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Sony vs Modchips
Cryptnotic writes "Sony
has decided to instigate legal action against companies distributing two new Playstation 2 modchips, the Messiah and the NEO4. Sony has previously ignored modchip makers who made products which were only capable of playing CD-R copies of games. These new modchips, however, have legitimate uses, such as playing original import games or out-of-region DVD's. Aparrantly this is what has angered Sony." If I could read Kanji I'd probably care a bit more ;)
If Sony curbs modchips, then people won't be able to bypass the copy protection. Your case with the Dell is flawed, because the PC is open hardware. PS2 is closed to the max, and they are attached to both the hardware (which they don't make money off of) and the software.
Not to say that this is fair in a legal respect, but Sony isn't thinking about law (like every other corporation); they are thinking about money. Again, blame the creation of the stock market for creating this mentality in businesses.
Zodiac Survey
SONY never went after MOD chip makers because there was no legal precendent. With the DMCA and the broad enforcement and wide interpretation of it's laws, SONY probably feels - make that probably does - have a clear victory in this case. But this is just another case of a major corporation essentially sueing the people by going after a few companies. Armed with the DMCA and the legal standard that legitimate use doesn't matter, large, entrenched companies can continue to use the DMCA to prevent other, legitimate, businesses from eating their market share.
Not that it really matters - people will always make these mod chips and sell them, or instructions to make them, on the internet. Heck, even X-Box hacking is gaining steam against M$'s weak protections. The problem is companies want to control more than just their product - they want to control if you can buy it, use it, how you use it and for how long. Yeah, right - I'm going to sit back and pay money so some other company can control a small part of my life.
If we've learned nothing from history, you only own what you can control, and you can't control people or technology... for long.
RC
... the problem with the entertainment industry is that it is often tied to disposable income (if you don't watch TV you're not going to die regardless of what kids think). As such there is serious competition for our attention ranging from walking in parks (NY muggings excepted) to window-shopping in malls (a legitimate form of entertainment as shown by theme parks taking this philosophy to extremes such as Disney). Groups such as Sony have to come up with ever more inventive ways of parting you from your money ... err catching your attention and delivering amusement. This problem is exasperated by the fact that different countries value leisure differently. A third world sweat shop worker just simply has better things to buy (like education for their kids) than light entertainment. Hence global companies cannot charge the same price for the same item (CD) in different countries. Hence their desire for market segmentation tools such as multi-zoning.
... up to the point of lobbying legislators (cough*DCMA*cough) to exterminate what they view as inappropriate economic conduct.
Now is this considered fair? Places like Australia don't believe so as their competitive watchdog recently ruled that multi-zoing was anti-competitive as it hindered parallel importing (is source CD from other countries). On the other hand companies argue that it is like passenger classes in planes, first-class still get there at the same time as cattle-class but pay significantly more. Many companies (esp software/pharmaceuticals) use the high prices of their products in 1st world countries to cross-subsidise less developed markets. Given the increasing connectivity of world trade this is becoming increasingly difficult.
Computers with digital rights management (aka service variability) is one mechanism to enforce this market segmentation, especially if it can be enforced through fixed/controlled end-points (cough*Xbox*cough). This is why companies hate mod-chipers and related products (satellite decodes, overclockers, etc) as it allows individuals to exploit the artificial price differential between 1st/3rd world pricing strategies. The end-result is a technological arms race (embedded ids, self-destruct, registrations, etc) in order to maintain this separation between high-margin customers and more marginal users. A person collecting warez for bragging rights is *NOT* willing to pay the same recommended price as someone looking to kill time by renting an evening game.
Anyone who thinks a company is going to destroy their global economic model just to please a small (but vocal) group of (from their point of view) "parasites". A large enough business entity can tolerate a small percentage of free-riders but is likely to come down hard on any systematic or organised threats to their business provided they can distance themselves from any media-fallout (cough*Adobe*cough)
Fortunately the free market (e.g. open source movement) has a little influence in moderating the extreme behaviour of the more pervasive global corporations.
LL
A modchip is usually a piece of hardware that contains the software to bypass the copy protection. PROM modchips are typically used because the people who make them can make a whole batch of programmable chips, and if the mod is rendered useless, they can update the software and still make modchips out of the PROMs they've got.
Old modchips worked by flashing the Playstation BIOS, or replacing parts of it on boot, so that when the game would call on the copyprotection, the new BIOS would say that every disc in the unit was good.
PS2 is different, though. See, it's meant to be flashed every single time you put in a new disc. And since the code in memory can change every time a new game comes out, it's a bit difficult to make a BIOS modchip. You need something different.
The quick and dirty solution people came up with for the PS2 is to intercept the checks as they're heading to whereever, and change the signals so that they're the proper result. Thing is, each game can do this differently. Due to the nature of the PS2, the checks could be called from a vector unit, from the memory card processor.. or even the reader unit itself. And the modchip maker has to add a wire for each signal they need to intercept.
Nowadays, PS2 modchips require 20+ connections (probably even more by now) just to cover all of the different signals that can be sent during a check. And each check is cumulative; you have to keep the old checks while adding for new ones. This is kinda ridiculous, since this introduces modchip bloat.. a new modchip defeat comes out, and they have to add more connections... it can really suck for people if they need a new modchip every time a new game comes out.
Enter the Messiah. You wire it into the DVD-ROM reading hardware, rather than throughout the rest of the unit. Since all checks have to go through the DVD system anyways, this is only logical.. thing is, Sony made it really tough to figure it out. Which is why it took them over two years to get the chip made.
Without a link to NEO4, I can't say whether or not they've gone the same route, but if they have, these two chips could spell the end for Sony's PS2. Since all PS2 consoles use the same BIOS, flashed every time a game starts, Sony can't easily change the hardware design of any newer units coming onto the market. So if this modchip is undetectable, and it does all the things they're saying it does in hardware, this could be checkmate.