Haha... Stupid Microsoft!

[A Black Falcon]

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=10229

:D

[OB1]

Hahaha!

[A Black Falcon]

What will you do now, Microsoft... what will you do now...

[EdenMaster]

Where do you get all those weird smilies, OB1??

[Dark Jaguar]

Probably the same place I used to pull all mine from, other message boards :D. That's where the head banging against a brick wall came from. :bang:

As for this article, I don't think MS will take it nearly as seriously as this reporter seems to. First off, I must say I never once understood why modchips were made illegal just because they defeated some safety mechanism. I can understand the piracy issue, but it was also for imports and such, and they blocked out the mod chips that only allow importing by making such a stupid law as well! Second off, just because it doesn't use a mod chip doesn't mean this method isn't breaking the law (wow that's a negative heavy sentence...). They are still defeating a safety mechanism, and I'm pretty much certain MS will more than likely sue them over this should they actually go about doing this, sadly enough. I have no feelings either way about it. I have no reason to actually want to use Lynux on my XBox for one, and I really don't see any moral problems with the thing either (unless someone uses it for pirating software, but that's not the fault of the modification itself mind you) aside from it breaking that stupid law (which I'll stand by until it's changed I guess), so I'm in the middle.

Still, as I said, MS seems to have nothing to fear from this except they will need a new checking method to block XBoxes from XBox Live (nothing against that either, modify as one will, it's your XBox, but don't complain about being blocked, because it's MS's service, you just get to use it).

[A Black Falcon]

I'm pretty sure that "a method that doesn't break the law" is "a method that doesn't break the law". It voids your warrantee of course, but that's not illegal... its not a chip! That's what's illegal about it... this doesn't do that so its legal, it seems. We obviously don't know the details of the process...

And modchips are illegal because of how they are mostly used for piracy. Sure, they also enable Linux and imports... but they are mostly for burned games. And Microsoft is trying to stop that by killing the modchip market...

And if somone releases a way to avoid the copy protection without using a modchip -- by just changing some circuits and using a new bios -- there'd now be a LEGAL way to get your system ready for burned games... which would not make Microsoft happy, to state it mildly. :)

[Dark Jaguar]

That's just it, the article SAYS it doesn't break the law, but does it? Sure they went after mod chips because a lot of people use them for illegitimate purposes (and I hate them for it, ruining a perfectly good device for others just because they couldn't obey the law and just BUY the frickin' game). Mod chips were made illegal officially only AFTER a law was passed that said no one can defeat a safety mechanism, software, hardware, or otherwise, built into something. Stupid law if you ask me, but even though they aren't using a chip, they are still defeating a mechanism on the XBox, with alteration of the firmware. From what I understand, that's exactly as against the law as using a chip. There's no real difference except instead of adding a piece of hardware, you are just adding software.

[A Black Falcon]

That's not the point. Maybe it is illegal... but that really isn't the point here. Think!

Even if it is illegal... IT WOULD THEN BE VERY EASY. NO MODCHIP NEEDED! Just a few simple tools... and you get a fully pirate-ready system. Simple.. easy. Anyone who is cautious and can sauder could do it...

So no modchip factories to go after... and far too many targets... and figuring out who has modded x-boxes would be hard. Then what do you do, sue them all?

So you see Microsoft's problem.

Yet on the other hand of course they don't want to legalize Linux-boxes... it'd be a extremely cheap server or even computer... :)

[Weltall]

Modchips are illegal?

As I understood it, your property is your property, and you can make whatever modifications you want to it.

[A Black Falcon]

Selling them is illegal at least, I believe... Microsoft seems to really be going after modchip sellers...

[OB1]

I added a bunch of new smilies to our list.

[A Black Falcon]

Cool! So we'll keep adding smilies until we run out of ... wait, there are hundreds and hundreds of them out there...

[Dark Jaguar]

I totally agree Darunia. Modchips in and of themselves shouldn't be illegal. After all, many specialty game stores had their own kinds of mod chips that only allowed playing import games (so that people wouldn't stop buying games from that store), see the Tales of the Gord for example :D. And, more importantly, as you said, one should be able to modify their own property as much as they want, outside of you know, stealing stuff. However, someone managed to get a law passed outlawing modchips, and not JUST mod chips but many other modifications, because they wanted to protect security systems on computers. So, the law pretty much states that it's illegal to defeat a security system. Problem is, the companies get to decide what is and what isn't a security system on their stuff... It's a VERY stupid law that I hope gets repealed. Yeesh, under this very law ATI could one day deside those custom drivers that unlock unused pipes in some of their "dumbed down" cards (like what OB1 has) are "defeating a security mechanism", and would probably cite them not having to buy the more expensive card to show how it's making them loose money. It's all very stupid.

[A Black Falcon]

Darunia

Look again. :D


Yeah, its a dumb law... its our hardware so we should of course be allowed to do whatever we want with it... but it IS the law. :(

[Dark Jaguar]

Heh, I KNEW I'd not be able to catch myself confusing you two one of these days when Weltall has THAT avatar.

Yep, that's, um, exactly what I said, actually...

[A Black Falcon]

Yeah, it is confusing that Weltall has a Darunia avatar...

And what do you think MS will do?

[Great Rumbler]

Like the article says, it's going to be interesting to see how this turns out.

[OB1]

Hahaha!

[A Black Falcon]

:D

That is funny.

[OB1]

Wha--??!! What was that?! Did ABF actually recognize PA as being funny??!!

*in Shake's voice* The world is coming to an end!

[A Black Falcon]

*sigh*

I've SAID that its funny sometimes... usually lame stupid-funny (you know, where you might laugh but you know its so incredibly dumb that it really isn't that funny...), but sometimes they are good.

The Lords of Everquest one with the lizard explaining the "differences" is pretty funny too... :)

[Dark Jaguar]

Ah yes, I hadn't even bothered pointing out their OTHER legal problem doing this. Blackmail, believe it or not, is illegal. It's just a form of extortion after all.

[A Black Falcon]

They still have a good arguement... if MS says 'no way' then that way to avoid it could just happen to slip out somehow... :)

[Dark Jaguar]

It'll happen anyway. I mean, it's technology. How are they going to keep it from comig out when someone else could just figure it out? MS has everything to loose if they agree to the illegal blackmail, because no matter what the information will be released ANYWAY. Might as well refuse it when you know it'll come out anyway.

[A Black Falcon]

But if this group doesn't tell, then it'll probably take a lot longer until it comes out...

[Dark Jaguar]

Saving them, how much in the long run, in comparison to how much they loose for agreeing to this.

Fact is, it's the group that's stuck anyway. If MS doesn't comply, MS will instead sue them. If the info gets out, guess who gets sued for damages as a result of going through on the extortion threat? If they drop the threat and release it NORMALLY however, MS can't sue them for the whole damages as a result of blackmail deal. That's their only choice lest they actually WANT to be sent to the streets working JUST to pay MS. I'm sure they don't want that.

[A Black Falcon]

Drop the 'threat'?

But the whole point of making it public was to try to get MS to release an official Linux kit so that they DIDN'T have to tell people how to do this!

[Dark Jaguar]

Yes, that's what blackmail IS you know. It's when you threaten to release some information unless someone does what you want them to.

[A Black Falcon]

MS would need to figure out who they are before they can sue them... :)

[Great Rumbler]

But, if MS releases an official Linux kit they get the money from that.

If MS sues them the information will get out and MS knows that's what will happen.

[A Black Falcon]

Exactly.

[geoboy]

I wanna get this straight: <b>Modchips are not illegal.</b>

The illegal part of modchips is the software that is put on them. It is perfectly legal to buy a blank modchip that has not been flashed. Perfectly legal! But it <i>is</i> illegal to sell a pre-flashed modchip or to flash it yourself with illegal software.

It is also legal to do something like crack DVD encryption, or to -- oh, i don't know, figure out a way to install linux on the Xbox -- as long as you don't tell anyone. ;)

These people are idiots if they think Microsoft will comply to the threat. Microsoft knows their way around the law and will most definitely win this battle should it go to court.

The Xbox is a cheap ass, powerful computer. It's cost effective for anyone wanting to buy dozens of them and network them together and create a cost effective super computer. That's why people are so eager to install linux easily on an Xbox. And while people get dirt cheap hardware, Microsoft pays the price, which they will not stand for. You'll see.