And others think it's not silly to ask GOG to remove this prohibition on reverse engieerning from the EULA and service TOS. Since GOG asked for feedback, here it comes.

In legal terms, what matters is usually courts' interpretation. So the whole point is to reduce probability of bad interpretations. Prohibition on reverse engineering is a bad thing (as it actually takes away user's rights through the contract obligation). Plus as was already said, in the current form when combined with anticircumvention laws it pulls another can of worms.

In general, regarding reverse engineering. Countries which have fair use laws see reverse engineering as a legal activity. So TOS forbidding it is an attempt to take away some users' rights (for what reason is a good question to ask GOG and anyone who does that). I.e. it's an attempt to put contractual law against copyright law (fair use part of it). Which one wins in court is not clear cut. But the point is, why even do that? It's not a good thing to take away users' rights.

If this goes into effect I won't be buying any more games here. I mean, what the fuck, we can't sell or transfer codes and we're limited to 5 gifts per day? What moron thought that was a good idea?

And we need to get permission to do let's play videos? Are you guys fucking mad. You know damn well that the rights holders don't have the right to restrict that and it's more than a little bit hypocritical of you guys to put that crap into this draft.

As far as the jurisdiction goes, fuck off. You have no right to dictate California as neither you nor I are located in California. California does not have jurisdiction in event of a legal dispute no matter how much you might want that to be the case.

Also, you don't have the right to change the terms of the contract without allowing us to have a full refund on any and all purchases we've made. I'm not sure what things are like in Poland, but you can't just retroactively change the terms of the license because you feel like it. You have to give a refund for people that are effected otherwise there can be no legal change to the contract.

Is it defined as legal or as not illegal? If it's defined as legal, the ToS doesn't forbid it, see the last sentence you quoted in post 202.

What do you understand by "legal or not illegal"? What I meant is that reverse engeering is seen as fair use (for example in US). So I assume that if it's not hindered by other things like anti DRM breaking laws in case when DRM is involved, it should be OK. Problems are however as follows:

1. Countries where fair use is not in the copyright law (some brought Germany above as an example).
2. In general courts having badly defined fair use practices, and siding with the contract rather than with users' rights.
3. Cases when DRM is involved (as above).

Overall, I see no reason for GOG to include that whole paragraph with reverse engineering prohibition to begin with. Without it, all this mess wouldn't even begin.

If a law mentions "You are allowed to make backup copies" it is different from a country where no mention of backup copies exist. In the first case, you are allowed to do so by law, in the second case you are not forbidden to do so by law, unless another ruling applies.

So, if a specific country has a ruling allowing reverse engineering, ToS does not change it. If a country has a ruling prohibiting reverse engineering, ToS again doesn't change that. If a country has no ruling, so you are not forbidden from reverse engineering, ToS does add such an exception, thus take priority.

Not sure if that makes it clearer.

I doubt there is any law that explicitly grants rights for reverse engineering. Like was brought above, such right in US (based on fair use) was established through complex court cases. I.e. precedents.

It doesn't matter however, since we are talking about what GOG can improve in the TOS to simply avoid all this issue. I.e. remove all that prohibition paragraph to begin with.

No objections there, was just curious about the "Legal activity" part, and wanted to verify if it was allowed or not forbidden. Subtle difference, but an important one nonetheless.

I just posted this in another thread, but it bears posting again in the hopes that in a more official thread it will reach the eyes of someone at GOG. This matter has had me fuming since Christmas, and the lack of any official word on it from GOG is getting hard to bear. I understand most of you may be on vacation at this time of the year, but even a "we have heard you and will get back to you on this later" would be really nice to hear at this point.

It is not exactly about the matter at hand, but relevant because the only existing remedy is explicitly forbidden by the upcoming terms of service. Here goes.

---

The one thing that I really cared bout GOG.com was DRM-free, nothing else. They said all the right things and I believed them. I supported them even when they didn't support me, and I recommended them to everyone. I thought the cause was of great importance, and that GOG was worthy.

Several times I bought things I couldn't make use of, because wine just wasn't good enough. But that was okay, I never burdened GOG.com with support tickets for this, because I had no delusions that what I was doing was supported. In time wine might get better and the games would be waiting for me, free of any artificial restrictions that could otherwise stand in my way. I could wait. And I was supporting GOG.com with my wallet while doing it.

Now, ironically thanks to wine not being good enough, it has been brought to my attention that this is no longer the case. Installer files have been deliberately crippled, by GOG, by means of encrypting them with a password, with the sole aim of restricting the customer to running just the supported, sanctioned, installer. Anything else is to be shut out by a digital barrier, placed by GOG, for this very purpose.

Digitally. Restrict. The customer.

Wine doesn't matter. Linux doesn't matter. This is the red line, and you crossed it. If you cannot see what this is, then nothing you have to say about DRM in the future will mean anything, because who even knows what it means in your world anymore.

Enter password.

In fact it's 5 gifts of each game every day. So you can still gift about 4250 games per day. Should be more than enough for most users. ;)

There is nothing wrong "asking" for it. Even thought it won't change anything to the Game EULA who already explicitly forbid it. The problem IMO is more when some peoples go batshit insane about this change as if it was GoG becoming the new EA while it's often pretty obvious that they never bothered to read the existing EULA which, at least for the games, already contained all the "controversial" elements which are, by the way, pretty common in commercial softwares EULA.

You do realize that even if they remove it, it doesn't mean that you are "authorized" to do it, right ?

That's what the "All rights are reserved" in most EULA means, it means that unless you have been "explicitly" authorized to do something by the rights owners or by a law (or an "exception" of copyright law like fair use and backup copy is in some countries), you are by default not authorized to do it.

And even if they remove the "All rights are reserved" mention it wouldn't change anything as it's automatic in most countries.

I didn't know about these changes.

I "specialize" on playing GOG.com games on real DOS and Windows 9x Retro Gaming PCs. Not being able to unpack the installer would kill playing games on Windows 98 for example.

What's worse is that many games in the current form don't work properly. For example Tomb Raider 2 has black graphic artefacts on the screen and there is nothing one can do. But they continue to sell it.

The community fixes and provides support free of charge and doesn't charge a cent.

The other thing is that on eBay labels such as Sold Out Software or Revive sell these games, new, sealed and cheaper than some of the GOG.com games. Maybe I have to rethink what I'm doing.

I also see a trend away from Good Old Games to all these new games, movies with less and less MS-DOS games compared to the past. It feels very commercial now and exactly what people didn't like about other platforms when they joined GOG

are you sure? That would be an interesting question. Though we probably should get a few lawyers in here ;)
There was this case in the US: Lewis Galoob Toys, Inc. v. Nintendo of America, Inc, which "established the rights of users to modify copyrighted works for their own use":
"Having paid Nintendo a fair return, the consumer may experiment with the product and create new variations of play, for personal enjoyment, without creating a derivative work."

on the european side we have this case from the European Court of Justice: SAS vs WPL:
"Second, the court concluded, with some circularity, that a person who has a licensed copy of a program is entitled, without needing authorization from the copyright holder, to "observe, study or test the functioning of that program so as to determine the ideas and principles which underlie any element of the program", [...]
The court also indicated that a license provision that attempted to override this limitation, such as a blanket prohibition on reverse engineering, would be null and void."

And while this legal debate might be fascinating, it isn't really why GOG should change that paragraph. As others have already stated GOG knows how important reverse-engineering is, they also know how important modding is.
And in practice we already see that they allow and even advertise mods and fan patches.

Why then not take the next step and also legally allow it?

@Gersen
You are right in pointing out that the change mighty not be as extreme as I thought (I missed those installer EULAs), and your argument that the rage here is a bit over the top is also not completely wrong. But do you have actually some argument for as to why that prohibition of modification should be in the EULA?
That is was there before and that others have it as well isn't really an argument.

Can you clarify your agenda here? All your intention here appears to oppose any proposals that ask GOG to restore user rights in the EULA and TOS. What if EULA already had something similar? Is it a reason now not to ask to fix it? No, unless you simply work for DRM proponents, since any normal person wouldn't do that voluntarily.
We aren't talking about what publishers request for games (that's the EULA which comes when you install the game). We are talking what GOG request for GOG services and tools + data (Galaxy, installer and so on). You yourself claimed before that installer is included in restrictions in the old EULA (even though I disagree). So according to you we should ask GOG to fix even EULA as well in regards what's related to GOG's stuff there, i.e. what they have control over. Yet you appear to incline that we shouldn't ask about it. What gives?

That's demagoguery. Any invalid restriction on user rights removed from EULA is an improvement. It can have multiple layers of that nonsense - can be. It's not a reason to ignore any of them which you seem to propose.