

Not really. CJEU just don't buy the bullshit that digital copies are any different from CDs and DVDs. Both are digital products. You don't buy a game or a program for the plastic on the disc. You buy the digital content. Data != the container. There shouldn't be any difference between buying Unity on disc and buying Unity on the Internet. When a software company sells a copy, it can't call it a license because that would utterly undermine consumer rights.

 

Except the fact that it takes a simple Ctrl+C/Ctrl+V to copy digital software. You can create ten copies of the software if you want, all of them fully working.
You can't do that with physical products. Physical and digital products are very different.

I can understand why companies would choose to try to prevent "selling" the license, because what's stopping that user from simply saying he has sold the license to someone else but continue to use it on two (or more) systems?
If you sell a physical product, you can no longer use it. If selling the license means you can no longer use that software then sure, I agree that the user should be free to do what they like with the license. But in most cases, it's not that easy

 

But that has nothing to do with anything.

Copyright infringement is a crime. If someone engages in it, you can sue them and have them sent to jail.

It is not, however, a reason to gut consumer rights. One does not have anything to do with the other. Just because it is ridiculously easy to make an ISO image out of a DVD doesn't mean that people should be barred from reselling their DVDs.

 

You're buying the data rather than the medium, therefore all data purchased should be treated as if it were bound to some specific but arbitrary medium? How does that make sense?

"You're not buying the canvas, you're buying the painting. But we're going to treat all legal discussions about this as if we're talking about the canvas." Is that how this is working?

Also, you're not actually buying the data. You're buying permission to use the data in a particular way. I've never understood something as abstract as a permission to be a transferable product.

 

That is the law of the entire European Union. UT, as a corporation within the Union, and any EU citizen (like the OP) is bound by that law as explained in the ruling I linked. You're not buying permission. You're buying a copy of a program, regardless of whether you buy it on a disc or online. The OP has the legal right to resell that copy; just lik he has the right to resell any physical object.

 

People have the right to sell stuff they own - I get that. But digital products are relatively new and are very different from physical products. These basic human rights were designed well before digital products were even imaginable.
It just doesn't make sense to me to try and shoehorn rights designed for one type of product into another.
I'm not saying you're wrong about selling licenses - I just don't agree with the argument that the two must be treated the same.

Edit: Just re-reading, perhaps I misunderstood what you were saying..

 

I'm not arguing with that. I'm just saying I think the logic behind it is flawed, if it is indeed as it has been explained.

 

He can't sell the license, no matter what. Why? Well it's pretty obvious isn't it?

The USA is the law of this earth. The USA tells you what you have to do not what you can do. An American Business has the right to your kidneys if it was in the EULA. When in the UK and I need to dial 999 ( The Police ) what happens is they send a message to the President of the United States of America asking permission and whether the EULA permits me to have officers turn up. Without US Approval the police in the UK who are controlled and funded by the USA cannot do anything.

 

Which is completely and total trolling bullshit.

Assuming we wanted some measure of control over your nation, we wouldn't do it with corporations. This thread can do without any "I hate Americans cuz they'z Americans" BS. It's not constructive and shows ignorance of the situation, so please save it for your 4chan rants.

Unity is a company governed by UK and EU laws, not US, and the OP is in Germany.

 

@Amon, your humour has made my day good sir

 

It's funny you say that, given that Unity is an American Company.

Unity Technologies is a global company headquartered in the United States in San Francisco, California.

Though it appears that the NDA is intended to be under European Law:

This Agreement will be governed by and construed in accordance with the laws of Denmark, without regard to or application of conflict of laws rules or principles.

Of interest is where you actually bought the software from, for example one of my invoices from unity lists two separate payable entities:

Unity Technologies ApS
Vendersgade 28
1363 København K
Danmark
Unity Technologies ApS
Attn: Accounts Receivable
50 Osgood Place, Suite 220
San Francisco, CA 94133
United States



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