The move toward digital content raised so many concerns when it comes to who actually “owns” the content. Along with a long list of other concerns, like what happens to the content when you pass (most companies say your digital content is non-transferable) or what happens if the company goes out of business. However, the world continues to move quickly toward making everything digital due to how ludicrous the profits (and low costs) are. But Ubisoft has created one more reason to be concerned.
When you buy digital content online, it goes into your library (saved within your account). You don’t get any physical copies of anything so if you install something, you have to visit your library and reinstall it if you ever want to access it again in the future. All other concerns aside, at least it is all there when you need it.
However, Ubisoft has recently taken it upon itself to start canceling accounts of users who haven’t accessed their accounts in a certain amount of time. Calling the accounts inactive and deleting the content within them.
Users have supposedly started getting emails from the company stating that their accounts have been suspended due to inactivity. That if they don’t access a specific link to re-activate their account, it would be permanently deleted within 30 days. A move that seems quite a bit petty and most users seem to agree as they took to the internet in fear and anger.
This adds yet another concern for digital content as companies can remove content whenever they want and apparently also completely delete your account all the same. There are so many ways to lose the content you pay for since you agree to long user agreements releasing the company from any liability and allowing them to do whatever they want with the content, as instead of owning what you buy, you simply pay for the rights to use it. Even though a lot of this content sells for the same price as it would in physical form. It is a ludicrously profitable system.
