UK High Court Rules Modchips Illegal

PhotoBoy writes "The Register has an article about the UK's High Court ruling PlayStation 2 modchips to be illegal. This means all homebrew and hobbyist coders in the UK can no longer modify their consoles to run games they have written. Gamers who like to mod their consoles to play games on import early are also out of luck. It's like saying you can't modify your car or your house or your clothes! Would Ford sue you for removing the rev limiter from your Focus?"

Comments

So many ways to get it

[stecoop]

Making it is illegal to bypass copy protection mechanisms

I have a sharpie that could be used to circumvent the copyright protection. My shift key also would be a violation. The courts won't go after Office Depot or Logitech because you want to go after big fish with money but not enough money to properly defend their selves.

Shouldn't the courts just go after the copyright violators rather than going after all mechanism that could be used to violate copyright? Of course not you know that judge doesn't want to youth playing those nasty region 3+ games; he is doing it for the good of public morals... right?

Don't Forget

[FractusMan]

While yes, there are people who use modchips to play their own, homebrew games, and play imported games, let's not overlook the obvious. People put modchips in their consoles so they can play stolen (ie, burned) games. If people did NOT use modchips for that purpose, this law wouldn't be necessary. But the fact is that the UK high court is not 'ruining your rights' - it's the people who copy and sell games illegally that ruin the fun for everyone. The UK is merely taking steps to stop that. Whether the steps are too far, I don't know and won't argue. But don't think that this is a cut and dried case of trampling of rights. Go bitch at your friends who have a bunch of "Backup copies" of games.

Re:Don't Forget

[Erick the Red]

Cars are used in bank robberies, but they are still legal.

Knives are used in murders, but they are still legal.

Computers are used for vandalism and fraud, but they are still legal.

Almost anything has an illegitimate use, but we don't outlaw the thing, we outlaw the use.

Re:Don't Forget

[Reapy]

People may not be hunting deer with ak-47's, but they might be collecting them, or firing them at the range, or both. There are legitimate uses. There are illegal uses. I don't believe it is fair to ban the product because it may be used illegally.

It doesn't matter that the majority of people who purchase the chips are using them illegally. It is the people who make the decision to break the law, not the mod chip creators. Remember that t-shirt, "Guns don't kill people, I kill people?" Same thing, mod chips don't make me illegally copy games, I illegally copy games.

Anyway, when I eventually have children, I fully intend to back up all of my games and only keep the backups out for use. At 50 a pop, a 60 dollar mod chip and some hard drive space is well worth the investment.

Re:Don't Forget

[goldspider]

If cars were used 99% of the time to run over people, they probably would be illegal.

If knives were used 99% of the time to murder people, they probably would be illegal.

If computers were used 99% of the time for vandalism and fraud, they probably would be illegal.

Suggesting that these mod chips are used primarily by "hobbiests" is proof that Slashdotters cannot honestly look this problem in the eye.

Re:Don't Forget

[DrFrob]

Following that logic: only X% of Americans are black, so employment discrimination against them is insignificant and should not be an issue.

The needs of the many do not always outweigh the needs of the few. Likewise, the abuses of the many do not always outweigh the legitimate uses of the few.

Re:Don't Forget

[drwav]

So what you are saying is that it is OK to make law outlawing something as long as it only adversely affects a minority of people.

Let's say that 99% of people use mod chips to play copies of games that they didn't pay for (I just made that stat up to work with your argument), thus the 1% that use mod chips for legitimate uses must sacrifice their rights for the greater good.

Sure it sounds reasonable at first, because chances are very good that it won't affect you in the slightest. However, if you sit and think about it for a minute and wonder how those few people who are being punished for the actions of other people might feel, you might start to realize that maybe this law isn't reasonable at all.

If everyone practiced a little empathy before making broad judgements like this the world would be a much more pleasant place to live in.

The car analogy doesn't hold up!

[kingLatency]

"Would Ford sue you for removing the rev limiter from your Focus?"

No, Ford wouldn't, but this comparison doesn't work. We all know that one of the main uses (I couldn't say the main for sure) for mod chipping is piracy. Theft of intellectual property is rarely, if ever, part of modifying one's car, clothing or house.

fair and balanced?

[deft]

"This means all homebrew and hobbyist coders in the UK can no longer modify their consoles to run games they have written."

I think if you'd like the slashdot community to discuss this intelligently, the article needs to have both sides. It would have been just as easy to say "while this certainly is a big blow to piracy, the rights of other citizens, while a very small population, are being infringed upon.

All to often the submitters skewed view steers the conversation in only one way.

Re:fair and balanced?

[kfg]

Except your revision is incorrect. The rights of all citizens are being infringed upon.

Rights are innate even when they are not being acted upon. A monk who has taken a vow of silence still retains whatever rights to speak any citizen has and a law forbiding speech, even though he has already chosen not to, infringes his rights.

KFG

Re:fair and balanced?

[runderwo]

How is this a big blow to piracy? Piracy was _already_ illegal. What does making a potential piracy tool illegal accomplish? Is piracy somehow now "more" illegal now that the digital equivalent of a lockpick has been outlawed?

Different analogy

[nulltransfer]

Would Ford sue you for removing the rev limiter from your Focus?

Not that I agree with this law, but lawmakers probably see mod chips as analogous to mounting guns on your car. There are many legitimate uses for mod chips, but since they don't want to deal with the exceptions, they probably want to completely illegalize the usage.

Earlier this year, the Italian court ruled that mod chips are legal on the basis that it's up to the user, not Sony, how they use their PS2. It even went so far as to name mod chips as crucial tools to "avoid monopolistic positions".

Thumbs up to the Italians, though :)

bah

[maxpublic]

Once I buy something, it's mine. Oh wait! So not true anymore; now I don't buy, I *lease* under whatever terms my corporate and government masters deign to grant me. God forbid that I should actually *own* something to be used in whatever fashion I see fit. Oh no, I'm just a consumer peon, I can't possibly be allowed such a right!

Max

Wait, the description of the decision is wrong

[Nakito]

The Slashdot blurb for this article is wrong and makes an incorrect analogy. The blurb says, "It's like saying you can't modify your car or your house or your clothes!"

But if you read the article, the description of the decision is substantially different: "The UK High Court has judged that the sale, advertisement, possession for commercial purposes and use of PlayStation 2 modification chips is illegal in this country."

The distinction is huge. It means that you are allowed to "modify your car" (to use the proposed analogy). You just aren't allowed to commercialize your modifications. You can tinker all you want, but you can't sell the results of your tinkering.

It's still a significant limitation, but we should at least be arguing about the actual limitation, not the incorrect one.

Re:Wait, the description of the decision is wrong

[gfxguy]

There are four violations in the statement:

1. Sale,
2. Adverstisement,
3. Possession for commercial purposes, AND
4. Use.

Number 4 is what you are doing if you possess one and use it. So it looks like you are allowed to have one, you just can't legally use it. "Legally" being the operative word.

Legitimate uses

[Xian97]

As the father of two young children, I took what I thought was adequate precautions to protect my game collection. I placed the PS2 games up on a shelf out of their reach and changed the disk for them when they wanted to play. One day a friend was over and while I was out of the room he gets a game down off the shelf to look at the cover art or manual and places it on the coffee table. In a matter of minutes the toddler is attracted to the bright, shiny packaging and the even brighter, shinier game DVD inside. Almost instantly a $50 disk is scratched and unplayable in spite of all the precautions I had taken. I contacted the company to see if I could get a replacment disk for a discounted price and was told that I would have to buy the whole package again for full price. After that I made DVDR backups of the games I had bought and modified the PS2 to play the backups. While I am sure many use modchips to copy games they do not own, don't condemn the technology when it has legitimate uses as well.

Re:Commercial ModChips Only

[ChrisMaple]

The sentence is ambiguous. Does it mean "commercial use" is illegal, or does it mean "use" is illegal?

Re:So what?

[fiftyvolts]

It was Ben Franklin and the direct quote is the following:

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

Missing from the Article Write-Up

[goldspider]

Emphasis mine...

"This means all homebrew and hobbyist coders in the UK can no longer modify their consoles to run games they have written, and criminals who violate copywrite laws can no longer play the games they illegally downloaded and burned ."

We all know that these mod chips have limited legitimate uses, but it is intellectually dishonest of the Slashdot crowd to intentionally ignore the primary purpose of these chips.

Sony PS2's now must be taxed as import consoles...

[rapiddescent]

Well this is very interesting because Sony got away with a punitive tax levy on the PS2 being imported to the UK because Sony proved that the PS2 was a customisable computer that could run user programs (not limited to Sony approved games). Thats why the UK versions came with PS2 Basic - to essentially make the console a home computer rather than a games console.

One of the main differentiations between a game console and a home computer is that a game console has a restriction on the software installed on it.

Games consoles imported into the UK from outside the euro zone attract a large import duty. I hope that Customs and Excise will now be retrospectively collecting import duty for every PS2 sold in the UK and interest on the late payment of that duty going back over time.

rd

I am neutral in this

[zogger]

I really am, just was commenting on the obvious legal hypocrisy with automobiles. I will also ramble here and there some, as I have a brain that apparently works that way....

I wasn't commenting on the modchips per se, I was commenting on the fact that cars are *definelty* sold with the expectations that at least some times the laws will be broken with them. It is 100% undeniable true stuff facts data. and I will repeat, they COULD sell cars that absolutely could not exceed the speed limit, yet they don't, that is pure evidence to show they know that cars WILL be used illegally, at least some of the time. they could mandate a totally legal car, they could make a mandated legal car, yet they do not. there is a reason for it, and that reason is the expectation and casual acception of illegal use of the car, along with legal use.

And it's similar to the modchips if you really want to ask me directly on the subject, not all games played on modded consoles are illegal, just some of them some of the time. Just like some times people drive cars legally, and sometimes they don't. It's one of those deals where the laws are so lame that almost everyone ignores them. I see it similar to these games. I can see wrongness and rightness to it, from both points of view, so that pushes me into a neutrality stance.

And BTW, I don't game, own a console, download MP3s or movies,etc, never have. I'm not a hypocrite about it. I have paid for shareware in the past and actually deleted it if it had a time out period and I really didn'twant it. I'm just a freeking square boy sprout when it comes to such matters, but I also can see when a law is so stupid it will get broken because of it's stupid-ness. I just call em like I see 'em. Similar to what I see happened to the music and movie guys, I have watched them over the years cry crocodile tears over their hundreds of zillions in profits, and every generation of technology is going to "destroy" them they declare, and periodically they get busted for industry collusion and price fixing, but that's about it, so I don't mind seeing them boys get borrowed from with cheap-to-make-copies. They coulda long ago come out with the one or two collar cd and made more money then they make now, but they are so greedy they don't understand this. They don't understand people didn't want to buy an unlistened to pig in a poke, or just this weeks top 40 that they create and push. they don't get it, never got it, and won't ever get it, too greedy, greed lead to insanity, they are stuck rthere. No law says a rich person can't be insane, is there? that's what happens to people who get greedy, they have gone *insane* and they then go on to make other stupid decisions based around their insanity, Political leaders get afflicted with advanced megalomania. Industries get it when it comes to dominance and "making money".

So..when it became easy to do, either modding or copying or whatever, people just did it themselves. I think they broke their trust and ethical and moral high ground a LONG time ago. I don't take their stuff,or buy their stuff, but I feel the same way about them if the hells angels stole something from the devils disciples-ehh, so what, who cares?

I don't believe in IP patents, none whatsoever. If it isn't a tangible,and built,at least a good to scale working model, no patent. That's my idea of a real product worth patenting. One of the dumbest things ever foisted on the US consumer and business world, and ESPECIALLY allowing a so called "product" to be sold with no warranty, excuse me, "licensed to use" with no warranty, is the patenting of intangibles. Hideously lame. Wicked stupid. harmful in the short, medium and long terms for advancing the useful arts and sciences. It's a congame and a scam, and as such, I think it's a fair play to scam them back if they insist on it..but not for me. I just ignore them, boycott, same as I do with overpriced hollywood tripe, "games", and whatever they claim is music. I got better things to do.