I’ve never liked the freemium model simply because it usually causes gamers to spend more than they would had they bought the game outright. Unfortunately it is a model that many developers are starting to adopt, most notably in the mobile scene where games such as the recently announced Real Racing 3 are free, but in order to speed things up in the game, unlock features and etc., gamers would have to fork out additional money. It seems that in the UK, a 5-year old boy might have gone a tad overboard and has gone on a spending spree with his parents’ credit card, racking up an iTunes bill of a whopping £1,700 (~$2,555)!
In a way the parents were partly to blame as they were busy with guests when this happened. Basically the boy asked his dad for the iTunes password in order to download a free game. As you know, once a password has been entered, there is a 15 minute window in which it does not have to be entered again, and unfortunately that’s when the spending spree began. The parents initially thought it was a mistake until their bank called them to confirm the charges. The good news is that Apple has since agreed to refund the parents the money. Phew!