I tried to purchase a digital download of Diablo II from blizzard.com's online store two weeks ago. Everything seemed to be going fine until I attempted to download the file and it failed. I checked with my online account and it showed that the order 'failed' in one section of my account, but was 'queued' in another part of my account. So, I called customer service and spoke with a guy named Joshua. Joshua said he didn't see anything wrong on his end, but that since I saw 'failed' on my end, the charge wouldn't go through, so I wouldn't be able to get the download. To solve this, Joshua placed a second online order for the digital download - directly over the phone.

He told me to wait a couple hours and the second order should go through. Because of how unusual Blizzard's site is, I had to create a second account in order to use a second 'key' to download the product again. A couple hours passed and both orders showed 'failed' on my side of the account: the original order I placed that Joshua stated I wouldn't get charged for, and the second order Joshua placed. At this point I called customer support again and emailed Joshua (who gave me his email). I spoke to Sam who told me that both orders had failed and that I wouldn't be charged for them. Joshua recommended that I go to the store and buy a hard copy of the game - which I did. Last week I checked my checking account and guess what? I was charged for both online orders!

I emailed Joshua asking for him to refund my two charges since I was never able to download the products and because I had purchased a hard copy and didn't need them. (The online store now showed that both orders were 'successful'.) After much confusion Joshua has told me that it is impossible for them to refund me because the 'keys' for each of the digital downloads had already been claimed.

The emails Zach forwarded us show that Blizzard is willing to refund the money — but claim that their system will not allow it and that he should wait for that "functionality to become available." That's unfortunate for them, but there's no reason Zach should wait around for the company to debug its software.

Zach, call your bank and let them know that you've been mistakenly charged and that the vendor says they aren't able to refund your money. Tell them that you'd be happy to provide them with the emails from Blizzard. There should be no problem getting a straightforward error such as this fixed. Your bank is there to protect you from this sort of nonsense.

Give them a call!

You can also buy print versions through Lulu and Flat World Knowledge for anywhere from $11 to $60, but it's free to download in Word and PDF formats. (Note: unless you plan on downloading it, you may want to skip the link to avoid wasting the professor's bandwidth—here's a screencap of the otherwise unremarkable page for the curious.) The New York Time says that it's not a widely used text yet, but Harvard is among the colleges using it.

The article also takes a look at Connexions, an open source textbook project that allows users to mix and match existing content according to CC licenses and sees 850,000 unique users a month.

And then there's CourseSmart, an online service backed by five dead tree publishers that sells limited access to printed textbooks for a discount of up to 50% over the print version. We haven't tried CourseSmart ourselves, but the Times' description of it makes it sound like a deliberately constrained "service" dreamed up by companies that don't want to hurt their $200-a-copy golden goose, but want to take advantage of the market they created in the first place when they priced their books so high. Which, okay, sounds like good business, but we still think they suck.

"Don’t Buy That Textbook, Download It Free " [New York Times]

While their databases are basically the same, I did spot a few differences, so if you try the combo on one site and it doesn't work, check the other's.

Bonus link for iPhone users: check out Dial Zero, a free app pre-programmed with the codes to directly dials human customer service reps at over 600 companies.

Dial-A-Human [Official Site via Wendy's Web Search Blog] (Thanks to Steven!)
Gethuman [Official Site]
DialZero [Download.com]

How long can a company continue to "investigate" what's obviously a failed download before they credit your account? For Xbox Live Marketplace, the answer is 2 months, 2 weeks, and counting. Every attempt Joe makes at resolving the issue lands him in a customer service purgatory from which no solution can ever escape. Joe writes, "The problem is that there is no recourse for the customer in a situation where this actually does happen. Microsoft took my money before my product was transferred to me. The transfer then failed to take place. It is no fault of my own and there is nothing I can do about it." Read Joe's full account below.

I recently attempted to purchase Ninja Gaiden Black from the Xbox Live Marketplace. Recently is used loosely here, as the original “purchase” took place on February 23th 2008.  After forking over $15 in Microsoft points, I sat and waited for my download to reach completion. This never happened. Progress reached 7% then the download disappeared from my queue without manifesting an error message.  A second attempt gave me the same result. This was a job for Xbox Live Customer Support. Here is a recap of my experience with those wonders of the customer service industry…
   
2/23 I pay money for Ninja Gaiden Black. My download fails at 7% on multiple attempts. Xbox Live Customer Support is emailed, as it is too late to contact the call center.

2/24: I call Xbox Live Support. We attempt troubleshooting. Nothing works. Later in the day I receive a reply from Support via email. An excerpt: This is a known issue that occurs with certain ISPs that perform specific types of network optimizations. Some network optimization processes can cause certain larger Marketplace files not to download. Examples of large files may also extend to content that is found in the Video Marketplace area.  (full email is attached)

2/25: I called Xbox Live Support. More troubleshooting is attempted none of which remedies the situation. I am told I will receive a callback in approximately one week, after they‘ve looked into the problem on their end. After we discuss the email I received from Xbox, I am also told to contact my ISP(Comcast) to see if the problem is originating from their end.

—Every call from here on out is escalated to a manager at some point—
—Also, in this time period, I contact Comcast. They monitor my connection for any abnormality that may cause this download to fail. None are found and I am assured that they aren’t actively doing anything that would interfere with it—

3/9: Never received a callback, so I contacted Xbox. I was told that there was no callback scheduled for my issue. More troubleshooting; no success. I am again told I will receive a callback.

3/23: Again, I did not receive a callback. I am told that the issue is “under investigation”.  I refuse any troubleshooting attempt, as I have already spent approximately 4 hours on the phone at this point. I believe this is the first time I mention wanting a refund. I am told the issue is now “under investigation with upper management”. I am told I will receive a callback in three days or less.

3/28: I did not receive a callback. I contact support and tell them I want a refund of my Xbox points. Not a credit to my credit card, just a refund of the points which are only valid currency on Xbox Live. The idea isn’t completely dismissed given the circumstances, but first the results of their investigation must be known. I am told that upper management is still investigating and I should try back in the near future to check.

4/7: I call Xbox Live Customer support. There is no further information available. I tell them that at this point, I really just want the points back. After going back and forth with management for some time I am told that the support call center does not have the ability to refund my points, but they have forwarded it to their tech department, who actually can do that. I am told to keep an eye on my points because a refund is on the way.(success!!!)

4/19: No refund is ever made. I call Xbox Live Customer support. They don’t acknowledge that I was promised a refund of my points. I get heated, but am still somehow under control. I am told there is no further information available and it is still under investigation. I tell the manager that I feel completely helpless and that this is an indictment of the reliability of the Xbox Live marketplace at large. I tell him I am emailing The Consumerist. However, I am too lazy to do so.

5/9: I directly call the Xbox Escalation Support line. The initial call center worker sounds very helpful. He seems to actually be concerned about the terrible service I have received and seems to be working for a resolution to come about today.  I am put on hold while he talks with management. He tells me he is going to transfer me to an upper level department that can help me. I am put on hold while he explains the situation to this mysterious high-level department within Microsoft. He then gets on the phone and transfers me to…..THE CALL CENTER IN INDIA. The very same place I have called SEVEN times previously and who’ve told me the same thing for the past two months. To her credit, this particular call center worker did have some skills. She danced around for a few minutes before finally giving me the same line I’ve heard so many times before: “I’m sorry, this is under investigation with upper management. I have no further information at this time.” Eventually, I am transferred to her manager, which is one of the managers I spoke with a few weeks ago.  After some futile discussion, I am told that the issue is being investigated and I will receive a callback. He couldn’t give me any type of timeframe for when I should expect my call. I actually email The consumerist.

Some Notes:
It is noteworthy that at the bottom of the description for Ninja Gaiden Black, it states “THERE ARE NO REFUNDS FOR THIS PRODUCT”.  The thing is, I did not receive a product for which a refund could be given. This is the equivalent of me walking into Bestbuy, picking up a copy of Ninja Gaiden, paying for it at the register, then the cashier refusing to give me the game and refusing to give me a refund.

The size of the file has come up as a possible problem. It’s 5.9GB, pretty big for Live. I’ve made it a point to download several large Demos and also rented a movie to test out my ability to receive products via Live. Several of these downloads were near 2GB and they all came through without incident.

The email I received stated that this is a known issue, but no one I’ve spoken to at customer support seems to be aware of any pattern of cases similar to this one.

In the earlier calls to customer support, they acknowledged that they could see on their end that the download did not complete. They haven’t done that in the last few and it came up today that, more than likely, what is actually under investigation is whether or not I somehow got the game and am now trying to claim that I didn’t.

I have spent in excess of  6 hours on the phone over this. (It’s not the money. I am a man of principle and I am not giving a massive corporation like Microsoft money for nothing.)

I have checked several message boards to see if this has happened to anyone else and I can’t find anything. It seems to be exceptionally rare.

The problem is that there is no recourse for the customer in a situation where this actually does happen. Microsoft took my money before my product was transferred to me. The transfer then failed to take place. It is no fault of my own and there is nothing I can do about it.

That’s why I’m writing this. The ability to purchase games and videos directly through Xbox Live seems like a great idea on the surface and when it works it is very convenient. However, this is a relatively new form of commerce. When you make a purchase on Live, beware of the fact that if something goes wrong with your download and troubleshooting doesn’t help; there is no effective protocol in place for them to resolve the issue. Xbox already has your money and as far as they are concerned that means the transaction is complete.

Oh yeah, and if you want to play GTA IV on Tuesday when I’m scheduled to get my system back from the repair center, my Gamertag is Tackleberrie. Be gentle though. My ‘box broke 4 days before GTA came out so, I don’t know the ropes yet.

Thank you for your time.  

By contrast, when we rented a movie through our Tivo using Amazon's Unbox download service and it failed to arrive in one piece, Amazon investigated and resolved the issue in less than 48 hours, and that was over a weekend. They looked at our account, confirmed we weren't able to download the file, and adjusted the account accordingly. Joe isn't asking for special treatment—he just wants to either have his points to spend, or have a product in exchange for points. Please, Microsoft, finish your "investigation" and quit jerking Joe around.

(Photo: Getty Images)

Granted, Netflix only has about 6,000 movies available for download—but even if their library is missing some obscure or specialty titles, that's still not a bad price-per-movie if you watch a lot of flicks on your PC.

We hate to sound like a commercial for Netflix, a company this writer has hated and avoided since 2002 when I caught them throttling my rentals—and that craptastic 2006 "settlement" was even more offensive than TJX's offer to hold a "special sale" for its victims of identity theft. But hey, a deal's a deal, and $9 a month for unlimited movie and TV downloads is pretty sweet.

"Netflix Expands Internet Viewing Option" [Wired]

Customers "can feel confident" their songs will play on whatever music device they buy in 2008, said Pete Baltaxe, Amazon's director of digital music.

"We're very pleased with where we are," Baltaxe said of customer adoption of the music service, though he would not provide data on downloads to date or site traffic.

U.S. album sales were down 14 percent in late November from a year earlier, according to Nielsen SoundScan data, as a growing number of fans buy individual songs online or use free file-sharing.

Digital music revenue has been growing in the double-digit percentages, but the total take is not enough to make up for the shortfall in compact disc sales.

If you purchased videos from this service, you'll probably want to read this FAQ for more information.
It appears that your videos will remain playable with Windows Media Player.

Farewell, Walmart Video Download store. Oh Johnny I hardly knew ye.

Walmart Video Downloads

PREVIOUSLY: Walmart's Video Download Service Predictably Sucks

Other applications of the patent include using it to create DRM content or to insert ads dynamically at playback of already downloaded content:

The playback token may be implemented as a digital rights management (DRM) license acquired in response to playback of the predetermined content. Another aspect involves a content insertion engine for inserting ads or other predetermined content into the playback of downloaded content.

The entire DG catalog isn't available, but one of their vice presidents says they're continuing to go through it "to mine the archives for the best gems," and that DG is making many out of print albums available:

The out of print albums now available on the DG Web Shop are from all across the wide spectrum of the DG catalog, including everything from one of the best ever Beethoven 5th Symphony interpretations from Carlo Maria Giulini and the LA Philharmonic; to wonderful Josquin Des Prez motet recordings, performed by the Orlando Concert; to Mozart Symphonies by the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra; to tango albums by the latest generation of Buenos Aires musicians.

RELATED: Deutsche Grammophon Online Store

Copyright law says the RIAA can elect to seek statutory damages "instead of actual damages and profit." The law also says that $750 is the minimum amount per infringement if you go the statutory route, which explains where the RIAA came up with that ridiculous figure.

But the defendant is claiming that $750 per song counts as an unconstitutional violation of due process because the figure is unreasonably high when compared against the actual value of a downloaded song—and that she should pay the wholesale price per song, which she estimates at 70 cents. By her argument, the $750-per-song fee is 1,071 times higher than the actual damages suffered by the RIAA.

From the judge's order:

[Plaintiff] shall set forth with more specificity the categories of expenses they incurred in making the song recordings, such as, for example, royalties. Plaintiffs shall also state with specificity which categories of expenses, if any, (a) they are unable to quantify or (b) they cannot quantify without unreasonable burden or expense—and in the latter event, they shall explain why.

"RIAA Must Divulge Expenses-Per-Download" [Slashdot]

RELATED
pdf of electronic filing of the judge's order [Pike & Fischer]
"§ 504. Remedies for infringement: Damages and profits" [Cornell University Law School]
(Photo: Getty)

From boingboing:

Allan Wood (a baseball megafan who has written a book about Babe Ruth) purchased over $280 worth of digital downloads of baseball games from Major League Baseball, who have just turned off their DRM server, leaving him with no way to watch his videos. MLB's position is that since these videos were "one time sales," and that means that Wood and everyone else who gave money to MLB is out of luck — they'll never be able to watch their videos again,.

MLB shut down the DRM server because they've changed suppliers, and now they expect suckers to buy downloads of games in the new DRM format. Anyone who does this needs their head examined — using DRM itself is contemptible enough, but using DRM this way is just plain criminal.

MLB rips off fans who bought DRM videos [boingboing]

A senior VP at Comcast said,

"During periods of heavy peer-to-peer congestion, which can degrade the experience for all customers, we use several network management technologies that, when necessary, enable us to delay - not block - some peer-to-peer traffic. However, the peer-to-peer transaction will eventually be completed as requested."

However, the EFF and Open Internet Coalition are calling bullshit on Comcast's overall explanation. Peter Eckersley at the EFF says,

"Characterizing that as delaying traffic I think is ... a stretch. What they are doing is spoofing traffic or jamming traffic. I think they are trying to create as much confusion about this story as they can because they've done something really scurrilous and out of line for an ISP, and I'm sure they've been burned by the community's reaction to it."

RELATED
"Comcast Tries To Sterilize, Decapitate BitTorrent"
(Photo: Getty)

The service, which is set to start in November after a test period in October, comes less than three weeks after NBC Universal said it was pulling its programs out of the highly successful iTunes service of Apple Inc. That partnership fell apart because of a dispute over Apple's iTunes pricing policies and what NBC executives said were concerns about lack of piracy protection.
...
NBC makes many of its popular shows available online in streaming media, which means that fans can watch episodes on their computers. Under the new NBC service, called NBC Direct, consumers will be able to download, for no fee, NBC programs like "Heroes," "The Office" and "The Tonight Show With Jay Leno" on the night that they are broadcast and keep them for seven days. They would also be able to subscribe to shows, guaranteeing delivery each week.

But the files, which would be downloaded overnight to home computers, would contain commercials that viewers would not be able to skip through. And the file would not be transferable to a disk or to another computer.

The files would degrade after the seven-day period and be unwatchable. "Kind of like 'Mission: Impossible,' only I don't think there would be any explosion and smoke," Mr. Gaspin said.

Anyone interested in these downloads? Too much DRM?

NBC to Offer Downloads of Its Shows [NYT]

Blockbuster buys download service [Mercury News]
(Photo: Magic Lantern Shows)

Now, if you buy an album, you'll get a discount of 99 cents for each song you've already purchased. Sounds fair.

Better still:

For a limited period of 90 days, Apple said it will make the "Complete My Album" offer retroactive to users who purchased tracks dating back to the launch of the iTunes Store four years ago.

Apple iTunes offers 'Complete My Album' [Seattle Post-Intelligencer]
(Photo: Lazy_Lightning)

Don't forget to remove "Extended Download Protection" from your shopping cart before you check out. According to Gizmodo the download comes with "Deduction Pro," which is, shockingly, quite helpful with deductions. —MEGHANN MARCO

Download TaxCut Premium [via Lifehacker & Gizmodo]

Apple comes clean with South Park Season 10 [MacNN]

As an example: we like Apple. We like iTunes. We think, overall, Apple is just the sort of shot-in-the-arm that the music industry needs. And Apple is a pretty trustworthy company. But that didn't stop them from silently degrading the rights iTunes customers have over their ability to copy the songs they purchased to other machines or hard copies (we remember this very clearly, but we're having a hard time Googling it up, not really quite certain of the germane search terms. Anyone got a reference citation for this?).

Anyway, Reuters has an interesting look up at the murky concept of ownership in the digital age, highlighting the dangers of letting a company licensing you thousands of dollars worth of media but not allowing you to directly control it as property. What happens when you want to switch away from iTunes? You have to buy all your songs somewhere else, on a different DRM format. What if you want to backup your iPod? It's not easy... they are designed to make the process as difficult as possible. There's nothing here that anti-DRM folks don't already know, but it's an interesting primer on the issues surrounding what companies are trying to tell you what your rights are compared to the rights consumers have enjoyed when making purchases for centuries.

Although we really do believe music, like soylent green, is "the peoples," please rest assured the image is posted with our pointed tongues gorily transfixed through our cheeks.

Do you own songs bought online? Well, sort of [Reuters]

It's gotta be good. The site design boasts rounded rectangles with drop-shadows!