More Info on Phantom Game Console

MImeKillEr writes "Newsforge is reporting that the Phantom Game Console discussed on Slashdot is really a DRM-protected PC, sans floppy or CD running Windows XP. It uses a proprietary encryption method to protect the data on its harddrive, and the only thing that differentiates this 'game console' from a standard, Windows-running PC is that it has no way to get data on or off of it except through a dedicated connection to Infinium Labs' own servers." Newsforge and Slashdot are both part of OSDN.

Comments

Re:Fair use?

[CaptainSuperBoy]

Feel free to not buy the damn thing. Or would you prefer to make it illegal for companies to produce devices that inconvenience your copying?

Re:Fair use?

[Acidic_Diarrhea]

I hate it when people begin their sentences with "Umm." It's rather low-class.

Anyway, companies (not people as you put it) are stuck with extra inventory all the time. You are correct that they are only stuck with warehouses full when there is a huge error but the fact remains that when we are dealing with whether one person is going to buy the console, if that one unit is not purchased, it is not guaranteed to sell. In fact, they may estimate that they will sell 100,000 units. By not purchasing that one unit, they sell 99,999 - and are stuck with an extra unit. It happens quite often. You're talking about companies getting stuck with thousands. You think about the reality of that. And spending $500 doesn't make a statement - it merely gives the company $500.

And if you want to see a company stuck with excess inventory - go into EB and ask for a Dreamcast. There are plenty lying around.

Re:Fair use?

[Acidic_Diarrhea]

Yes, you're right - if 1,000,001 did purchase the machine with the intent of never buying any software for it, the company would overextend and go into a much larger hole. Of course, that's not going to happen. We're talking about the role of one person (and the number of people who are going to agree to buy the machine and not the software isn't significant enough so that you can argue all those single people across the country will add up).

As for your points
1. That's what I was saying. It's a silly idea to believe that your purchase or non-purchase makes a different.

I don't know about this

[hesiod]

(note: this is a lot of rambling & ranting, it won't necessarily all make sense to you.)

They don't seem too keen on people actually using their site. When I tried to get to it, it told me I don't have Flash 6 (which I do, unfortunately), and then I clicked "Continue" to go on anyway it came back to tell me again that I don't have Flash. Fucking brilliant. So I decided to see if I could find something else, just for the heck of it. (after this, too, for some reason, the rest of the site worked) I went to /images/ and got this:

> YOU ARE NOT AUTHORIZED!
> AND WILL BE REPORTED TO THE PROPER AUTHORITIES!
> Your are attempting to illegally login into a secure server and may be breaking the electronic wire fraud laws.
> We monitor all login attempts and report any violations to the FBI we find suspicious.
> We will not tolerate any hacker attempts to this server.
> We record your IP address and originating domain and much more information to track you down. We use advanced intrusion detection software that reports to our security department in real-time and will allow them to see any intrusion attempts.
> Please be advised that we take this very seriously! We will take the full course of action in any occurrence!
> To report anything contact:
> security@infiniumlabs.com

I am not authorized? Authorized for what!? And they're going to report me to the authorities for going to the wrong page. Yeah, funny. And I like how they assume I am breaking into their server. Not to mention they'll have a pretty damned hard time trying to track me down. And of course, Going to an images directory = Advanced Cracking techniques, woo. So now I will be at the mercy of these people taking their full course of action against me (which is? Absolutely fucking nothing). *COWER*

That page is so silly that it makes me wonder if one or both of the following 2 are true:
1) Their webmaster is an idiot
2) This is a hoax/vaporware (there's probably a good reason it's called a phantom)

The article claims it isn't vaporware, but they give no reason to actually believe that, or why they say that.
The company currently doesn't seem to sell anything other than hats, mugs, and shirts.
The beta-testing application is pretty badly designed, especially compared to the rest of the site, but I guess that's not really a reason to doubt the existence of its product. Speaking of which, Why the HELL would they want my resume? WTF does that matter? After trying to sign up JFTFOI, the Sign Up button did nothing. Great.

Re:wrong.

[Alan Partridge]

INFINITE

Just because your accent doesn't allow you to pronounce words correctly, doesn't mean you can spell them incorrectly too.