Sony and Nintendo Step Up Anti-Piracy Efforts 147
Edge reports that Sony and Nintendo are both expanding their anti-piracy operations in an effort to reduce piracy rates on the PSP and the DS respectively. Nintendo has hired Neil Boyd, who handled anti-piracy operations for Warner Brothers, to help them demonstrate their "willingness to take action against criminals who are making money out of the infringement of games developers' copyright." Sony has taken a more direct approach, choosing to alter the hardware used in the PSP Go so that things like the Pandora battery can no longer be used to alter the firmware.
Strategy? (Score:1)
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What, Warner Bros. anti-piracy strategy? Suing people?
Warner Bros. anti-piracy strategy is suing people. What?
There, fixed it for you.
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Found out that Warner Bros. anti-piracy strategy is... *wears sunglasses* eating kittens. YEEEAAHHHH!!!
There, all true..
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Just goes to show that using Linux helps prevent piracy. Go F/OSS!
Actually, the definition of piracy used in the summary is: installing a free, flexible OS onto a computer device. So, installing Linux is now piracy.
Dreamcast hijack thread (Score:2)
Dreamcast was a really good system. It was almost same generation as PS2.
And yet they've given up on Wii piracy (Score:5, Informative)
No, really. The've shown that they believe that Wii homebrew == Wii piracy (having attacked generic homebrew almost exclusively, not just piracy tools, and considering that they harassed us when we attempted to notify them of a security issue), and yet it's been over 5 months since the latest security-related update. Somehow I don't get the felling that Nintendo is interested in combating Wii piracy very much (it's not like they've done a whole lot to stop modchips either).
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That's because they make so much money on selling systems and accessories. DS profits are primarily software related.
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Not another $60/mo phone bill (Score:2)
Why don't they open source the game software and sell subscriptions to the server.
Because then every player would have to buy a $1,440 two-year subscription to mobile Internet access. Not everybody wants another $60/mo phone bill.
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Sounds very Apple-y
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The've shown that they believe that Wii homebrew == Wii piracy (having attacked generic homebrew almost exclusively, not just piracy tools, and considering that they harassed us when we attempted to notify them of a security issue)
I seem to remember using Google to search for the phrase "homebrew is piracy" and ending up on a page that argues that Nintendo holds one or more patents on the DS Game Card protocol. If this is true, then homebrew devices infringe patents.
Re:And yet they've given up on Wii piracy (Score:4, Insightful)
"Piracy" is copyright infringement only to most people.
Re:And yet they've given up on Wii piracy (Score:5, Insightful)
No, really. The've shown that they believe that Wii homebrew == Wii piracy (having attacked generic homebrew almost exclusively, not just piracy tools, and considering that they harassed us when we attempted to notify them of a security issue), and yet it's been over 5 months since the latest security-related update. Somehow I don't get the felling that Nintendo is interested in combating Wii piracy very much (it's not like they've done a whole lot to stop modchips either).
So somewhat, you not getting the feeling that Nintendo is interested in combating piracy equates to "They've given up on Wii piracy"? Seriously?
Looks like complete BS to me.
The fact is that the only thing separating the homebrew tools from piracy tools is what the user deem moral or not. The exact same tools used for homebrew are used for piracy.
I use the homebrew tools, and really, if it wasn't for the fact that my play time on a game is not registered in the Wii when I use them, I would always use the homebrew tools to play my games, that I have all ripped, just in case. And you can see how tiny of an argument I have already to not use these tools (but they're still installed).
Once someone starts continuously using the homebrew tools, all hell breaks loose, as they will be more and more tempted to download some games "just to see".
The sole thing preventing me from downloading some games and then play them on the Wii is in my head. If I didn't have enough money or if I played lots of games all the time, I guarantee I would have downloaded lots of games already.
So to me it's no wonder that for Nintendo, Wii homebrew == Wii piracy because that's exactly what it is. You can't scan people's heads to make a difference between pirates and legitimate homebrew users. And I'm sure there are far more pirates than homebrew users.
If Nintendo didn't put region lock in their console, I wouldn't even have considered homebrew. This is one of their mistake. That's the sole thing that pushed me to install homebrew.
Then again, modchipping your console is on another level entirely, and so I understand that they don't get out of their way to stop these people, because the return on investment is far too ridiculous.
Even installing homebrew is not for the faint of heart, and most people don't even understand how all of that work and don't care. I'm even sure that most people installing homebrew on their console don't understand at all what they're doing, which is evidenced by all the video tutorials I've seen people made just to install homebrew.
All of this is far more difficult than buying a flash card for the Nintendo DS.
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The fact is that the only thing separating the homebrew tools from piracy tools is what the user deem moral or not. The exact same tools used for homebrew are used for piracy.
Nope, at least not in the case of the Wii. The main homebrew community has been very cautious (and clear) on separating the war3z-related homebrew from the "original" stuff. For the later you can check wiibrew.org you will find a lot of legitimate homebrew applications and games that do not empower copyright infringement (I agree that emulators are a gray area, specially in the light of the VC)
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Feel free to correct me if I'm wrong, but don't you need material from the legit (or at least morally ok/grey by my books) homebrew sites in order to play "backup" games?
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The author would be a good idea. Or just use the talk page on the wiki.
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thats interesting but not really piracy, as you have previously stated you have pretty weird views on what piracy is, to the rest of us its simple:
are you playing wii games, that you did not purchase legitimatly?
patent (if they're even valid) and trademark (if your not passing it of as the original who cares) abuse don't count as piracy, they count as *shock* patent/trademark abuse.
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thats interesting but not really piracy, as you have previously stated you have pretty weird views on what piracy is, to the rest of us its simple:
are you playing wii games, that you did not purchase legitimatly?
I am typing this into a web browser that I did not purchase legitimately. That's because Mozilla Firefox is free software.
patent (if they're even valid)
Tetris is 25 years old; no patent there.
and trademark (if your not passing it of as the original who cares) abuse
Just calling it "Tetris" might be borderline genericide (cf. Xerox copiers and Kleenex tissue), but using the logo points toward abuse.
don't count as piracy, they count as *shock* patent/trademark abuse.
Google turns up thousands of results for the phrase "drug piracy". How would one explain that if the term "piracy" is limited to copyright?
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Google turns up thousands of results for the phrase "drug piracy". How would one explain that if the term "piracy" is limited to copyright?
Because the term "piracy" is not, as GP claimed, limited to copyright. It is, actually, not limited to anything. It's an emotive rhetorical device used to vilify whoever a big megacorp wants vilified, be it copyright infringers or rival pharmaceutical companies.
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Maybe we should start calling the megacorps the pirates and see how that turns out...
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And get the Pirate Anti-Defamation League on our asses?! Are you out of your mind? Do you know what those people DO?
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Before you counter with homebrew Wii games, they are not officially licensed games: they are homebrew games that just happen to run on the Wii.
marcansoft's post [slashdot.org] is about these homebrew games, and whether or not distributing tools to run homebrew games should be termed "piracy".
if someone told you that Secret Maryo Chronicles (you can probably tell what this is a FOSS clone of) is an attempt at pirating a Mario game, would you honestly believe that?
Is Secret Maryo Chronicles anything like The Great Giana Sisters [wikipedia.org], which did get pulled under a threat from Nintendo?
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Is this a hard concept to grasp for you?
Piracy is downloading and playing a game that is sold in stores without purchasing the game or any other software in question. Sheesh. I am getting stabby just reading your replies.
Layne's Law (Score:2)
Piracy is downloading and playing a game that is sold in stores without purchasing the game or any other software in question.
Webster disagrees [merriam-webster.com]: "3 a : the unauthorized use of another's production, invention, or conception especially in infringement of a copyright". But at this point, the discussion has fulfilled Layne's Law [c2.com], and we can agree to disagree.
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So to me it's no wonder that for Nintendo, Wii homebrew == Wii piracy because that's exactly what it is.
Nintendo states on warioworld.com that it categorically declines to deal with students, hobbyists, and microISVs: one needs a dedicated office and a track record of published titles. So for which platform should students and hobbyists be building a portfolio to start a company? Most PC monitors are just too small for four people.
Even installing homebrew is not for the faint of heart
Bannerbombing a Wii into the Homebrew Channel installer involves loading files onto an SD card, putting it in the front of your console, and going into the Wii settings. And you pro
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> So for which platform should students and hobbyists be building a portfolio to start a company? Most PC monitors are just too small for four people.
Use the DVI/HDMI port that comes with many PCs now and plug the PC into the TV.
Use many of the Linux/Windows hacks to enable WiiMote access on the PC.
The untrained and the unwary might mistake my mini for my wii.
CRT SDTVs don't have HDMI (Score:2)
Use the DVI/HDMI port that comes with many PCs now and plug the PC into the TV.
CRT SDTVs already in homes have no DVI/HDMI input. Should I just point anyone who wants to buy my game to SewellDirect.com, which sells VGA to composite adapters?
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I was addressing your "dev kit", not the in home units.
A proper DVI port also has the nice feature that it's pretty trivial to drive an SD TV.
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I was addressing your "dev kit", not the in home units.
So once my team has developed a PC game that works on my dev kit (PC + Vizio HDTV), how do we deploy it to the masses, many of whom still have SDTVs?
A proper DVI port also has the nice feature that it's pretty trivial to drive an SD TV.
How many DVI ports on PCs are "proper" in your sense, which I take to mean "supporting the composite output pins"?
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The i945 Mac mini has such a DVI port. It also happens to look strangely like a Wii too.
Perhaps you could actually look into what low cost, low profile, console-ish gear exists out there.
Re:And yet they've given up on Wii piracy (Score:5, Informative)
Nintendo states on warioworld.com that it categorically declines to deal with students, hobbyists, and microISVs: one needs a dedicated office and a track record of published titles. So for which platform should students and hobbyists be building a portfolio to start a company? Most PC monitors are just too small for four people.
Xbox 360. Seriously, I don't really like Microsoft, and I don't really like xbox (or playstation for that matter) games in general (i tend to like more playful games, http://www.ukresistance.co.uk/2005/11/blue-sky-in-games-campaign-launched.html [ukresistance.co.uk])
But, one thing Microsoft is good about with the 360/xbox live is allowing independent content (or at least so I hear). I've seen other people trying out games from the market with lots of interesting gameplay concepts that you would probably not see in a mainstream game
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Ha ha no. A homebrew tool is one that takes an executable file and runs it. A piracy tool is an executable file that fucks up half of your system, has a 50% chance of bricking it, then plays pirated disc games or installs pirated VC games. Piracy apps are specific, considerably sleazier, lower quality, and more dangerous than most home
Re:And yet they've given up on Wii piracy (Score:4, Interesting)
You do NOT need to take those risks just to run homebrew, and running homebrew is pretty much completely safe these days (there are always some theoretical risks risks, of course, but the practical incidence of issues is just about zero). If you disagree, please point me to a single report of someone having bricked their console by using our official installer (people who have previously applied warez hacks need not apply). Again, you're confusing the tools you need to just run applications (that is, Bannerbomb at a minimum, and then The Homebrew Channel if you want convenience) with the tools used to pirate games: not just the loaders - those are safe - but the system software (IOS) hacks and the extremely nasty exploits used to install them (because the people who write these things aren't real reverse engineers and don't know any better).
Piracy tools are extremely dangerous for two reasons: 1) you need to fundamentally patch the Wii software to run pirate games (so it'll read game data from another source), and 2) the people behind them are often highly incompetent. As a result, you get things like cIOScorp, which replaces every single version of IOS with a single patched version. That's the equivalent of taking a whole bunch of shared object sonames for a single library (each with different ABI quirks) and replacing them all with a single, patched version. Where this shared object is as critical as the C library.
Besides the actual insane hacks they use, their installers are almost universally crappy. They don't check return codes, so often they'll uninstall some critical piece of system software, then fail to install it again. Running any piracy tools while your internal storage is near full is almost a guaranteed recipe for a permanent brick. I also know this because I make a device to help repair issues generally caused by using out-of-region games and people often ask me if they can use it to repair their consoles after one of these accidents (the answer, invariably, is to send the Wii to Nintendo and pay their normal repair fee). I've had dozens and dozens of people tell me personally about having bricked their Wiis with piracy software, and none at all who have had any issues installing homebrew using our installer.
You don't need nasty hacks to play imports. Playing imports with homebrew is perfectly safe, since it only involves a replacement game loader that doesn't check for the region (it's something optional, not enforced by the IOS security software). This is totally safe (and useless to warez games). The critical difference is that warez game loaders need to patch IOS so it can at game runtime continue to load data from whatever media the game is stored on. Region-free loaders are just disc loaders, you can write one in a couple hundred lines of code using the stock Wii software and without the need for any hacks beyond running PowerPC code. You don't even need to touch a single file on NAND - you could run a region-free disc loader from Bannerbomb, which is basically provably safe because it doesn't touch persistent storage. This is completely different from piracy tools, all of which need to permanently alter system software one way or another.
To debunk your specific claims:
The Homebrew Channel is an _installable_ application that makes _zero_ changes to your firmware. It installs itself exactly as a WiiWare channel would. Its installer perfor
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Uhm, I'm was a homebrew virgin before this weekend. I followed one guide and extracted 1 zip file on an SD card and had homebrew up and working, then backed up my NAND (system memory), and started downloading all the GPL free (non-pirated) games for the HBC via the Homebrew Browser. Backing up my NAND took more time than anything, and I think I was done in less than 30 minutes and trying out everything available via the Homebrew Browser.
It may have been hard before some of the current tools, but literally
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It may have been hard before some of the current tools, but literally it was following a guide of 10 steps, dragging and dropping files to an SD card, and then pointing with my Wiimote.
The big problem is that it's so easy now.
Anyway, my point is that the same countermeasure used against piracy work against homebrew, because homebrew use the same flaws to get installed, than piracy tools. Nintendo has no way and no incentive to differentiate who is who.
However, I am still tempted to get the backup stuff working on an old USB HDD and putting all of our games on it. It's not like we have a ton of games (maybe 20), but I'm mostly concerned about wear and tear on the discs. My kids are pretty well trained in handling DVDs, CDs, game discs, but company often is not. I'd only backup and run from USB HDD the stuff I own, but the problem with that I hear is that the way those loaders work is "illegal" even if you are using it for backup. Somehow the HBC claims not to be "illegal," but it still voids your warranty.
I've installed the tool for the same reason, and would actually use it if it registrered my game time and other things like games played from the DVD drive.
That's not for me to decide if HBC is legal or not though, and I don't care.
Playing DVDs and watching Youtube is cool on the Wii. I don't get why Nintendo doesn't license that and blow AppleTV and that sort out of the water since they've got a huge marketshare? I don't have a major need for this as we've already got a killer MythTV setup, but I love that the Wii is ultra portable. Not that we'd take it anywhere, as if we're going on vacation, we can take a break from all of that.
Nintendo
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As one of the authors of the Homebrew Channel and someone who has spent way too much time analyzing the Wii software, I'll just say that installing any of the backup stuff is going straight into poorly coded dangerous software territory. Not to mention that most of it is illegal in and of itself (not in the DMCA circumvention device kind of way, which we all know about, but in the distributing le
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Well, they aren't too happy about what can be done now with the Wii.
I currently have a 100% hacked Wii that has not been opened or had any hardware added at all. Purely through exploits used to get the Homebrew Channel installed you are able to modify the Wii's firmware enough to allow you to install wiiware/virtual console titles, or even back up game discs to an external HDD.
So I'd say Nintendo are concerned about piracy on the Wii. As far as security updates, each release of the Wii firmware puts an halt
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Wrong. The Homebrew Channel uses an undisclosed exploit to install itself that the warez people don't know about. Currenty they're using an older exploit that Nintendo failed to patch to install their stuff. The patch cycle for the past couple of updates has been like this:
- Nintendo releases update, breaks everything
- We use an exploit that we developed to release a new version of HBC (this is useless for the pirates because they still can't use that to install their patched IOSes, it only lets you run hom
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Toronto Drywall Company [youtube.com]
Is this the new rickroll?
Totally Retarded (Score:4, Interesting)
in every way.......
Sony produced the PSP Go for a very specific market, whether they understood it or not. People buying that are not interested in stupid fucking "snackables". Dear God, they make it sound like something a 2nd grader would eat at lunch.
The PSP Go is for people that *already* understand how to take existing UMD's in their collection and convert them and play them on the PSP. The attraction of the Go model is more memory, less power consumption (UMDless), and a smaller form factor, and possibly longer battery life.
Their attempt to cripple the unit so that you cannot play UMD backups, while being blatantly offensive towards supporters of Fair Use, just totally destroyed their *real* market for the product.
I am actually interested in the PSP Go. ONLY IF I CAN PLAY MY UMD BACKUPS. If not, then STFU Sony and you don't get my money.
Total Morons.
P.S - Yes... it can be used for pirated ISOs as well as Fair Use ISOs, but that does not make my point any less valid about their market does it?
Not their only bonehead move (Score:3, Interesting)
If, instead of putting the "SELECT" and "START" buttons in the little round spot in the mirror-image position of where the thumbstick is on the Go, they had put in another thumbstick and put those two buttons somewhere else, they would have made ports of shooters and other PS2 and PS3 games to the PSP a lot easier. Backward compatibility with old PSP games would be trivial - the old games don't "know" about the second thumbstick, so they'd automatically ignore it.
I like my PSP quite a bit. It has served me
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Re:Totally Retarded (Score:5, Insightful)
You did forget. It is not stealing, either way.
If I make a backup copy of a UMD game I purchased, it can never be anything remotely resembling theft. That falls under Fair Use which is not some bullshit argument that "pirates" throw up like a shield. Fair Use is my right, as in, legal entitlement. Of course, Fair Use is really just a legal test for copyright infringement, but the whole point is that I am just protecting rights that I already obtained by financially compensating the copyright holder in return for rights granted to the content.
No copyright holder should ever be able to claim that I don't have the rights to make copy after copy in my home so that I can enjoy their works forever (my lifetime, and those of my heirs that will inherit those rights). The very concept that I should be limited is offensive, bullshit, immoral, and legally retarded.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with making and playing a UMD backup.
Now, as for actually "pirating" the UMD's, that is not theft either. I'm sorry, that so many people out there just cannot get their minds around that. It is not about right and wrong. Promoting those arguments is not supporting piracy either. It is a simple fact that "piracy" is copyright infringement, and that is a matter for civil courts. That is the way it was set up, and it is the way it should be, and that is the way it is now. The act of theft must involve something physical. You cannot steal intellectual property. Not unless, you alter the very fabric of the Universe itself and somehow make the color Purple taste like an Orange. Intellectual Property is a TEMPORARY legal entitlement granted to you by the "State". It is not tangible. How on Earth could I steal that? I can't because it is impossible. The only thing I can do is to perform the act of infringement upon the rights granted to you the State. Nothing more, Nothing less. That does not require the Gestapo busting down doors as if these people are raping children.
Once again, none of those argument means that I support so-called "Piracy". I have stated before, and I will state again, I support compensating the artists, developers, etc. that make the games I enjoy. I own over 40 UMD titles, and ALL of them are neatly kept in their packages on a book-shelf having only been placed in a PSP a single time. I exclusively play my PSP titles via a PSP with a custom operating system and 8 gig memory stick holding the ISO images.
Yes, really. Absolutely. I said, "whether they knew it or not". "Snackables" is the biggest bullshit I have ever seen. First time customers looking at the PSP Go will realize rather quickly that ALL of the UMD titles at Wall-Mart, Target, etc. CANNOT BE PLAYED. So where the heck do they get their content? Snackables? Mofo Pleeeeease.
When it comes to a choice between a brand new product with ZERO legacy support for hundreds of existing titles, and an existing proven product with support for hundreds of games (and far more user satisfaction with custom homebrew) I think the choice becomes pretty simple.
Now what about existing PSP users? The vast majority have to be already using custom operating systems and UMDless methods of play.
It does not matter where you approach this. Sony created a product that has a primary appeal to the people that already play UMD backups, pirated or not.
So yes.... Sony made a PSP uniquely targeted to the so-called Pirates. I agree, they did not probably intend to do that at all. Given the complete sociopathic retards that run the joint (rootkit), I absolutely believe they have such a complete disconnect with their customers that they really really thought the PSN network and snackables would be enough.
Like I said, Totally Retarded.
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"If I make a backup copy of a UMD game I purchased, it can never be anything remotely resembling theft.... .... Of course we could make the argument that since we bought the original liscenses to old games we don't have to pay for them again when they become available (i.e. once you buy a liscense it can't be revoked).
The fair use case you mention is an excellent example of hypocrisy of the industry itself when it comes to old games they re-release but to whom the customer already owns the license to access
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whether you like it or not, unless they're releasing the exact same game, with the exact same content, you aren't legally entitled to a copy because you bought a license to a previous version.
In the real world, consider the dictionary. Just because you bought a copy of Webster's dictionary 10 years ago doesn't mean you have the right to download a copy of this years version - even if 99.99% of the content is identical. You do have a right to make copies of your old dictionary for your own personal use. (
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I do agree with you on that. However, I think what the poster was saying is that if you had something like a Crash Bandicoot game on the PS1, you would be legally entitled to run the code on the PSP.
In that case, there is nothing substantially different. Nothing at all actually. It's the same code, just being emulat
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It doesn't have to be substantially enhanced, if you include bonus features or even a new title screen, you don't have the rights to it.
You are allowed to take a game you previously purchased and try to make it run on whatever hardware you'd like (with some DMCA exceptions), you're not allowed to copy a new release of an old game and claim you have rights to it.
For another example, you're allowed to scan a book you own and transfer it to your ebook reader. Whether you're allowed to download digitized versi
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Ironically enough "piracy" is justified in this case...
You may be right. But be careful. ANYTHING can be justified when the only person who needs to be convinced is yourself.
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Fair Use is my right, as in, legal entitlement.
Fair use is not your "right", it is something you can do without fear of prosecution.
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It is my "right" in that Fair Use is really just the act of protecting rights I have already been granted. In other words, it is legally protected behavior. I thought I was clear on that in the next sentence, if not I apologize.
Prosecution, AFAIK, relates to criminal conduct. I think you mean you can be sued. Well that is always true. You don't need to be correct to sue someone. Just have a reasonable argument and Voila! you are in the courtroom wasting people's time.
If we were to be very specific, the
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I agree. Facilitating my Fair Use would place an undue financial burden upon Sony as the replacement medium and shipping is not free.
However, the real point is that when I am willing to absorb the costs of replacement, or the costs of preventative measures, Sony wrongly attempts to obstruct my Fair Use protected behavior.
It goes both ways. DRM and hardware based copyright protection exist because of an enormous inequity between the consumer and mega corporations like Sony. It is a clear case of corrupti
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Yeah, we all know it is copyright infringement. It is still breaking the law and theft is just easier to say. Yeah, you aren't depriving the company of something, WE ALL KNOW THIS. But you are using something you didn't pay for and it is just easy to call that stealing or theft.
It's easier to say "you're a moron and you should die in a fire" than it is to say "while your position may be misguided, the underlying philosophy may still hold some validity."
That doesn't make it correct.
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No... It is garbage to call it theft. If *you* know it is copyright infringement and the unwashed masses understand it as "theft" (because of propaganda and ignorance) that does not mean it is theft at all. The fact you are willing to enable the continuance of their ignorant behavior does not make you correct in this case.
The problem is that this "something" is not tangible. It m
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What about the laws that used to say I could own a Nigger? I apologize, that was just histrionics, but I hope my point came across.
We ALL must choose the laws we agree with. Just because it is a law, does not mean it is correct, *lawful*, moral, ethical, etc. When the laws are out of hand I think it is my civic duty to disobey them.
The DMCA violates my rights Fair Use behavior. Note, I did not say my rights to Fair Use. The DMCA prevents me from making copies for the sole purpose of protecting my right
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You did not even read what I said. Fair Use is a behavior protected by other rights that I AM legally entitled to.
I will not respect the DMCA since it is a law that violates my rights. I purchased the PSP. I DO HAVE THE RIGHT to put whatever operating system on it I want. Sony's only recourse is to not sell me the PSP, but lease it
Sony removed the battery to stop Pandora? (Score:3, Insightful)
Come on, fixing the Pandora problem was as easy as changing the firmware that listened to the battery.
It is an enormous stretch to think that the PSP Go! doesn't have a removable battery because of the Pandora battery. Wouldn't you think it would be more because non-removable batteries are in vogue in high-line devices like the iPod Touch and Zune HD, both of which the PSP Go! competes with?
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Indeed. An ipod touch battery replacement from Apple is £66.13 in the UK (equiv. US$107). That's probably higher than the profit margin on a brand new device. And the great thing about it, is that the cost is totally hidden from the initial purchase - the majority of people have no idea that batteries degrade over time, and won't even think about Total Cost of Ownership.
Their real anti-piracy strategy... (Score:1, Funny)
A new fleet of ships of the line, bristling with cannons and hung with sails.
Let's see how those pirates handle a few hundred pounds of cannonballs coming at them!
Also, they're sending in the Plumbers to clean things up.
Their strategy goes the wrong way... (Score:3, Insightful)
The real problem is that the industry - and that's not just Sony and Big N - still keeps ignoring is pricing. Maybe you gotta stop labeling crap the same as diamonds. (and yeah, I know Third Parties don't get a say in this!)
I think a general drop in prices is called for - and maybe the dropping of the belief that "Visuals are Everything".
Piracy vs cost of redesign (Score:2)
One has to wonder if the the money wasted on redesigns and protection schemes doesn't actually exceed the revenue that would have resulted if piracy wasn't possible. Every pirate I know fills one profile...cheap bastards that wouldn't buy anything to start with. Nearly all the friends I have that pirate speak about "homebrew" but do no development themselves and their idea of homebrew is emulation so they can pirate other stuff.
However, the current software model is a dead end. Many people are just not w
I don't need you either. (Score:2)
I bought a PS2 with the intent of purchasing $20 games. If I can't find them (out of print or not sold here or whatever), I'll just download them. I intend to give them my money, but if they make it impossible to do that I won't do it.
Of course, that probably means I'll stop buying console stuff and move back to computers. I feel better about giving hardware mfrs my money anyway, even though PC gaming is a constant upgrade treadmill.
Ever higher game prices are only shooting yourself in the foot.
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I bought a PS2 with the intent of purchasing $20 games. If I can't find them (out of print or not sold here or whatever), I'll just download them. I intend to give them my money, but if they make it impossible to do that I won't do it.
Of course, that probably means I'll stop buying console stuff and move back to computers. I feel better about giving hardware mfrs my money anyway, even though PC gaming is a constant upgrade treadmill.
Ever higher game prices are only shooting yourself in the foot.
Actually the upgrad treatmill has slowed down significantly thanks to the consoles.
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How is $30 for an r4ds flash cart for my dsi TONS of cash? Thats less than the price of one new game, plus i can keep "backups" of all my games on one card. Cheaper and more convenient, not a tough decision for me.
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How is $30 for an r4ds flash cart for my dsi TONS of cash?
$30? That's too expensive. You should visit this store [dealextreme.com] *free shipping*
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While I like dealextreme and order from them often, you should point out that said orders with free shipping generally take 4-5 weeks to arrive.
Re:Oh please nintendo don't do it! (Score:5, Interesting)
ps: Here, NDS flash cartridges are even sold at the groceries...
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I know like 7 or 8 people [...] NONE of them, has a single original game. Why so?
Because they come ask you when a new title comes out if you couldn't by any chance put your hands on it? ;)
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Where is here? Eastern Europe? Southeast Asia? South America?
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England - hell, I got myself one just so that I can avoid having to carry lots of carts around with me when I go on holiday.
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From where I stand it seems that the DS is so insanely popular (almost 110 million units sold to date) exactly because its games are so easy to pirate, not in spite of it.
Its not like the games aren't selling either - close to 450 million DS games sold so far
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Attach rates (Score:2)
Which makes a lifetime (to date) attach rate of what, just over 4? That is not that much, really.
Nintendo makes a profit on the lowest of attach rates, which is why you haven't seen Nintendo react quite as quickly in updating the DS and Wii lockout as Sony has in updating the PSP lockout.
Re:Oh please nintendo don't do it! (Score:5, Interesting)
Hell, eventually they managed to make all pirated game self-loading and because the Dreamcast used a proprietary disk format that could hold more then 750mb, some people managed to remove content from the game to fit it on a regular CD. Thus making the GD-Rom's piracy measure of going past the 750mb useless.
I read a post-mortem article from one of the leads at SEGA after support was dropped. They took a gamble with the Dreamcast and knew they had to reach a certain number of units sold both in games and in systems to be able to compete with the Playstation 2. They never officially blamed piracy but they said it definitely hurt them, especially in the last six months before the PS2 arrived.
In my opinion the arrival of the PS2 didn't kill the Dreamcast, piracy did.
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How come the arrival of super-easy piracy for the PS2 (Available shortly after V2 arrived on the market, so a matter of months) didn't kill it?
Or the fact that pirating a game for the XBOX (also available mere months after XBOX's existence in the market) meant faster load times and easier game selection?
And how come the Gamecube lagged behind both, despite that "quality" piracy wasn't available until several years after its launch?
Or the PS3 lagging behind, despite no widespread piracy? Or the XBOX 360 sur
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pppffffttt
Total BS. The downfall of the Dreamcast happened before the unit even shipped.
All of the big studios decided that they weren't going to bother supporting it.
THAT killed the Dreamcast. Whether or not it had easy to use pirating tools
really didn't have anything to do with it.
People with big money to spend didn't want to waste their effort on any more
platforms than they absolutely had to. So Dreamcast got the short end of the
stick as it was seen as an "also ran".
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The Dreamcast died because developers stopped developing for it. Easy as pie.
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Interesting. I remember buying a used game from an online store, and when I got it, it was entirely obvious that it was a CD copy with an inkjet printed label. It played perfectly without me needing a mod chip in the console, and I always wondered why it worked without needing hardware modification.
I also wondered why the online store agreed to take the disc back without any objection, because I thought for sure they had just ripped me off. I guess they didn't realize it was a pirated copy, despite the o
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I'm not a fan of videogame/software piracy because there are good legitimate alternatives (and no MAFIAA), however my brother and his friends justify it because ds/wii games are not full games ( there are some and to be far to him he has a fair few of them). While he doesn't mind paying £30-£40 for a full xbox360 game, he finds paying £30 for a collection of minigames is too much. pc game piracy is pretty easy too but i believe that the pricing on a ds games is what makes
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They said something about people who make money off pirated games, don't seem very interested in going after P2P and stuff like that.
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However, it's MUCH worse on the handhelds. A flash cart for the DS is something like $7, if you look in the right places (Cough*dealextreme*cough)... and games are generally well under 100 mb, so they're quick and easy to download.
And the PSP... cripes, I don't think ANYBODY uses it like Sony intended. I don't blame or begrudge Nintendo or Sony for tightening them dow
Re:Oh please nintendo don't do it! (Score:5, Informative)
It's far more likely that Superman and Wonder Woman will actually become real, eliminate the Taliban, deliver Osama Bin Laden to the White House steps, and then top it off with a Sex Tape. Ohhh, and the Wonder Twins get caught doing each other in Central Park.
NONE of the console manufacturers have even a measurable amount of respect for Fair Use. NONE. As far as they are concerned, they own the hardware 100% and should be able to 100% control every single one of your actions with their product as if they are in the room holding your hand. That game you bought gets a little too scratched? That cart get dropped in the pool? Well FUCK YOU. Buy another.
I feel you about what they are going through. It's just wishful thinking they are going to try to find a middle ground. They are just as extreme and inflexible as hard core pirates who will never compensate anyone for any intellectual property whatsoever.
It might as well be religious fundamentalism. Your reasonable position has no place here.
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NONE of the console manufacturers have even a measurable amount of respect for Fair Use. NONE.
OpenPandora does. Its Linux-based gaming PDA isn't out yet, but there is video evidence that it's much farther along than the Phantom ever got. And I have a couple more arguments that depend on where one draws the difference between a gaming PC and a console.
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Yeah and how many games will be made for it? I know it will emulate probably even ps1 games, but I lug around my laptop already and the screen is a lot bigger, plus I can throw a usb gamepad in my bag and have some nostalgia on the go.
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NONE of the console manufacturers have even a measurable amount of respect for Fair Use. NONE. As far as they are concerned, they own the hardware 100% and should be able to 100% control every single one of your actions with their product as if they are in the room holding your hand. That game you bought gets a little too scratched? That cart get dropped in the pool? Well FUCK YOU. Buy another.
I see what you try to do, but your argument is stupid and wrong anyway.
If what you said was true, they would never allow you to download games you buy online as many times as you want. Erased that online game because you need place on your Wii? You can download it back as many times as you want.
The sole reason that they don't allow that on physical properties is because they fear you would get several legitimate copies when you actually paid for one.
Did you even try getting a new copy? Usually, a cart dropp
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There are at least a dozen different ways to make cartridge based games self destruct their data if they're opened. You can't get the ROM off it if a system wipes it any time oxygen is sensed inside the cartridge which has a vacuum in it.
sure you can, I can dump my legitimate games onto cf card using my actual ds.. you do realize that for the cartridge to be usable the system has to be able to read the data... right?
dumping does not involve removing cartridge chips these days (ok.. well... arcade games sometimes) it either involves putting the cartridge into an original system that's running a dumper program, or making something yourself that has a cartridge port that can read it.
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I can dump my legitimate games onto cf card using my actual ds
I know what you're talking about: Rudolph's dumper. But do makers of DS copiers even make the CF card adapters anymore? I thought all the manufacturers had moved on to SLOT-1 solutions.
it either involves putting the cartridge into an original system that's running a dumper program, or making something yourself that has a cartridge port that can read it.
Any ideas on how to build an NES copier?
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Any ideas on how to build an NES copier?
http://www.tripoint.org/kevtris/Projects/copynes/ [tripoint.org]
Afaict the trickiest bit with copying nes carts is actually identifying them. nes carts (unlike gameboy carts) use a huge range of mapper chips and don't have any header information to say which mapper is in use. So if you are trying to dump a cart that hasn't been dumped before you may well have to open it up to find out what mapper is in there.
If you want to actually copy the cart rather than just make an image for us
The five mappers you meet in NES-land (Score:2)
http://www.tripoint.org/kevtris/Projects/copynes/ [tripoint.org]
CopyNES: $125, plus the price of a working NES and a PC from the Windows 98 era (you'll need a parallel port for the CopyNES and a USB port to get your files onto a USB stick). Unless you have a lot of games that aren't coming to VC any time soon, it's cheaper just to buy games on VC for $5 each.
Afaict the trickiest bit with copying nes carts is actually identifying them. nes carts (unlike gameboy carts) use a huge range of mapper chips
If one restricts oneself to NES games (72 pin), there are only a handful of common NES mappers: NROM/CNROM/GNROM, UNROM, BNROM/AOROM, MMC1, or MMC3. Even most of the unlicensed games are clones of CNROM (Panesian),
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Or just download the whole freaking rom collection and call it a day. I mean come on, are nes roms getting that hard to find these days?
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I know what you're talking about: Rudolph's dumper.
I used an original gameboy advance media player, with modified firmware, and I had not heard of rudolf's dumper until you mentioned it then, I had a tool around 2005'ish that could dump ds firmware, ds slot sram, and ds slot rom, very handy multi-functional tool, featured a debugger also. Cannot for the life of me remember the name of it but if I can remember I will post in a reply.
Any ideas on how to build an NES copier?
best bet to follow petermgreen's advice, my main experience is snes where we don't have memory mappers, just silly co-processo
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It's only because you misunderstand what Nintendo is selling. They're giving you subsidized hardware, and selling the rights to you as a consumer to big companies.
The only reason they care if you own a DS/Wii is because you then buy games; they lose money on the actual system. So obviously they only want the system to be used for games they get a cut of. And obviously, in their
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The only reason they care if you own a DS/Wii is because you then buy games; they lose money on the actual system.
That's been shown to not be the case many times. Nintendo does not take a loss on the Wii systems.
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Make a game console and sell it then.