Sorry to necro this but I just saw in the latest LTT vid that apparently Microsoft did go through with this plan? They were talking about it in the context of the diskless xbox that just released. https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/xbox/forum/all/how-to-transfer-content-licenses/7ac76f4e-c7e4-4153-8824-1e424478b02d

That’s their goal. “You’ll own nothing and be happy.”

Having to fly under the radar or risk financial ruin doesn’t sound like ownership to me.

Yeah that’s more comparable. I was mostly just trying to state the difference between ownership and a perpetual license but I’m thinking I oversimplified lol.

Oh yeah, I understand. I was just trying to describe the difference between ownership and a perpetual license in overly simplified terms. Also, can you think of any examples of digital goods that retain first sale doctrine? With physical disks at least a second hand market still exists for that very reason, but I can’t think of any digital media that allow resale. I would love to be wrong!

It depends on your definition of ownership. If having perpetual access to a product is enough then yes. But we aren’t allowed to, say, disassemble a game and use it’s assets to make something of our own. As opposed to say a spoon. Nobody can tell me how I can and can’t use my spoon.