MSE News: 'Immoral' My Little Pony game tempts kids to spend £70 on 'virtual gems'

Fire_Fox

thelawnet wrote: »

Anyone who chooses to store personal data on their ipad will be well aware that there is personal data on their ipad.

It's not however obvious that when you create an itunes account with a password, that it can be accessed without the password for a 15 minute period.

And I'm not really sure what the relavance of the pin is in relation to My Little Pony. If an ipad is locked with a pin then it's unusable until unlocked. However if your child is playing with the ipad because you have unlocked it for them, then the pin is irrelevant, and provides no protection at all against unauthorised itunes purchases.

Eh? There's basic security, it's the username + password, it's just that Apple for some reason choose to make this insecure. Given that Apple are the world's largest company and generally regarded as trustworthy, a normal rational person would have no reason to believe that their credit card was so insecure that a four-year-old could run up thousands in unauthorised purchase through this device.

As I recall you have in-app purchases turned off, so I'm not really sure how this supposed infringement of your liberties affects you.

It IS obvious, it is in the terms and conditions in fairly plain English and it's in the Restrictions section of the gadget and iTunes as far as I can tell. You just can't be bothered to read any of that!! :rotfl:

Exactly: YOU unlock the security by entering the iTunes PIN so exposing YOUR credit card and then immediately hand it to someone who is incapable of making responsible purchasing decisions. You'd know that was a security risk if you had not been too lazy to explore the security features on iTunes and your gadget.

I have in app purchases turned off because I invested time in exploring my device and its security features when I first got the handset. I realised that there was a risk of accidental purchases, in my case most likely when I am tiddly. :beer: According to you I have the intellect of a prehistoric four year old so if I can, can't responsible parents?

sharnad

Lip_Stick wrote: »

My opinion on these types of games, is that it's wrong for them to market them towards children, and have pricey in-app purchases costing what they do. I certainly think they should be limited. We all know kids desire certain characters etc especially when it's to do with the latest toy/film and these play on that.

What parent, in their right mind, would allow their child to spend £70 on a mountain of gems, or whatever it was? More emphasis when viewing the game's download page should be put on it being a restricted game when not paying.. rather than just saying it's 'free' until you read all the T&Cs.

thelawnet - you made me lol with your 'As for 'supervising the very young child', this just brings me back to my point about childless troglodytes. It does not make you a bad parent because you don't feel the need to sit there staring at My Little F***ing Pony while your child plays with it' :rotfl: - Couldn't agree more.

You dont need to sit with them but any idiot can set up there password protection and keep it away from the kids fifteen minutes after they download a game

jayjay77

But we must remeber that they are the first parents that have had to deal with mobile phones and young children. We go off into when I was young lol. It is a war and it is about our rights, im an adult and I know for certain that my buget has no space for spending money on games. At the same time I like Candy Crush Saga. I have no choice at level 35 to go on facebook and I dont know anybody playing this game. I dont want to mess around but unless I pay I habe no choice. No game should be allowed to tell me what to do. This os even worse that all the betting sites which while being immoral and playing on peoples hope at least have a glimmer of a chance that you get something out of it. It is wrong we are being encouraged to pay money for something that has limited impact on our economy.

fiendishlyclever

jayjay77 wrote: »

But we must remeber that they are the first parents that have had to deal with mobile phones and young children. We go off into when I was young lol. It is a war and it is about our rights, im an adult and I know for certain that my buget has no space for spending money on games. At the same time I like Candy Crush Saga. I have no choice at level 35 to go on facebook and I dont know anybody playing this game. I dont want to mess around but unless I pay I habe no choice. No game should be allowed to tell me what to do. This os even worse that all the betting sites which while being immoral and playing on peoples hope at least have a glimmer of a chance that you get something out of it. It is wrong we are being encouraged to pay money for something that has limited impact on our economy.

Candy crush drives me mad - I refuse to buy anything in the game because of the greed of the developers. This is entirely their right however and they can operate under any business model they like. If you don't agree, delete the app and don't use it. At the end of the day the app developers are in the business of making money.

As for the previous posts, it amazes me how many people share passwords with partners/children then moan about app purchases. As mentioned earlier (discounted) iTunes vouchers, a good password and disabling the 15min window for in-app purchases are all good practice.

gjchester

jayjay77 wrote: »

At the same time I like Candy Crush Saga. I have no choice at level 35 to go on facebook and I dont know anybody playing this game.

It is wrong we are being encouraged to pay money for something that has limited impact on our economy.

The game is free and you had 34 levels to enjoy, is it a crime that the developers want to get something for their hard work.

Would you have preferred buying it at £9.99 without trying it, and then found it was a lousy game, That's what we used to do before the payment model changed to these pay a little to unlock more models.

koru

Note that Apple will refund in-app purchases in some cases. I just got a refund of £68 for purchases made unknowingly by my daughter on my mother's iPad. I kind of assumed they would refuse, but they could not have been more cooperative.

Perhaps this is influenced by the US court case which requires them to refund people in the US.

TurnUpForTheBooks_2

So it is not ok to tempt kids to spend £70 of their parents' money on a game App, but it is ok to tempt kids to spend £70K of their own money on an app to SFE to secure a game slot at a UK University ?