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Game Pirate Sentenced To Jail Time
Posted by
Zonk
on Mon Sep 24, 2007 12:45 PM
from the don't-use-craigslist-for-this dept.
from the don't-use-craigslist-for-this dept.
A man charged in a case separate from the much-publicized anti-modder raids last month has been sentenced to ninety days in prison, another nine months of work furlough, and five years of probation. "Police seized over 1,000 pirated game discs during the raid on Brown's home, along with 'numerous' mod chips. Ric Hirsch, Vice-President of Intellectual Property Enforcement at the ESA, said, 'Sentences that include jail time send a clear message that violating intellectual property rights is a serious crime with significant consequences and violators will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.'"
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Mod Chip Raids In Perspective 186 comments
GamePolitics has extensive coverage on the aftermath of this past week's Federal raids on suspected modchippers. There were numerous negative reactions to the action here on the site, and your comments were not alone. Many commenters at the site Dvorak Uncensored expressed similar frustration and disbelief at the federal government's priorities. As stated on the site's original post: "Are you kidding me? With drug dealers everywhere, murder, porous borders, terrorism the Feds are concerned about game mods?? Holy crap. Next I supposed they will be cracking heads over unlocked phones. Great." Meanwhile, one of the raided men is now without any electronics whatsoever as a result of the search and seizure, and feeling very much alone. Another man has (more seriously) been barred from seeing his girlfriend and daughter, and has been reduced to sleeping in his car. As he puts it: "I would like to formally thank Microsoft and Nintendo for cracking down on the little guy with a soldering iron in his garage, rather than going after the people that are responsible for the bootlegs being available."
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THANK GOODNESS! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:THANK GOODNESS! (Score:4, Insightful)
That said, I sort of wished they threw more of the book at this guy for pirating this stuff. Mod chips have a legitimate use by enabling the owner of hardware to use it in the way they see fit. The homebrew community and those who enjoy the protection that backups provide should hold a zero-tolerance policy to those who would use those tools to enjoy materials for which they didn't pay.
My guess is that if the homebrew/backup communities weren't all driven underground thanks to the DMCA and corps with large legal budgets, they'd agree.
Parent
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I happen to like handcuffs, thank you very much!
Re:THANK GOODNESS! (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm not saying that these types of crimes are best punished by putting these people in with violent criminals, but they should definitely serve time in a real prison. Separate the violent criminals from the non-violent criminals for safety's sake, but other than that the accommodations should be similar across the board.
Parent
No Shit. (Score:3, Interesting)
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There were three guys in prison... two muscular, bearded and looking really badass.
One of the ruffians asks the other: "So, what did you get prison for?"
"I killed 10 people - cut their arms and legs with a pocket knife, just for the fun of it. You?"
The other guy answers: "I caught my wife with another man. Burned the hell outta' them".
Then they stare at the third guy - a wimpy kid with glasses sitting in a corner. "Hey kid, what ya here for?"
The kid answers in a
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This whole digital copying thing is a really horrible precedent to set in this country.
I really want to know why they equate digital copying to theft , we pay for data bits and the electricity to get and send them as well as paying for the service to transport it. This completely ticks me off.
If the person was selling "back ups" then I am all for having them arrested and they should be sitting in their home with out a internet connection or computer. I see
Whew (Score:5, Funny)
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Please don't trivialize game piracy by mistakenly thinking it's just a matter of having your IP stolen.
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I haven't downloaded movies in a long time but if I did I guess someone might lose "some" money because I guess I could occasional had rented one.
Music are to expensive and worthless to buy, and there are so much free and great music out there (last.fm and scenemusic.eu for two resources.)
Of course I also
Re:Whew (Score:5, Insightful)
I make a living from IP, and no I still don't care.
The average brute who beats his wife and kids probably won't end up in jail for the first several incidents.
Your average petty thug mugger who confronts people and takes their wallet and watch at knife or gunpoint rarely ends up in jail for more than a few hours, no matter how often they get caught. Despite the threat of violence, the theft of real property, and the substantial emotional distress they cause their victims.
Your average retail convenience stores are shoplifted from on a daily basis. Real goods, that cost real money, being stolen for real. Every day. When the pricks get caught, how many of THEM end up in jail for more than a few hours? Practically none.
So why should a guy who makes copies in a nonviolent way, that don't take anything real away from me, and potentially don't usually even mean a lost sale -- what exactly has he done that he should he go to jail when other criminals who do much worse things do not?
Once we've got a policy of locking up all the brutes, thugs, drug dealers, thieves, and shoplifters then we can look at raising the penalty for crimes like jay-walking and copyright infringement.
Now, of course, if this guy is at the commericial/industrial scale of infringement, complete with counterfeiting discs, and laundering the money made, then yeah, he's costing his victims and society enough to treated like a serious criminal and deserves jail time.
But your average schmuck with an ftp server or some such nonsense
Parent
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There are thousands of them out there and working together t
Woo! (Score:2, Funny)
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Or just do the right thing and execute the criminals with the only exceptions being the ones whose cases are iffy.
It's funny, isn't it? When a dog is considered a danger to the community we have no problem putting it down. It's an animal after all. However, when a human, another animal which supposedly has the ability to know right from wrong, kills/murders/rapes/whatever, we have no prob
Well, there are two sides. (Score:2)
Permanently.
The problem comes in when you understand that the legal system makes mistak
Re: (Score:2)
As you said, it's obvious that people who are constantly being arrested have not learned from their prior experiences. There is no reason we as taxpayers should have to continue to house and feed these people. We do not have the time or resources to keep coddling these people. To use a recent example, a man was pulled over in New Hampshire for drunk driving.
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You do realize, of course, that this is essentially the same argument t
The message I got out of this (Score:5, Insightful)
And for what? 90 days of jail. Whoo boy. He must be a really tough criminal! I dunno about your country, but 90 days is about what you get when you drive with the subway and refuse to pay the fine. For the third time. After being tried and told that paying the fee of 60 bucks is PROBABLY more interesting for you.
In other words, the damage this guy did must've been somewhere around 60 bucks. At least we now have found a reliable value for IP.
Devil's Advocate (Score:5, Insightful)
Their job is to uphold the law. They did so. There is nothing wrong with that.
If you're angry, then I seriously suggest that you write your Representative(s) [house.gov] and Senators [senate.gov].
Parent
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What was wrong was that their workforce was diverted to such petty crime while there are other, more serious, crimes being unprosecuted because of a lack of funding.
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police departments are usually broken down into divisions that each deal with their respective speciality.
I have no problem with that - I even approve, if it means the police involved in any given specialty might know the difference between, say, art and a bomb.
I have to disagree, however, that it doesn't mean some crimes get ignored in favor of what they choose to go after. As long as I can look forward to seeing a single spam email in my inbox every morni
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Sorry for being blunt, but that's all that comes out of sentences like that. Why should anyone TRY to scrape together 100k bucks? That takes about half a lifetime, unless you're a lawyer or rich by default. Working a lifetime for those leeches? Just to prolong their existance?
Most likely, I'd take my last few cents, buy me a good arsenal of automatic weapons and find their headquarters. Go out wi
non violent criminals (Score:2)
That said, he did break the law when he pirated games, and it is entirely just that he should be brought up on charges. However, the punishment should fit the crime.
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No one ever goes to jail for just having pirated materials (regardless of the law against it in some countries). The only people who get in trouble are people selling/distributing it.
NPO (Score:2)
Is anyone else picturing Blackbeard and Captain Hook standing in line at the IRS with their 501(c) [wikipedia.org] forms in hand, discussing their tax exempt status?
"Arrrr, we be a powerful Recreational Club we be!"
- "Avast ye lowly deckswabber, we make a fine Fraternal Beneficiary Society we do!"
"So it be a life of Charitable Givin' for ye?"
- "Aye! Donate me hearties, Yo ho!"
"Well blimey, if I don't stuff that in me ca
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Personally, I pay for all the games and stuff I have, but I'm indifferent to people using copies. Where I do draw the line is commercial infringement. I actively dislike the making of money from an infringement setup. For that, I think 90 days is fair. It's not throwing the book at him and making him out to be the root of all evil, and up there with the terrorists.. It's saying "You'v
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
And that is most likely also what the verdict is about. Notice how the modchips are mentioned, but nowhere that it's illegal to have, store, own or sell them?
However, the punishment should fit the crime.
Personally, I'd say that's about achived. He had "over 1000 Pirated Games" and got 90 days. Now, in many legal systems you'll find a system that trades "daily earnings" against a day in jail (provided you cannot pay or refuse to pay). I.e. 90 days jail is
Now for modding thought (Score:5, Informative)
Brown was facing 10 counts of felony offenses, including grand theft, computer crime and trafficking in counterfeit products. In August, Brown pleaded guilty to two counts of counterfeit trafficking and today received a one-year sentence, the first 90 days to be spent in prison and the rest in work furlough. He was also given five years probation and a fine of $100,000, and will be required to pay $10,000 in restitution to the ESA.
Which sounds to me like its for selling pirated copies of games. I don't see an issue here. Don't sell copies of games, and you've got a lot less (or maybe nothing at all) to worry about.Re: (Score:2)
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The people in charge (Score:2, Interesting)
The only way to make them stop is to insist with all force necessary.
If you're not willing to get your hands dirty to stand up to this scum then no one HAS to care what you think..so why bother shaking your little fist and writing scathing condemnations?
Cut word lines
Cut music lines
Smash the control images
Smash the control machine.
- William S. Burroughs
Clarification (Score:3, Informative)
It's important to note that he was a "mod chip seller," not a normal Joe who downloads pirated games and then plays them on his modded consoles. The grand theft charge was dropped in the plea, of course.
U.S. law makes copyright violation a crime -- for the distributor. It has yet to pass laws against the distributee. And won't, otherwise you could be prosecuted for buying a plagiarized book at the bookstore.
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"Grand theft" would never have stuck. Grand theft refers to tangible items. What did he actually steal? Nor "computer crime," given that the offense itself didn't involve the use of a computer. "Trafficking in counterfeit products" would be selling copies of pirated items, but not the selling of the mod chip itself.
Unless this guy was selling th
Absurd! (Score:5, Insightful)
-Rick
Re:Absurd! (Score:5, Insightful)
Why?
Because "financial crime" undermines society itself. Look around you. The whole world is depending on the monetary system to work. And it only works as long as we - the users - trust that system. As such, "financial crime" is extremely dangerous for society because it destroys one of the most important foundations we depend on: money!
The most serious "financial crime" is counterfeiting money. It is punished extremely hard, because such activity is a serious threat to society. If we can't trust money, the world will stop functioning. Like... really! stop functioning!
The second-worst "financial crime" is forgery of documents where money is involved. The reasons are exactly the same as above. If you forge a check/document/contract in order to acquire someone else's money, that activity is a threat to an important foundation in society.
We can continue to describe the many different grades and shades of "financial crimes", but if you think about the logic behind it, it kinda makes sense. The reasons for having harsh punishments for such crimes are all similar: It is a kind of crime which is very destructive for society as a whole.
I am not saying that software piracy is as bad as rape. Nor am I saying that I agree with the course of action in this particular case. I am simply trying to explain the logic. Some laws are made to protect the individual, other laws are made to protect society as a whole. Are the former more important than the latter? Is there any reason to protect the individual, while society falls apart?
That is the reason for harsh punishment of "financial crimes". You don't have to agree with these reasons - but I hope you will at least give it some thought.
- Jesper
Parent
Don't do for profit (Score:5, Insightful)
Well 16x is the Industry Standard.. (Score:2, Insightful)
Actually, that was a pointless rambling.. I sincerely doubt the ESA would do something so laughably foul.
Trafficking vs Personal use (Score:2)
If he was making these copies to SELL, then yeah, I could imagine over 1,000 CDs. At $5~10 USD each (average street vendor price), that adds up to some serious cash fast, especially if you can start run
Unbelievable (Score:3, Insightful)
Real, actual, non-fictional people's salaries are based on the fact that if people play these games (or music, or movies) then they will pay for them. If you don't like the way the market works due to levels of compensation, etc. then feel free to get your media from those that offer it freely or at a rate you agree with and who base their economic plans on that fact.
However if it's a commercial product and you steal it, then go to jail and shut up. You broke the law. Quit whining, quit the straw man style "rapists and murderers" blathering and learn something for a change. If you advocate open source and freely available media, quit giving our community a black eye by encouraging theft and cheering on pirates. If the new media model is going to work, it will work by being a better model, not by undermining the current system we have. Undermining rather than supplanting only encourages harsher laws and more intense DRM which will make the transition harder to accomplish in the end. Like I said, unbelievable.
Yeah! You get em Ric [sic?]! (Score:2)
but (Score:2, Funny)
Mod Chips? (Score:3, Insightful)
OK, I suppose I'm a little behind the times and I apologize for that. I also don't wish to start a flame-war here and I do believe that some people have pretty heated opinions about this.
There are mod chips for my Prius. [xanga.com] There are performance mod chips for lots of cars [speedydelivery.co.uk]. While they may invalidate an owner's warranty (in some cases) one has purchased the car and is willing to install it and take a chance that maybe, perhaps, they either won't pass their vehicle emissions inspection or they may wear the car out a little sooner.
So why is it illegal to make or sell a mod chip to make a game console work differently? If it invalidates one's warranty, well that's the chance you take--you cannot take the console back and get warranty service on it.
I cannot see or understand a law that would prevent you from doing a mod on your PSP or X-Box. After all, you bought it; if you mod it it's yours so who cares?
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Yet, for video games, music, and movies, the DMCA gives that industry the unique ability to call your modification of the hardware a CRIME because it bypasses copy protection. Being able to play backups and imports is basically the result of sidestepping copy protection.
But, you know, since I want to play a Jap
Criminal copyright violation - steep punitive fine (Score:3, Informative)
He was a counterfeiter. He should be thrown in jail with the rest of the drug dealers, prostitutes, con men and other smalltime ne'er-do-wells until he sobers up. This kind of thing must be pursued and stopped for the health of the industry, and the rule of law in general.
This is going after the dealers instead of going after the junkies, and it's the right way to go. I applaud the San Diego police (and prosecutors) for going after folks are causing true harm.
On the other hand, the punitive fine ($100,000 - ten times the awarded damages of $10,000) seemed absurdly steep. Without knowing the man's means, it's hard to believe that this was a fair judgment. It's a warning sign when the jail time and the punitive fines are so completely incongruous.
--
Toro