Judge to freeze Connectix VGS 20
jht writes "According to this article in MacWeek, a judge has dropped the proverbial 10-ton weight on Connectix' head, freezing all shipments of Virtual GameStation. Hopefully the next judge in this series of appeals will understand the nature of emulation and reverse the decision. If it stands, it doesn't look good for Bleem, either. " Connectix has indicated that they are continuing on with development, as well as supporting and upgrading older versions of the boxes.
how effective. (Score:1)
Connectix VGS is a shrinkwrapped product written with the intent that people will play games that are in the CD-ROM drive.
So, what do they do? They remove the shrinkwrapped product from the market. But the emulator itself is still out there, on a thousand hotline servers and warez sites. Meaning that people will continue to use connectix vgs, but all new users will be people with little enough scruples they are willing to warez the emulator.
Anyone who can figure out how to warez the emulator is likely to know how to warez games as well.
By kicking it off the market, Sony has not dealt at all with the problems presented to it by VGS. instead it has simply stopped the benefits (i.e. soccer moms setting up imacs for their 8-year-old children who wouldn't know the word "warez" if they read it in the newspaper.)
-mr. anonymous lazy person
..i sure do wish i could remember the password on my real account.
Uh...you should really provide a reason *WHY* (Score:1)
:They will give the consumers what they want IF they speak loud enough
I am a consumer, and I don't want them to allow the emulator to be released...so I guess that's what they'll give me.
"Where was I when God had shown how to make a happy home?"
Uh...you should really provide a reason *WHY* (Score:1)
VGS will NOT read CD-R backups of games. It runs like a pure Playstation... it does not have a MOD chip built in. There is a third-party hack available for version 1.1 and below that will allow this, but most people are using version 1.2 right now because it has much better compatability with some games. Because Connectix wanted to address the complaints that VGS encouraged privacy, they made the security a lot tighter in version 1.2, and last I checked, no one had cracked it to be able to play CD-R's yet. I'm not sure what the story on Bleem! is... I believe they said they would not play CD-R's either.
So what's the charge, anyway? Last I knew, Sony was getting buddy-buddy with Apple, so this might be all show, and wind up being nothing more than a slap on the wrist while the two continue to scheme... which is fine by me.
DarkInfo *too lazy to create and remember an account*
Connectix VGS (Score:1)
I talked to the Connectix rep when he was here last week. I can not see a reason why Sony would not want this product. It can help with sales of games for the playstation. And I know that the VGS is not perfect, but it does a good job. PS: they are working on A PC version. But they are running into a hardware problem with the fact that PC users all have differnt hardware.
Uh...you should really provide a reason *WHY* (Score:1)
The people who would use a hacked emulator are largely the same people who will be able to get their hands on one now anyway, since the code exists. Meanwhile, I had no interest in Playstation titles until I heard about Bleem. So by taking legal action against the emulators, they've lost me as a customer for Playstation titles.
Meanwhile, I find the precedent of "I can stop you doing X, because X *might* allow someone else to do Y" to be intolerable in general.
Bleem (Score:1)
how effective. (Score:1)
Connectix VGS (Score:1)
I agree. AFAIK, both Sony and Nintendo - SEGA seem out of the picture - sell their consoles at a loss in order to generate a market for what they really want people to buy: Lots of games.
As such, the VGS would only help them - unless it's bought by people who already have a PSX in order to play games they already own... :-)
how effective...and amusing (Score:1)
It was because the quality was not on par with the Sony and they didn't want their stuff to get a bad reputation because it was being played on a system that was not suited for PS games.
Guess this shows their true colors.
Not an appeal, yet (Score:1)
This wasn't an appeal; the MacWeek article says that it was a decision by a U.S. District Court. Sony filed suit in January, so this was probably a decision by the judge on a motion for a preliminary injunction. While the injunction is nominally "preliminary," such injunctions are generally only issued where the judge finds that the moving party (here, Sony) has a substantial likelihood of ultimately prevailing on the merits of its claim. The first appeal, if any, would be to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
(Apropos of nothing, I continue to be appalled that the federal courts are so technologically backward. The entire docketing system for the federal courts is on a computer; is it gatewayed to the WWW? No, you have to have an account and pay $1/minute to get docket information if you don't want to physically go down to the courthouse. Every judge's chambers uses a word processing system to create opinions and other long documents; are such documents available on line? Not for the district courts. And don't get me started on the state courts.)
Uh...you should really provide a reason *WHY* (Score:1)
Uh...you should really provide a reason *WHY* (Score:1)
I don't advocate boycotting Sony. In fact, it appears that there is little that WE as a community can do. It's all in the hnands of a judge who likely doesn't understand technology very well, as are a lot of decisions like this. Ignore it, continue to use the VGS if you have it.
Or could we consider using the pirated copy a form of civil disobedience?
Uh...you should really provide a reason *WHY* (Score:1)
I cant vouch for VGS, but from what I've read, I'm under the impression that it has various types of locale and pirating protection.