1) GOG.com is a digital distribution platform with a curated selection of games, a "you buy it, you own it" philosophy, and utmost care about customers. (from GOG's "about us")

2) Your GOG account and GOG content are personal to you and cannot be shared with, sold, gifted or transferred to anyone else. Your access to and use of them is subject to GOG’s rules which are set out here, as updated or amended when necessary. (from GOG's User Agreement)

1)"You buy it you own it" and 2)"GOG content are personal to you and cannot be shared with, sold, gifted or transferred to anyone else."

Aren't 1) and 2) just a titsy little bit contradictive?

Doesn't "owning" mean that the "owner" decides what to do with stuff he or she "owns"?

A possibility to transfer ownership to someone else would be nice - at least half of the content of my library is just gathering dust, so I would love those games to do some good somewhere else, to someone else -, it would make sense as well.

Wouldn't it?

"You buy it you own it" means that nobody will be able to take your games away from you, because they are DRM-free. But, since they are DRM-free, there's no way to tell that you've transferred ownership to another user (in other words, that you haven't downloaded a backup copy and keep playing it while you "gave" it away).

With DRM-free we get a very big advantage (the top priority for me) at the cost of some compromises.

Maybe GOG should be clearer with their wording, but then this can't be easily explained extensively, which I will prove with the following wall of text:

Two different things: the license, and the IP (intellectual property) rights.

You own the license(s) to the games you buy here, but not the IP rights. You have the license to play the game, but since you don't own the IP rights, you are not allowed to make copies of the game and share them with everyone or sell the copies to others. as if you were the developer or publisher of the game.

When GOG vaguely says "you own the game", they mean that games bought from GOG, at least single-player games, don't include DRM, which are technical measures to control how and when you play the game, after the purchase. So after you have bought and downloaded the game from GOG, no one, not GOG nor the game publisher, can technically prevent you from playing the game, nor is your ability to play the game dependent on the existence of the GOG service/store or the publisher.

The question whether you can and/or should be able to sell your games (game licenses) to others... it isn't actually quite clear whether it would be legal, and it possibly depends on the country where you are. In theory you could possibly download a game from GOG and then legally sell it to someone else, but:

1) you are not allowed to play the game yourself anymore, of course.

2) that means merely the game installer itself. You can't sell (both technically and legally) the GOG services associated with that game to someone else, as in transferring the game from your GOG account to someone else's GOG account. You can only sell the right to play the game (= license), but not the services like the ability to download the game from GOG.com, or receive support for the game from GOG.com staff, or receive updates for the game through the GOG.com store.

It is the same if you have bought a 1-year membership card to a local gym. The gym can decline the membership if you sell it to someone else and they try to come to the gym with your membership card. The gym membership is a service that is not transferrable, unless the gym specifically allows it.

I don't think the OP means making copies of the game and selling them. I think he means removing the game from his account and putting it into someone else's account. Just once; no copies made.

Like a physical CD or a book, to which GOG often compare themselves.

Yes, I know you'll say: but you could make a copy for yourself to keep: GOG can't verify that you've not kept any copies since the game doesn't have DRM. But the same thing could be said about physical CDs. No one can verify that you haven't made a copy for yourself before selling it, yet re-selling used CDs is mostly legal.

owning it and transferring ownership do not necessarily go hand in hand. while the games are drm free and you're trusted with them, there are still software licensing rules and copyright laws.

look at something like gun ownership in any country possibly other than the US: you own the gun but you can't just transfer ownership to anyone without a whole lot of paperwork.
house ownership? all sorts of stamp duties and whatnot when it comes to transferring ownership.
same with cars in a lot of countries: can't be sold to someone else unless they pass roadworthy (unless you're selling it as scrap).
alcohol? you need a license to sell it on.
software ownership is kinda the same thing, compounded by the fact that it's not a physical thing that one person can be in possession, exclusively, at a time.

there's a gifting function where you can buy gog games for other people if you want.

^ As timpu said, the first thing that needs clarifying is you own the games here as in "you own one copy that's not held hostage via a remote kill switch (DRM) and if you've backed it up, then you permanently own it and cannot ever have it taken away" (unlike Steam 'subscriptions' where you risk the lot vanishing from falling out with Valve over a credit card chargeback or buying regionally restricted games in a low income country and then emigrating). Reselling digital products from one consumer to another though is a far larger and more complex issue that overlaps with the EU's previous rulings:-
https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2012/07/top-eu-court-upholds-right-to-resell-downloaded-software/
https://wccftech.com/steam-resell-games-french-court/

In theory Europeans at least could test this stuff in court. The reason this isn't enforced (yet) is partly because DRM makes it a moot point, plus the obvious logistical problems of "returning" something that can be copied to infinity (and was delivered to you in the first place as a copy rather than the original), plus legal costs of "industry shattering" lawsuits in general. Removing it from your account / transferring it to another can already be technically done (that's already visible with refunds & gifts). But the legal argument is stronger for forcing Steam / Origin / uPlay to do that rather than GOG due to those stores continuing to maintain control over it post-purchase (DRM).

Maybe not, but I just made it clear what owning the game can mean. If you mean its IP rights, then yes, you can make copies and sell them for a good profit, kazinggg! But that is the service part. People need to make a clear distinction between the license to the game, and the service that GOG provides on top of the game.

If and when GOG closes its doors, the service ceases to exist and no one has access to the service anymore, but people can still keep playing their GOG games, both technically (= no DRM) and legally (= the license they still have). A mere CD or book doesn't have any related service with them that you'd need to be able to transfer from one person to another, on top of the item itself.

In GOG's case, the "book" or "CD" would possibly be the offline installer of a game you have bought from GOG. It might be legal to sell that offline installer to someone else (as long as you don't keep a copy to yourself and never play the GOG version anymore), but I don't think GOG has any obligation to let one to transfer the related service with it (as in, transferring the "game" from one GOG account to another).

Then again, I am unsure how much people would be willing to pay for a second-hand GOG game installer anyway, if it doesn't include the service with it (being able to download the game and any updates from GOG, get support from the GOG staff for the game etc.). No I wasn't really going to say that as I don't consider it that relevant to this discussion. That is the moral part, not the legal or technical part that I am discussing here.

I dunno about individual games and while one is alive(haven't thought about it much, or if I did I forgot it like a bunch of other stuff[poor memory]), but I think transferring whole libraries upon verifiable passing of an account holder should be allowed....but it's GOG's call, as always, so they'd have to be ok with it.
======================================================= Yes, but what if someone is old and dies, or dies unexpectedly? Shouldn't a user be able to transfer their entire library to a family member at least in such event?
======================================================= Yes, but that not allowing goes against the supposed "ownership" of one's games a bit, don't you think?

Even with easily copied CDs/DVDs one can still sell them(and their licenses) to other parties...either online via sites like eBay/etc and offline to game stores and other people.

======================================================= As you said, most of those things can be done...albeit with some work involved. If someone dies, as I said above, then is their collection forfeit? That seems to go against "owning" one's games.

This isn't a euphemism; it means what is says. These are not the type of items that you can just donate to Goodwill after you're done with them.

It's 2020 and people are still confused about the difference between digital items and physical items? Come on.

Also it has zero to do with DRM, Steam doesn't let you sell games or your account either.

Depends if you are thinking about the game (license) itself, or also the service that GOG provides on top of the game itself. I tend to consider only the game license itself, ie. that when I have downloaded a GOG game installer to my PC, there are no technical means (DRM) that can limit where, when and why I play the game. The comparison is not that good because the CDs/DVDs don't usually include any service or account that should be transferrable with the game, or they don't at least depend on such.

The thing is that transferring games between GOG accounts would be extra work to GOG. Either someone in GOG staff would have to do the transfer, or they would have to automate it with extra programming, and maintain that it works.

At that point the question becomes, shouldn't GOG then at least have the right to charge a fee for people transferring games between accounts because clearly such ability would cause them extra work and expenses? Maybe $1 per transfer, or $3? Could they charge anything they want, even so much that it wouldn't make sense to transfer games between accounts ($100 for transferring a $3 game)?

With CD or DVD games, you don't have to ask the store where the game was originally bought to transfer any services from the seller to the buyer. There are no extra expenses to the store for "allowing" such practice. Depends what you mean by the "collection". The GOG game installers someone had downloaded to his hard drive from his GOG account, or the entries in GOG's database that "this account has these games in the GOG service"?

The latter will vanish anyway if and when GOG ceases to exist, there is no clause that GOG (or anyone else) should provide the service forever.

I don't consider it unthinkable that someone would pass his 5TB external USB HDD to their offsprings with all their purchased GOG games, it would possibly even be legal. I have no idea how the HDD with game installers in it would be valued (at least in e.g. Finland where one has to pay tax for inheriting something worth money; maybe there is some limit to that, I don't know because I'm not dead yet).

My guess is that if you were motivated you could get digital rights transferred too. But the problem is that it's likely such a hassle and cost that it'd just be easier to rebuy the game for someone else.

Like, if you had a $1 tennis ball and you wanted to give it to a friend, but the legal fees and ownership transfer deeds would rack up hundreds, if not thousands of dollars, you'd probably just buy a second $1 tennis ball for your friend and keep the original.

I'm sure if you spoke really nicely to GoG and/or steam and were willing to have lawyers draft things and provide proof that you've completely given up all copies upon rights transfer (and lawyers willing to lodge court cases) then you'd be able to get things moved from account to account. But the first meeting with a lawyer to just explain what you want to do will cost more than a couple of games. There are some things that are forfeit on death. Especially non-physical things.
I'd be interested in finding out if anyone has produced a death certificate, claiming to be the next of kin and asking to inherit someone's account.
I mean in that circumstance it'd be (imo) ok to hand over the account. It's not been tested in a court of law at all though as far as i'm aware.
The ultimate paradox. By the time you know, you'll no longer be able to know.

Both, but I was more asking about people passing on their game libraries after passing...mainly to family....imo if one was deceased and not playing said games it should be allowed....even if GOG charged a small fee to do so.

Still, both are game installers(albeit in different formats) which are essentially licensed copies one can play after paying.

Agreed, but it likely could be automated to require little work, and a limit could be setup (game transferred per account per year/etc) and/or maybe a small fee charged.

That said, I(again) was talking more about transferring whole accounts in the event of someone's passing. That would likely just take a change in email/proof of that person passing sent to GOG/etc.

Fair enough.

Both...the games one has downloaded and future fixes/updates/access to re-dl.

Also what if someone passed in a few years due to being very old or due to freak accident/disease? It could happen and GOG could still be around.

Good info, but what about games not downloaded yet or which might receive future fixes after one passes that one hasn't downloaded to such a drive for those left behind after their passing?

If one purchases support for life or till the end of GOG(whichever is sooner/essentially what one gets when buying games here) then why should that change upon death?

(Also thanks for answering my post so in depth and making me think on a few things/give me something to reply back to)
==========================================
Well I was more talking about what you say below, so i'll skip to that bit.....interesting stuff, though, so thanks for your take on this(transferring such items).

That intrigues me as well...if anyone's ever done such or if any store would allow it.

Speak for yourself...I plan on living forever - William Riker ;)

(That quote might not fit this reply bit exactly, but it came to mind when reading it :))

Well I have been immortal so far....

some interesting articles that are relevant to this thread:
https://www.justis.com/digital-assets-after-death/
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/08/17/digital_entropy_of_death/

Post got eaten so have to redo it this way....sorries. :)

1. Me too....maybe it's catching on? :D

2. Read em...it's nice to see some states allow it but it needs to be federal, imo.