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Playstation 2 Recalled In Japan
silvergun writes: "According to FGNonline, the 1.25 million Playstation 2 units sold in Japan have been placed under a mandatory recall by Sony, due to the fact that they can play DVDs for territories other than they were intended. I'll say ouch for Sony." Update: 03/31 02:04 by CT : Several people noted that the recall was on the DVD Playing Software, not the actual PS2 hardware itself. Sorry about the confusion.
Oh, big fat elephant's fanny.
Um, are Japanese 7-11s that different from the ones here in America? I certainly wouldn't expect to go to one here to buy or return electronic equipment of any kind -- might get a Frostie maybe, but certainly not a Playstation console.
Yep, 7-11 is quite different in Japan. Japanese aren't comfortable giving credit cards out over the internet, hell, they aren't even comfortable using credit cards in general! Most all transactions are done in cash, even company payrolls. So 7-11 and other convenience stores like Lawson's have become centers for e-commerce. You order online, and then go pay at the corner store. Gateway uses this system, you order online but pay for the transaction in cash at Lawson's, then they forward payment and Gateway ships the computer from their factory.
What it actually says is that the Driver CD that came with the PS2 is being recalled, not the actual unit itself.
Only because they slipped past the lawyers. Manufacturers don't sell them as non-regional models.
They don't, but other, smaller companies figure out how to 'region hack' the players, mod them and sell them for an extra 100$ or so. They even back up the warranty too. www.dvdcity.com has them, as well as many other sites. Look for 'code free'.
Oh, it's so funny. The same company that (among others) initiated the DeCSS fiasco, is shooting its own knee by releasing a DVD piracy tool.
"I love my job, but I hate talking to people like you" (Freddie Mercury)
How much is this really going to cost Sony?
How many people are going to return their software/whatever so that they can no longer play DVDs from other regions?
Not many I would say.
Yes, I know that's a borderline troll, but now I'll try for off-topic. The college where I got my "Intructional Multimedia" degree ordered around a dozen educational Quark Express licences for use in one of the labs. Each licence came with an ADB dongle so the software would work. After one month no dongles were left. Admittedly this isn't a technical fault, but a human nature one, but the effect is the same - make the system too complex in an effort to "protect" your investment and you break it...
IIRC, Xing didn't encrypt its player keys, though, which I think was another part of the deal for manufacturers of software DVD players. They may be contractually responsible for that, in which case they might get their CSS license revoked.
Your right to not believe: Americans United for Separation of Church and
A million here, a million there, pretty soon you're talking real money!
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As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
That's bullcrap. You can buy 'em legally. Non-regional DVD players cost a bundle, but they're there.
I take it then, you would not be fond of boycotting Sony (which I started to do just earlier this week).
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
I was in my Japanese class this morning, and we saw a commercial for 7-11. They were showing some sort of seaweed-wrapped rice ball thing.
What happened to Xing? You'd think that what they did was worse for the DVD industry ostensibly.
I'm amazed Sony would go so far as to recall the Playstation2. That really has to hurt their momentum, which they need badly to combat the Dreamcast's installed base here in the US, and also so they can be entrenched for the menace of the X-Box. I guess it just shows how committed Sony as a movie company and MPAA member is to the continuation of the restrictions on regions.
The guy who did this is in my cool book:
http://torsion.org/witten/movieboycott/
I eat dog. Free DVDs. Horray!
A cunning suggestion, spoilt only by the fact that new memory cards still aren't available. It's the production of memory cards that has been causing the recent PS2 shortages. Still, you can keep your current copy installed on the memory card until you can get a card for the new driver, provided you don't play RRV. :)
++ Say to Elrond "Hello.".
Elrond says "No.". Elrond gives you some lunch.
Not particularly useful until someone comes up with a mod chip for PS2: without it, you won't be able to use your burnt copy of the disc.
++ Say to Elrond "Hello.".
Elrond says "No.". Elrond gives you some lunch.
Simple answer: they don't. I'm assuming this is mostly to cover their backs - Sony can now say that they made reasonable efforts to prevent abuse of the driver's features by issuing the recall and switching over to a new version immediately.
IANAL, but an enforced withdrawal probably wouldn't be allowed by law in many countries anyway, especially in those cases where the PS2 unit has been exported.
++ Say to Elrond "Hello.".
Elrond says "No.". Elrond gives you some lunch.
Non-regional DVD players cost a bundle, but they're there.
Not legally. The licence that DVDCCA require you to sign has a bunch of clauses, one of which is that you have to follow their region locking scheme.
That is, btw, generating a problem for HW manufacturers today. DVDCCA changed the scheme some time ago, and require the HW manufacturers to change their products or loose the license.
See http://www.dvdcca.org/dvdcca/rpc.html for details.
If J.K.R wrote Windows: Puteulanus fenestra mortalis!
Wonderful argument, convince enough people and you'll be lucky enough to live in the only zone where access restrictions apply, while the rest of us opt out. Have fun.
A lawsuit at this point would set an interesting precedent, don't you think. I mean,what about the region free DVD players that are available from places like http://www.dvdcity.com, among other sources? Are these modification outlets going to start getting sued over producing region free players?
Too bad they can't stick with producing region free players. Heck, that shoots the value of the PS2 way up in my book.
--
Behold the Power of Cheese!
There's probably a Sony engineer laughing to herself quietly right now. But the question is how could Sony allow the Playstation to be released without regional encoding if they were serious about it???
Yet another case of closed development resulting in software which dosn't work in quite the way its expected. Though its unclear if this is deliberate or an actual bug. Either way the implication is that the region coding is some kind of "bolt on".
In country like France you can buy since DVD Day 1 a non-region enforcing DVD player in all appliance store because restraining region products are not welcome.
Thus anyone in the EU can buy such a player...
OTOH, apparently a lot of anime is region 0.
Probably becuase the main people behind the region coding is the American movie industry. With Japanese companies not having the same wish to milk specific markets.
and your old one for breaking a pointless law
Except that in civilised parts of the world the end user wouldn't be breaking any law. Sony might be in breach of a contractual obligation, but the end user is not a party to that contract.
Due to an international agreement signed by DVD-player manufacturers and film companies, it is illegal in Japan to play back the content of DVDs sold overseas.
This bit sounds very iffy, in order for it to be true the Japanese government would need to be party to these agreements.
Otherwise it's surely a civil matter between Sony and the cartel.
Cool, I didn't know that. I may actually buy one then! (being in New Zealand...)
Think this will delay the US release date? Hope not... "Whoops" heh...
Waste of money to buy another, why not just drop the $200 on an Apex? Easier to unlock the regions plus it plays MP3's and also disables Macrovision. Oh yea and you can get Apex DVD's players in the US already. ;->
"Listen: We are here on Earth to fart around. Don't let anybody tell you any different!" - Kurt Vonnegut
"3) Why 7-11?"
They have 7-11s over there? Man, I wonder if they have Arby's, BillyBobJack's, and dollar stores...or would that be yen stores?
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
The original article says nothing about a "mandatory recally by Sony" - rather that Sony is
forced to recall the units. As usual Slashdot
angles the story a bit...
About a decade ago, (at the height of the Japanese economic boom) the Japanese franchisee for 7-11 bought a majority stake in the US chain from it's parent company (which I think is/was called Southland Corporation) then licensed the 7-Eleven US franchise back to them.
Convenience stores, especially 7-Eleven, are a major business in Japan.
Work for Change & GET PAID!
I was reading the recall thingie for the PSX2's and was reminded of the internet capability that it along with the dreamcast will have. Does anybody forsee banner ad's and such in the future of gaming?
Was it just me or did the article say they could exchange their stuff at 7-11? Sounds sorta odd... I guess there's just a lot of em... sorta like voting takes place at schools... weird...
If i paid for it, i would tell sony to fuck off...its my proptery now. Does japan have any laws saying you have the right to your property? In any event, how would they track down the cash purchaser?
Hi bob :) Money is not an object in this case. Sony will do whatever it takes to stay in the good graces of the DVD-powers-that-be. (Aren't they one of the powers-that-be anyway? Did they help the MPAA put the norweigian kid in jail?) And another thing- isn't regional encoding illegal in the first place? market manipulation and all that? It's getting pretty silly around here lately with this whole DVD thing. I can't help but feel a "disturbance in the Force"....
miller
With all the recent lawsuits related to DVD "built-in" security features and whatnot, it just seems to me that client-side security (i.e: DVD players needing the decryption keys), and the whole business of specifying regions, are dying a horrible death. I'm not sure which idiot chose this protection scheme, as the implementation is obviously bound to security holes. It's the same as having locked audio files... it simply can't be done.
I'm not saying the idea is bad (or good)... but the design and implementation definitely have a lot of room for improvement.
I'd really like to know how you plan on making it play N64 games. :)
--
The other side is crowded. The dead have nowhere to go.
I'm curious if software licenses in Japan (or elsewhere, for that matter) can be created to legally require upgrades whenever the producer decides to throw one out. Obviously software is often sold with a time-limited license, but these are typically agreed to up front.
Are people who refuse to upgrade the software in this case subject to legal liability, either from being in violation of the software license or for possessing an (oh dear!) illegal DVD decoder?
Look at it from this way. Suppose the PS2 was mistakenly shipped to the U.S. with the same capability as that afforded by deCSS. Would those who bought one and never took it back to be hobbled once the mistake became known be in violation of DMCA or, possibly in the future, UCITA?
The start-up software for the DVD player is loaded onto a memory card that comes with the system.
-Sub-Zero
Check out justen.org .
Stop using your ass for talking and your dick for thinking...
...this is really going to hurt them. It's interesting to see that Sony is willing to swallow a huge loss financially (I'm assuming the cost of recalling 1.25 million consoles is tremendous) just in order to keep DVD players without regional encoding off the market. They're a huge company with tons and tons of money, but at the same time, the recall definitely doesn't feel too good for them. I guess that shows how worried they are about losing that control, though.
Something like this was mentioned already in a CNN article back in November, so I don't think I'll be going to hell now.
Copyrights, Patents, Trademarks: temporary loans from the Public Domain, not real property ("intellectual" or otherwise)
Exactly how do we define mandatory recall here? Are police going to turn up at your door if you don't send it back in?
Tarsnap: Online backups for the truly paranoid
The Japanese PS2 DVD software *IS* Region Coded. If you put in an American DVD it wont play.
HOWEVER, there is a bug, (or 'debug') code which you can use to cause it NOT to check for Region Coding. I beleive it's put in a regular PSX controller and hold up while the DVD is booting.
So technically, it is a way to 'circumvent' it, because in normal operation it doesn't run other-region DVDs.
----
Don't underestimate the power of peanut brittle
ADVENTURERS! - ANTIHERO FOR HIRE - CARDMASTER CONFLICT
hence the furor when ridge racer V wrote over the DVD decoder drivers
all this will do is overwrite the existing drivers on the memory card.. simply buy a new card. (or 4) make a copy
send the CD back and laugh a lot...
dms0
You should feel guilty if your just watching - ATR
Sorry to nit-pick, but the CD was actually invented by Philips.
I find numerous things odd about this whole deal. First of all, how do they enforce this? Do they make future games not work on the non-upgraded hardware? Do they knock on your door if you had a pre-order and they have your address? And secondly, Why enforce this? I understand that Sony is a member of the MPAA, but it would seem to their advantage to merely offer to fix the problem rather than force a fix to the problem. Its not like the MPAA loses money because of region code avoiding softare (or do they? This *is* something of a grey area for me and I'm sure others). And lastly, How does sony plan to make ammends with consumers? I know if I had bought one of these units i'd be hella-mad that I would have to send it back (or even just a single chip out of it or whatever I would have to do) and I would expect some sort of compensation (an issue I didn't see addressed by article.
Whew. Well, thats a lot of questions, but I'd like to see if anyone can answer them for me. :)
I hope this opens people eys to the crap that our "world-wide-comglomerants" (sp? ok I think I killed that word, but it is 2:30 am) are starting to hand down to the masses. I would say your average Joe doesn't know anything about all this regional encoding shi.. shtuff. Maybe a letter from Sony in their mail box asking them to bring in their new Playsation so that some "features" can be disabled, will get a few people riled up about this. If we want this to become an issue where something is going to change we need to have some non "2600 people" on our side. :-p
BTW - I feel good. First time poster, long time reader
seeing as Sony pretty much 0wnz Japan-land, its like they have their own secret sevice. ...argh... **Eyes start to glow** ... damn you people...
Sony Secret Service Agent: uh.. sorry kid, we'll have to take that...
Guy who has a PS2: No damnit! i paid more than $700 bucks for this off of eBay!
Agent:
Guy:
heh heh
i am so sorry to hear the big bad sony has made a mistake. maybe psx2 wasn't all that and a bag of chips.
Beer Die is the game of champions Learning To walk my own path.
Seven-Eleven selling PS2's? I could see that, Japanese car dealerships sold the Sega Dreamcast, and would use them as incentives to sell cars! I don't remember the specific dalership, but I don't think that's important.
I could see them selling the things out of vending machines, at least the games. That stuff is hotter than smack is in this country, and it's legal.
Moderating to further my personal world domination agenda... and to get chicks.
It seems that by making concessions w/ intellectual property and copyrights, we only benefit rich corporations. People will always find work arounds - so keep wasting your money SONY.
It seems that everyone has been doing it a couple days early the past couple years; it's too obvious if it's done right on the day, I suppose.
In the spirit of DeCSS, someone should burn a copy of the disk before returning, and spread the ISO. Sure, the ISO would be much larger, but it would serve the same purpose, and someone will probably want this bad enough to spend the time.
Side note: Is this a CD or a DVD? If it is a CD, will it be simple to make a copy/ISO? Or if it is a DVD, can someone just rip the files?
I certainly don't think that a trick like that would work anywhere else in the world.
You give the customer something he likes but it is not legit? Well, TOUGH.
I don't believe most Americans, Canadian, Mexican, European, or even most Asian or African (don't forget the Penguins of Antarctica) would fall for such a move. I, for once, certainly wouldn't have brought the software back, or at least I would have kept a copy, if any legal problems could arise from this...
Cheers.
You can't handle the truth.
I don't believe that there is any way they can MAKE anybody return the startup software under Japanese law, but they could refuse to offer warranty coverage to anybody that hasn't surrendered the CD based on the serial number of the console.
"I threw up my hands in disgust and wondered if it had been such a good idea to have eaten my hands in the first place."
With all this stupidity going on with region encoding, and macrovision, and psx2s that don't work right, and this and that and 7-11, I find myself loving my little Apex DVD player more and more every second. Mmm, No region encoding. Mmm, no macrovision. I don't even care about the copy protection aspect, I just like hooking it up through the vcr instead of having to buy a new tv to get the damn inputs that dvd players friggin support. Mmmm, if you can still find an Apex anywhere, get one. Mmmm.
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"What is that sound its making?"
---
"What is that sound its making?"
"It thinks it has a virus, but its actually just linux."
-Elendale (Of course I want it...)
IANAT (I Am Not A Troll)
Don't take what I say as Gospel. I got that snippet from www.opendvd.org but they may have their facts wrong.
For a caveman you have remarkably good technological and political knowledge.
I agree there should be a campaign to stop regional coding. It prevents DVD retailers from competing internationally, enforces higher prices in different countries, and adds to the cost of producing a player. In return for this, the customer gets no benefit whatsoever.
U.K.: Trash. Invariably involve naked men (Monty Python, Full Monty), the English national pasttime.
But Japan and Europe are both in Region 2.
OTOH, apparently a lot of anime is region 0.
price fixing due to geographical regions is illegal under the WTO.
This is probably true, but how do we get the WTO to do something about it?
England, Australia, New Zealand and other countries have already banned DVD players which enforce region codes.
NZ has, England hasn't but its not illegal to buy them, and I don't think Australia has either. Nevertheless, I can't think of a single model of DVD player that isn't available multi region from somewhere in England. In parts of Europe, multi-region players are available in most high street stores, and its illegal to prevent other European countries from importing these.
Citizen Kane knew what it meant ... it's just a sequal now...
Ignore the "p2p is theft" trolls, they're just uninformed
Surely once you've purchased your PS2, Sony can't take it back whenever they want, even if it can play forbidden DVDs.
This is insanity. This whole region encoding has to go, but then on /. I'm preaching to the choir.
so, let me get this straight. they're recalling the CD's, not the consoles, or else!... hmmm, I know!, I'll make a copy of the CD (i'm sure a modchip2 will be out in a few hours anyway), return the original, be legit with sony and still play my region 1 DVD's. if the japs can't figure THAT out then they deserve the punishment. (or maybe I'm full of it and this just doesn't work)
oh and about the 7-11..well:
7-11=-4. 4 as in four letters. the word sony has four letters. SONY OWNS 7-11!
There are two kinds of people in the world: Those with good memory.
The email I got from Sony's online store (it's in Japanese or I'd post it) said that if I want a new utility disk then I need to send back the old one. They basically say that not all PS2s have the 'problem', but that if you want 'improved' DVD functionality then send it back...
The DVD driver is saved on a memory card, and is only used when you want to play DVDs. If you have no interest in playing DVDs on the PS2 (if you already have a DVD player, for example), then you can delete the driver entirely and free up more room for game saves. In other words, the hardware is completely independent of the DVD driver.
Green Monkey
7-11 is owned by a Japanese corporation. In fact Forbes Magazine had an article (April 3rd,2000 p. 53) about 7-11's Internet related strategy of being a pick-up spot for on-line purchased merchandise. The theory being that it's easier than having to stay at home. Note in the Playstation article how people can drop of the defective merchandise at a 7-11. That may seem odd to us in the USA, but it is common in Japan. 7-11 plans to roll this pick-up/drop-off service out in the US soon.
---K2K was here---
Sony is the king of all things electronic in japan (well, to me they are)....so why don't they just *buy* all the other zones make a sony-world? Or perhaps that's a part of sony's master plan? Insert sci-fi whistle music here...
Sorry, but you can never tell with these companies...
-bugbbq
i don't believe a suit would have a chance. we are talking about international trade not interstate trade. trade restrictions are the norm in the international arena, and wto would be your forum of dipute resolution. obviously the u.s. supports this whole region coding scheme so its unlikely to ever be challenged. its up to the hackers and crackers of the world to keep devising schemes that empower the consumer. if sony keeps recalling everytime a new flaw emerges, they will never make any money.
I seriously doubt the "start-up software" for the PSX2 is either a CD or DVD. It would be a new low for consoles to require a separate "start-up disc" when you turn it on. Plus, if the "start-up software" drives the reading of DVDs, how could it be on a DVD?
It's on a disc (I don't know if it's a CD or DVD). The way it works is, you load the DVD drivers from the disc onto your memory card. That's why they were running into problems before... Some games were erasing the drivers (I guess they were writing their save games over them). I have no idea why Sony set it up this way. I guess they thought if they loaded the drivers off disc, they could easily fix bugs and upgrade if they needed to. Which, in retrospect, they have.
Josh Sisk
In country like France you can buy since DVD Day 1 a non-region enforcing DVD player in all appliance store because restraining region products are not welcome.
It seems that large country with a big movie business are more able to protect their people from seeing foreign movies. Or is it to protect this industry and define what their people have the right to see or not?
Don't forget that American movies are shown in Europe and Asia. If they have overthere a good movie industry (with a lot of DVD/VHS export and lot of movies), their people will not see American movies. That's why region blocking are not allowed by WTO but "enforced" in USA.
--- Bouh !!! ---
Sony has make a product that some people (journalist, MPAA ...) would call it illegal. So they have to do something, just to prove to everyone:
Their image is safe.
But what about the cost of the operation? Do you remember who invented the CD? Right, Sony. They just pay the manufacturing cost without any margins (if they don't "clean" some cash in the operation, paying some company they own to do the job).
They will make 1.25M CDs for 5 cents each (or less). CD cost: $62,500 without shipping.
Based on the US price (33 cents), shipping cost: $412,500.
Total: $475,000
Question: was is $475,000 for Sony? Less than a one minute phone call, for all of us.
--- Bouh !!! ---
OOG DIGUSTED BY SONY AND MPAA'S PRACTICES!!! OOG DONT SEE HOW SONY HAS RIGHT TO TRY TO FORCE CONSUMERS TO REPLACE PSX START UP SOFTWARE (NOT CONSOLES, PEOPLE) THAT THEY SCREWED UP THEMSELVES!!! WORSE, OOG THINK SONY USE PROPAGANDA TO TRY TO CONVINCE PSX2 OWNERS THAT SOFTWARE IS FUNCTIONALLY DEFECTIVE AND NEED BE RETURNED!!!
OOG DISAPPOINTED BY REGIONAL ENCODING AND PRICE FIXATION AND SONYS ATTEMPTS TO FORCE CONSUMERS UNDER THIS STANDARD!!! OOG THINK SOMEONE SHOULD START CAMPAIGN IN JAPAN TO INFORM PSX2 OWNERS OF TRUE FEATURES OF SOFTWARE, INFORM THEM OF REGION ENCODING SCHEME, AND EXPLAIN SONYS ATTEMPTS AT PROPOGANDA THROUGH MANDATORY RECALL!!! MAYBE ENCOURAGE CONSUMER TO KEEP "DEFECTIVE CONSOLE" AS FORM OF PROTEST AGAINST SONYS BULLSHIT!!! IN OOG'S OPINION, IF AVERAGE JOE CONSUMER FIND OUT ABOUT REGIONAL ENCODING AND SONYS PSX2 LIE, CONSUMER BE PISSED, AND THIS MIGHT LEAD TO WORLDWIDE REGULATIONS OVER REGIONAL ENCODING AND PRICE FIXING!!! MAYBE OOG IDEALISTIC, BUT OOG LIKE TO SEE EFFORTS IN CASE!!!
OOG THE OPEN SOURCE CAVEMAN!!! OOG BREAK HEAD WITH OPEN SOURCE CD!!!
You eloquence suggests that maybe you do not understand the real reason why DVD's are encoded for region specific viewing.
There is a commercial advantage for the US residents that are DVD fans. A DVD can be released to the public a lot sooner than VHS. Why? The reason why some VHS movies were not released until a good year after the movie was released is due to lack of encoding.
Now, we do not have to wait a year until a movie has hit all markets in theatres, we can run out and buy it on DVD four months after it's theatrical release.
I am sure that a lot of the people griping about DVD encoding would also gripe about waiting a year or more for their favorite movies to be released.
Plus, if someone is that avid of a DVD fan that they have to buy the latest foriegn films before they are allowed to be shipped to the US, then MAYBE that one percent should spend the extra money to buy a player from the region.
*sighs*
Market Manipulation is not illegal.
If market manipulation were illegal, then movie makers would be forced to release a product in theaters, VHS, and DVD all at once.
As it is right now, a movie is released in the states, a month later it is released in the UK and Australia, a month after that, the rest of the world in staggered releases, then we have the release of the DVD and VHS in the states. The release of the DVD and VHS is also staggered in other countries to match the same time frame as the states.
Companies in general can ensure a steady stream of profits by trickling the product throught the cycles.
Dodge, for example, had 5000 Neons sitting on the Belvidere production facility in Illinois for three months before the car was first released.
A company has to worry about supply versus demand and make sure they are not going to fail in the market.
Does anyone remember that initially Sony was against DVD's in the first place? Sony would not make a DVD player until they made sure that the market was solid.
If people really want to watch the latest DVD's that are released in other countries, they can purchase that region's player with which to do so. There is nothing stopping them from doing that. There are no rules or regulations against that.
I seriously doubt the "start-up software" for the PSX2 is either a CD or DVD. It would be a new low for consoles to require a separate "start-up disc" when you turn it on. Plus, if the "start-up software" drives the reading of DVDs, how could it be on a DVD?
No, this more likely refers to the BIOS or some other chip inside the console. Which means that you either return your console, or pop the hood and remove the BIOS. (it could also be on a flash card, which goes in an external slot like the memory cards, that way you would never have to take it out to play games, except to upgrade for new features and stuff.)
But once again, I don't know, I don't own one, although I do doubt it would be such a hot item if it req'd a boot disc.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
So /. and other such outlets are responsible? This is more a blow to them than to us.
They are exposed. In a large, media-worthy case they have shown that their scams and tactics amount to being negligent in technological security and having the law pick up for them, but that the law picking up for them would be analogous to arresting 1.25 million people simply for buying playstations in this case. Or by playing DVDs on the playstation, which is Sony's fault they can do. And that that would be analagous to the legal action taken against DeCSS, Bleem!, Tickets.com, mp3.com, and everybody else we've heard about lately getting picked on by big entertainment media.
They can't release crappy technology and just take a legal recourse. This case shows it. It is pleasant small victory for us, loss for them.
It's like a fork manufacturer sells forks with a license saying what that fork can be used for. use it improperly, and they sue you. Or release a product which can be used with fork "improperly", and they sue you. These are the games big entertainment has been playing, and this fiasco is the big exposer.
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"This fork has been licensed only for the use of ingesting tofu. Any other use is strictly prohibited and is punishible in civil court."
"Furthermore, distribution of any other product which can be ingested with this fork is punishable in civil court."
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
Of course, IANAJL (I'm not a Japanese Lawyer), so things may be different there.
Who would sue sony for it over there? The biggest deal would be to themselves. Sony wants to keep the region-encoding in place more than anybody. And then their standing with MPAA/CSS, who would be realy pissed. This is all outside the law, more like "if you violate the private contract we get pissed at you and don't let you in on stuff" than "if you violate we sue". And believe me, MPAA has a lot of power in that department.
So it's not civil, or criminal, but political. Sony has to recall them, you don't have to give them back, but once again they will throw their weight around and games will be made to run on the new ones only.
Of course, IANAJL (I'm not a Japanese Lawyer), so things may be different there.
Implying you are a lawyer somewhere else?
Or you just preferred to add a redundant letter?
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
Damn, My brother was in Japan the day the Playstation 2 was released, and I DIDN'T ASK HIM TO PICK ONE UP FOR ME!!! Oh well! That sucks!
<sarcasm>I've got to offload my CD player... it has the capability to decode CDDA tracks and send it to audio-out, where it can be manipulated to play in Japan!!</sarcasm>
Seriously: if you want to play a DVD/CD/8-track from outside your region, you must first get it. The hardware is pointless without the software. (Exhibit A: the 68010 CPU.)
Given sufficient time, any system will be abused. (Exhibit B: US courts.) No matter how secure you make it, it will be broken. The main reason the MPAA is mucking around is to try to keep actors' salaries.
So, what if they suddenly vanish out of the picture? Will piracy run rampant, or will enough people remain that don't have the skill/interest/connections that it only makes a 3% difference in the annual DVD income? (Oh no... I sound like I'm advertising. I'm using %'s b/c they make small numbers.) Will piracy grow over time? I suspect yes. Then will piracy slow again if several major movies halt production b/c they can't make enough after piracy, and make this known?
One of the things I have noticed about people is that they are perfectly willing to trade major future losses for minor present gains. (Exhibit C: downsizing, which only looks good on paper. Should engineers follow downsizing principles, and weaken your car's parts until it can barely stand weather's stress?)
~~~LXT~~~
Life is like a computer program: anything that can't happen, will.
So sony orders a recall of all PS2's because they have extra features what do you as a customer do? If you were debating on buying a PS2 or not you would rush out to the store now to buy one before the good ones were all gone. As video game consoles are a self-reinforcing phenomenon (you want the same console as your friend does so you can share/play the same games) overall the recall could make them money.
If you liked this thought maybe you would find my blog nice too:
Ok, call me a karma whore, but i think the real thing here should not be making it so they cant play non-territorial movies, but lets kill this shit about "if you buy it here, you can only use it here" this stinks worse than software licensing!!!!!!
1.25 Million units eh? Phew Im glad my PS2 falls in about 1.48 million :) I guess i dont have to send mine back to Japan! hehehe
UGG BIG LAWYER FOR SONY AND MPAA!!! UGG SA OOG INFRINGING ON PSX2 COPYRIGHT PATENT!!! UGG SUBPOENA OOG CAVEMAN!!!
UGG SUE SLASHDOT TO REMOVE POSTINGS OF OOG!!! UGG HAVE BIG CLUB AND GOOD AT LAWSUIT!!! IN UGG OPINION SLASHDOT DEFECTIVE FULL OF PIRATE OPEN SOURCE COMUNISTS LIKE OOG!!!
UGG THE LAWYER!!! UGG BREAK OPEN SOURCE HEAD WITH LAWSUIT!!!
3.You can't claim the PS2 is in any way a DVD-copying machine, any more than a standard,
fully-region-encoded DVD player is.
Though DVD players which allow titles from any region to be played back violate the DVD licensing agreement. And the DVDCCA is already cracking down on manufacturers who put in hidden menu options or ways to modify the players.
The MPAA has had a word with them and they will be disabling the hack RSN. In fact, such hackable players will probably disappear from the market within the year.
Only because they slipped past the lawyers. Manufacturers don't sell them as non-regional models.
Or do you mean stuff in 19" rackmount enclosures, intended for studio use?
I can see this developing in a similar way to the PSX 1 mods that are around - they are based on the original 'region' controller that shipped with the press demo and other usints when the PSX was first released. All that happends is you burn the data onto an eprom and solder it into your PSX (but I guess you all knew that anyway :)
So I assume somewhere down the line people will be getting copies of the recalled software and using it instead of the stuff their PSX shipped with.
Which kinda brings me to a point......... this software has been recalled etc etc. Would it actually be illegal for me, if I owned a UK PSX2 for example to replace my software with the old software as I own the hardware and stuff. I guess this is like asking if it'd be legal to use someone's copy of word 2 if I owned word 6 so I guess it would be illegal.
Hohum
troc
Troc's dubious podcast and blog: http://www.trocnet.net
No support, future games check for version and don't work with low ver until you replace it.
You call them, they tell you to upgrade before getting any support.
May be the dial-up service does the same.
/Simon
On a more serious note - who cares? I know that when I get my PSX2 it'll be mod-ed to the hilt and it'll be able to play whatever the h--l I want...
Great, let them spend all this money recalling the software and reissuing the Japanese region software. Then let them sell PS2s in USA (presumably with North America region software).
Then it'll be time to hit 'em. Hit 'em? Yeah: Surely this whole region scheme is illegal, as restraint of trade, anyway. Why haven't the DVD folks been sued over it yet? I don't know why, but I'm sorta glad it hasn't happened yet. I say let them spend a lot of money deploying region-compliant players, and then WHAM! Sick DoJ (and European counterparts) on them, getting a court order to make everyone recall every DVD player on the market in USA & Europe, and replacing them with ones that will play in every region.
Let them waste their money. I look forward to reading about their stockholders jumping out of windows.
And the best part is this: since all the DVD player manufacturers will have contracts with DVD-CCA, where those contracts contain an illegal condition (the requirement to respect region codes), the very validity of those contracts will become questionable. So maybe some of them will renegotiate, and others will just assume they can throw all the conditions out and make DVD players without any restrictions (e.g. Macrovision) at all, etc. Some might sue DVD-CCA, and some will get sued by DVD-CCA. There will be chaos, and lawyers' fees will have more stockholders jumping out of windows.
It will be glorious! :-) Will they have time to crack down on players for personal computers, when they're busy with Sony, Panasonic, etc?
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As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Sony Exec, senior year: "Lessee... I've got my 600 level business course, Electronics Thesis, Intro to upper-level management, and I just managed to squeeeze into 'creating a thriving black-market for Dummies'. should be a full year."
insightful humor, no less.
--kevin
occasionally, i reserve the right to say something.
vOv
By tweaking the PS2-specs, so that the old
PS2 will be incompatible with newer Playstation2
-games, they could at least in theory force
people to return their old ones, for the new.
Of course. There will probably be black market
modchips that makes the old PS2 maintain
compatibility.
As for the tweaking, Microsoft has done it for
years, so why not Sony?
now everyone knows why I use a computer to eat instead of the stock market. Sony was up $10+ today.
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+&x
Not to mention that Region Codes and other price fixing due to geographical regions is illegal under the WTO. England, Australia, New Zealand and other countries have already banned DVD players which enforce region codes.
-- iCEBaLM
Just think, you are using whatever mod for years, collecting an international movie collection, then one day you buy a legitimate movie or game and from then on the PS2 says, "Sorry, you are using an unauthorized, illegal and immoral set of drivers designed to defeat the regional coding," every time you turn it on until you get the latest version of the mod or change over to Sony's "legitimate" price-gouging/censorship version of the OS.
I wonder if MS will try stuff like this with X-box?
It really disturbs me that PS2 will probably become the console of choice, despite Sony's malevolence and incompetance.
All the creatures will die, And all the things will be broken. That's the law of samurai. (Jubai, 1605)
Um, are Japanese 7-11s that different from the ones here in America? I certainly wouldn't expect to go to one here to buy or return electronic equipment of any kind -- might get a Frostie maybe, but certainly not a Playstation console.
I know this is semi-offtopic, but that paragraph has me extrmemly curious now. I'm picturing these strange Nipponese convenience stores, with the Nascar imagery I'm used to replaced with Hello Kitty and the rack of porno mags (unsaleable to persons under 18) replaced with glittering Playstation decks (unavailable for export to the USA without a DOD-or-whatever-it-is munitions license. Heh -- we're not so different after all... hahaha
DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL
Aren't they a couple of days early for April 1st?
:)
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I wear pants.
Yes I speak playstation and I ate a banana too. it said unto me that i should roll some rocks down a neanderthal and spout off over some ice cream.
I LIKE TO EAT POOPY
rm -rf ~/.signature
it's in my head
There's probably a Sony engineer laughing to herself quietly right now. But the question is how could Sony allow the Playstation to be released without regional encoding if they were serious about it??? Could this be a quiet way for Sony to begin protesting the union they are a part of without blatently violating the rules (oops...recall!!!!). Sure Japan's a big market but it's not like they are going to lose revenue over this. Let's hope a similar bug is in the US release. Sony has probably lost DVD sales over this this issue to other companies. But face it, pirating will occur regardless of the restrictions they try and put on regular joes like me. So why punish Joe/Jane??? I think the real issue they face is high bandwidth internet and compressed video. Just wait till you can download and watch the Matrix in real time 1024/768 30fps compressed video. Thats when they will start to shit. Until then it no big problem...........
Waiting in Wisconsin
no sig.
It's not a mandatory recall. nothing in the article says that you have to take it back.
"PlayStation2: SCEI has been forced to recall the start-up software which accompanied the 1.25 million PlayStation2 units shipped to date, in order to combat a bug that allows the Japanese consoles to play foreign DVDs. "
"Gamers can return their illegitimate software wither via mail from April 1, or through 8,000 Seven-Eleven stores soon. PlayStation2 will now ship in Japan with software that does not support the playing of foreign DVDs. "
I would think that someone would be smart enough to find another reason to recall the units. Who wants to part with their playstation 2 so they can lose the ability to play dvd discs they weren't "allowed" to play before.
How does this mandatory recall thing work? I doubt that they can force people to give back their PS2s, or is there some license agreement between Sony and their customers? If I had bought a PS3, I would screw Sony and keep mine so I can watch DVDs from any region I want!
I don't have one, but a friend in Europe does. It's great if you're an English-speaker in a non-English speaking country, and want to order US DVDs in English.
This is a bit of a blow for those of you following all of the stuff with DVD/RIAA/MPAA/DeCSS/Whatever other series of meaningless letters you want.
/. be partially responsible for this? Could the unintentional whistleblowing have thrown a wrench in Sony's plan to slip this one past the grownups until the heat was off? I would hate to think so, but it seems possible.
But I think that this is more about their standing with CSS or whoever, than public image or actually caring who watches which DVD where.
From what I know about the 'hack' (very little), it didn't seem like it was supposed to be found at all, or at least not as publically announced as it has been.
Which raises an interesting question: could
Then again, what do I know?
It's not the hardware being recalled, it's the software.
yeah, like if i had paid out cash for any dvd player, and found it could play all regions, i'd return it. i really would. honest. heh. how the hell can sony expect them to be returned? the only way i could see any being returned at all would be if they refused any right of warranty and/or support to those who didn't return them. even then though, i'd rather take my chances and keep my machine . . .
Apparently, the PS2 regional override is just activated by mashing buttons when powering on the systems (there's no set "code"). If you manage to push enough of them, it causes some sort of interrupt conflict and the regional protection doesn't get loaded (or something like that; I don't remember the specifics). In any case, this seems to be definite proof of the old adage that a bug is simply an undocumented feature ;).
Green Monkey
Its that curse again ... ...
Sony bought into TAO
TAO are involved in OS development for Amiga
The Amiga has a well documented curse
Hence all their troubles are really THE CURSE OF THE AMIGA.
This is just my paranoid theory, your mileage may vary...
and remember just because you're not paranoid, doesn't mean their not out to get you.
A couple of months back, it was found that owners of Gran Turismo 2(PSX) could only complete 98% of the game due to some last minute changes to the game. Not really a big deal but enough people complained that Sony 'recalled' GranTurismo2 and replaced it with a '100%' version.
Compared to the amount of GT2 CDs sold, the number of people that went for the recall was miniscule.
This is just Sony putting on a good face for the industry/public. 'Look, we did the right thing!'
D
The first, last, and only tech news site on the net
A device which contains a crack for DVDs, the code necessary to play DVDs from all regions? I'd keep it and buy another playstation.
And if I could get some of the code onto my computer and analyze it, like they did with bleem, search for the keys, well we could be seeing DeCSS all over again!
Just have to move to Antarctica before distributing so as to avoid legal concerns...or keep to self, heh heh heh
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
..but rather the start up software. I.e., a CD (or a DVD, I don't know, I don't own one).
That sucks for Sony, but it is definitively not as bad as having to recall the consoles themselves.
OG.
One other thing I was going to bring up but forgot to mention - in the Daily Radar article they mention a future HW recall is possible if Sony cannot overcome the issue of copying DVD's to a VCR via the PS2 output (through lack of macrovision altogether or unprotected component output I cannot remember).
If that did come to pass, the article states that might very well put the estimated US launch date into jepordy.
That would bring about an interesting situation indeed - would Sony then stick with the scheme to region code DVD's, or would loss of the potential benefit of having the timing to place a PS2 in 75% of American homes lead them to break away from the MPAA and fight the lawsuits that would come from a U.S. release of hardware that would allow perfect duplication and possibly region free DVD playing with hacked DVD drivers?
It seems like the very design of the PS2 (DVD player software loaded from CD) makes it fairly open to modification.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
DVD Copy Protection costs Sony $5billion (Monday's Headline)
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+&x
(The PS1 DexDrive was compatible with both Japanese and North American saves... I'm assuming the PS2 one will be as well.)
Green Monkey
1) Why doesn't someone big sue the DVD CCA for restraint of trade with the whole region encoding scheme? Money. Don't you guys see....it's much cheapr to buy into the system and try to make it work for you than to try and fight it. Sure, the rewards are potentially greater, but the risks are much bigger.
/. effect. That is a very real, documented case of the internet's power to disseminate. I can't think of a single news station/newspaper/magazine that can claim that. They may have a larger/broader base of viewers/listeners/readers (for now), but we all know that is changing. Ultimately time will tell if journalists can really be held responsible for things like this. After all, it is their job to "get the scoop". The net just makes the scoop a matter of seconds rather than hours.
2) Why is Sony doing this recall now? I'll bet its a contract issue with the DVD CCA. You can bet that when they sign the NDA and technology license agreement, there are clauses about not infringing upon the whole scheme. Here again it's much much cheaper to go along with the crowd than to do what's right.
3) Why 7-11? Well, why did the US Mint release the new Golden Dollars in Wal-Mart first, before the banks? It's simple: convenience of location and power of distribution. There are pantloads of WalMarts here, and they are pretty close to where people live (in addition to being pretty popular places, especially for Southern teenagers on Friday nights.) I'm sure 7-11 has a similar stature in Japan: lots of stores close to where people live, and people are in the habit of going there anyways. Besides, id Software had Quake 1 shareware CDs sold in 7-11 in the US. It's not THAT strange.
4) When will the DVDCCA/MPAA/whomever get a clue? Never, as long as nobody is willing to fight. What we really need is a company with the money and the balls to fight this thing out. Afterall, assuming there do exist clauses in the DVD Forum contracts making you comply with region encoding, you can't be bound by them if they are illegal. Perhaps there is a company out there willing to sell such a value added product (Apex?) and also willing to legitimize the whole thing.
5) Are journalists responsible for creating problems like this? That's an interesting question that we don't seem to have an answer for. 5 years ago, I'd think not. There didn't exist news networks to get infortmation out to large numbers of people rapidly enough to make a difference. Now there is the Internet, with the potential to move millions of people to action in a matter of minutes. Don't believe me? Think
... honestly, how can it be illegal for someone to sell a non-region encoded device?
Even in the US, assuming that the DMCA stands (which is a big if), I would have assumed that several things occured in the manufacturing of the PS2:
If Sony would be in trouble for anything, it might be for failing to adhere to the terms of the DVD CCS license contract (which undoubtable says something like "You are supposed to enforce Region Encoding"). However, this is contract (ie Civil) law, certainly not criminal law.
Of course, IANAJL (I'm not a Japanese Lawyer), so things may be different there.
Certainly, if the case is Civil, people who bought the PS2 aren't legally forced to return it. They can keep it. If it's criminal (wherein the possession of such a device is illegal), well, then, guess you have to give it back.
I'd be interested to see what this turns out to be...
-Erik
There are always four sides to every story: your side, their side, the truth, and what really happened.
Other people have posted this already, but since few seem to be noticing I thought I'd mention it again. It's only the CD's that come with the Playstation 2 that are being recalled - these hold the software which you load into the Playstation 2 memory cards, which is in turn used to play DVD's.
The software was buggy, and I believe not only would not play Japanese DVD's (though I could be wrong about that part), but it definatley let them play Region 1 (US) DVD's - quite a no-no in Japan!
You do have to wonder though how many people would return software that would let them play US DVD's. Perhaps Sony will refuse to support the systems at all until the CD's are returned.
DailyRadar (yes the site is a bit juvinile but it has pretty good PS2 coverage) has a story about this as well - they mention that Sony might have to recall all the actual PS2 hardware if the ability to copy DVD's from the component output is not resolved.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Just think! A black market filled with DANGEROUS CRIMINAL MASTERMINDS will soon spring up, centering around ilicit "original PS2 trade". PS2 cartels will come into power, and rule japan and other countries with an iron fist of TERROR , doling out favors and original PS2s to those that please them, and curry favors... While they ruthlessly withHOLD these blessed units from those whom do NOT please them, condemning such individuals to an eternety of region coded gaming and DVD watching. OH THE HUMANITY! OH THE PATHOS.
Ok, I'll stop.
Sony:
"Sorry guys, the software we gave you is too good. You'll have to return it for an inferior copy. I'm sure you understand."
Customers:
"Fuck off."
translated from Japanese by,
tingalingusob