After Click to Cancel legislation for subscriptions, California has introduced another piece of consumer protection legislation for buying digital content.

It will force companies to tell you when you won’t actually own the content you think you’re buying – something which has occasionally been true for iTunes purchases …

The problem with ‘buying’ digital content

There have been numerous examples of consumers thinking they are buying digital content, which remains theirs for life, only to find it unceremoniously removed – sometimes years later.

For example, two class action lawsuits were filed against Apple back in 2021 for using the word “buy” for iTunes movies when these can, in rare circumstances, be later removed from your library.

Both lawsuits make the same complaint: that the iTunes store wording says that you can “buy” or “rent” movies, while the reality is that you can only license them – and that license can be later withdrawn.

There have been examples of people losing access to content purchased from iTunes, though these do appear to be edge cases. Similar complaints have been made about the fact that you don’t actually own e-books purchased from Amazon.

Apple continues to use a “Buy” button in the Apple TV app today.

A similar thing happened earlier this year when Ubisoft revoked access to the online-only racing game The Crew after people had bought it.

California law on digital content purchases

California has introduced AB 2426: Consumer protection: false advertising: digital goods. This says that companies aren’t allowed to use the words “buy” or “purchase” unless they clearly state exactly what is meant by this, and tell you if there is a risk that you might someday lose access.

Existing law makes a person who violates specified false advertising provisions liable for a civil penalty, as specified, and provides that a person who violates those false advertising provisions is guilty of a misdemeanor.

This bill would, subject to specified exceptions, additionally prohibit a seller of a digital good from advertising or offering for sale a digital good, as defined, to a purchaser with the terms buy, purchase, or any other term which a reasonable person would understand to confer an unrestricted ownership interest in the digital good, or alongside an option for a time-limited rental, unless the seller receives at the time of each transaction an affirmative acknowledgment from the purchaser, or the seller provides to the consumer before executing each transaction a clear and conspicuous statement, as specified.

Image: 9to5Mac collage using Fruit Basket on Unsplash

LOS ANGELES (KABC) — Extreme weather and our changing climate means that forecasting has become even more important.

To help you become more climate-ready, ABC News and the ABC Owned Television Stations have teamed up to help you navigate this new reality.

What’s in store for California’s water year?

The state’s water year begins October 12 and ends September 30 of next year.

Typically, fall rain starts in October then the bulk of California’s rain falls from December to February. April is when we see peak snowpack. So what will this year look like? Climate experts are warning to be ready for some extremes.

“What we’re seeing in the forecast right now is that we’re likely off to another late start to the wet season,” said Dr. Michael Anderson, who serves as the official State Climatologist for California. “Meaning, the dry conditions continuing and certainly still seeing the above-normal temperatures.”

High pressure is also in the mix, meaning rainfall could be delayed this year.

“That can happen as high pressure kind of keeps things, pushing storms to the north and we’re seeing that right now with almost all the [precipitation] activity hitting the very southern end of Alaska and northern British Columbia,” said Anderson.

But when it arrives, forecasters are urging people to be ready seeing as to we could see more extreme rain events during dry seasons.

“The one constant we are seeing is that extremes are getting more extreme,” said Jason Ince with the California Department of Water Resources. “Our droughts are getting longer and hotter, our big storms are getting stronger since warmer air can hold more moisture.”

Forecasters are also on the lookout for Santa Ana and Diablo wind events this fall and the potential for decaying tropical systems to cause thunderstorms, which are both concerning for fire crews.

“We end up with some pretty good [precipitation] events sometimes with some thunderstorms, but those thunderstorms, if they’re dry can be fire starters which can be a problem,” said Anderson.

Our water demand is the highest from May to August but remember, this September started out dangerously hot in California so were still on the tail end of this season. Well finish this water year end of September. To learn more on the new water year, click here.

California Governor Gavin Newsom has signed AB 2426, a new law that requires digital marketplaces to make clearer to customers when they are only purchasing a license to access media. The law will not apply to cases of permanent offline downloads, only to the all-too-common situation of buying digital copies of video games, music, movies, TV shows or ebooks from an online storefront. spotted the development, which could see marketplaces facing fines for false advertising in the state if they don’t use clear language to explain the limitations of what access entails. In other words, you won’t be seeing language like “buy” or “purchase” once the law takes effect in 2025.

The move to digital storefronts has raised new parallel concerns about ownership and preservation for media in the modern age. Ubisoft’s move to after the game’s servers shuttered is one of the most recent examples of how customers can suddenly lose access to media they felt they owned. The new California law won’t stop situations like The Crew‘s disappearance from happening, and it won’t stop those losses from hurting. But it does make clearer that ownership is a pretty rare and intangible thing for digital media.

Governor Newsom is having a busy week. He also signed the state’s “” bill yesterday and last week signed two bills with protections against , both living and deceased.