EA, Atari Sue Over Videogame Copying Software

Thanks to the Monterey Herald/AP for its news story regarding EA, Atari, and VU Games' lawsuit against the makers of the Games X Copy backup software. The article explains: "The federal lawsuit [PDF version], filed Tuesday in New York, alleges that Games X Copy software by 321 Studios Inc. of suburban St. Louis violates copyright laws by illegally cracking copy-protection systems used by [PC] game makers." Doug Lowenstein of the ESA trade body, also backing the lawsuits, explains: "I wouldn't get into speculating on dollar losses here. What's at stake here is a rather important legal principle - that products with no purpose other than to circumvent copyright protection are illegal under the DMCA." The piece also notes that "Federal judges in New York and California have barred 321 from marketing... [similar] DVD-cloning software - a victory for movie studios, which contended that such products violate the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act."

Comments

This is the same EA

[DAldredge]

This is the same EA that just made it IMPOSSIBLE to bypass the 15 second startup movies that play every time you start up Ultima Online. There is a way to disable them, but they can ban your account for making unauthorized mods if you use it.

Kids

[BancBoy]

Many children (young and old) treat their game discs with a bit less respect than they should sometimes. Who wants to buy a new copy everytime your copy starts skipping or fails? Won't you please think about the children!?

Now I know

[BobPaul]

Thanks to this article, I know of the existance of "Games X Copy," a product I would never have known about had EA and the others sued.

What will I do with my knew found awareness? Probably nothing right now, but I'm sure I'll let others know about it eventually and there's a slim possibility I might buy a copy before they're gone...

Thanks EA and Atari! Now I know about another great 321 Studios project!!

Re:Good on the DMCA

[0racle]

I bought SimCity 4 and the Rush Hour expansion. After installing the expansion, running it cam back with the error "Please insert the correct disk." Rush Hour is one disk and it was the one that was in there, so just to play the game I legally bought, I had to find a NoCD crack for it.

Copy protection my ass, I had to go and look for a way around it just to play it. I'm glad I did though, damn its fun.

From where I am standing

[colonslashslash]

Preventing people from making legal backups of their games that they purchased for $50 odd is insane.

That basically boils down to the fact that when you spend your hard earned 50 bucks, all you are getting is a CD / DVD disc (and hopefully a box and a manual), as you have no rights to do anything to the data contained on it.

That's one damn expensive disc.

Don't get me wrong, its their work and they should keep ownership rights, but for the money consumers pay for the product, they should at least have some freedom to copy the data providing it is for personal use. Whatever happend to "fair usage"? I can understand their concern over piracy, but from a business point of view, is screwing over your customers in an attempt to stop a few people getting the product for free really a wise move? Seems like the path most corporations and companies are travelling recently.

Also, by preventing your customers from copying the data, you are implying guilt before innocence, ie: people are more likely to be pirating than making legimate backups, so treat them as criminals by limiting their experience.