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Man Convicted For Hacking Xbox
PipianJ writes "Remember the ruling in Britain which outlawed mod chips last year? BBC News is reporting that a man has been convicted of modding an Xbox and sentenced to 140 hours of community service, a fine of 750 pounds (about $1300), and the confiscation of his PCs and Xboxes." From the article: "The man had been selling modified Xbox consoles which he fitted with a big hard drive containing 80 games. 'This case sets a major precedent which marks a milestone in the fight against piracy,' said games industry spokesman Michael Rawlinson." Update: 07/04 22:12 GMT by Z : Updated to more accurately discuss the story.
From the article:
"The man had been selling modified Xbox consoles which he fitted with a big hard drive containing 80 games."
So.. um.. not just mod chips, then.
Precedent or no, this guy no more deserves our sympathy or support than some guy selling bootlegged CDs on a street corner.
Irritable, left-wing and possibly humorous bumper stickers and t-shirts
What does this mean?
Do it yourselfers who only modify boxes for themselves probably won't be bothered.
Those who do it for friends for free or just the cost of parts may but only if someone rats them out.
Those who are doing a high-volume business OR who are making any kind of profit are toast.
In a nutshell, the industry will play wack-a-mole and go after the higher-profile targets first.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
You are mistaken. Common law is quite popular is Britain much more so then many other countries.
Original summary:New summary:
That they would label this article as, "Man busted for chipping box." When in fact it had nothing to do with the chip itself, but the PIRATED SOFTWARE the hard drive contained.
Without the court docket all we have to go on is the article. The article says he was actually convicted for chipping, not copyright violation. Possibly he plea-bargained down to that (or the UK equivalent)... but regardless, IF he was convicted for chipping then this case can be used to help make the next case against someone doing something less obviously illegal, like selling Linux XBoxes...
Regardless of the fact that this guy deserved to be punished, I can't see how chipping for a legitimate use (ie, to use it as a media centre etc) can possibly be illegal.
Did you miss this link in the submission? The fact that mod chips disable a copy protection mechanism makes them illegal, according to the court, whether or not they're actually used to play illegally copied games. The court makes case law. It's now up to UK legislators to change the situation.
I would hope that if I bought the hardware I'd be entitled to do whatever I liked to it, provided I didn't actually break the law by putting pirated games on it.
I would hope so too, but unfortunately, the DMCA and the EUCD were passed into law. Now, manufacturers can legally prevent you from doing what you want with the equipment you buy from them, by forcing you to disable access controls (thus breaking the law) in order to do it.
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PipianJ writes "Remember the ruling in Britain which outlawed mod chips last year? BBC News is reporting that a man has been convicted of modding an Xbox and sentenced to 140 hours of community service, a fine of 750 pounds (about $1300), and the confiscation of his PCs and Xboxes From the article: "The man had been selling his modded Xboxs, instead of modding it for personal use, but what modified Xbox consoles which he fitted with a big hard drive containing 80 games. 'This case sets a major precedent does this set for casual homebrew gamers and importers?" which marks a milestone in the fight against piracy,' said games industry spokesman Michael Rawlinson."Update: 07/04 22:12 GMT by Z: Updated to more accurately discuss the story.
The title of the story is unrelated to the meat of the story. It's like ordering filet mignon at a fancy restaurant from a pretentious waiter and getting a plate of Rhesus Pieces.
This is about copyright theft, not modding. The title is uninformative and flame bait. Zonk should have known better than to release this story with that title.
Watch this post get modded into oblivion. I don't care, my karma is bullet proof, bitch.
--
BMO
The European copyright law is basically a copy of the US DMCA, so yes. Its for compatibility so that we can trade 'fairly' with the US, perhaps next we should consider flogging and stoning so we are 'compatible' with Saudi Arabian law?
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
Just a point on fair use for imported games - with DVD's the region encoding and the scrambling are two separate things AFAIK. Throwing all controversy with DMCA/EUCA out for a moment, breaking the scrambling/CSS part of the DVD would clearly by illegal, but breaking the region coding is not in any way a copyright violation or a breaking of a copy-protection device. Assuming the XBox works the same way, modding for compatibility with imported titles is not the same as modding so that a copied disk can be used or so that it can load from a hard-drive. Hopefully that would stand up in court, although given how crappy the law is in the first place i doubt it.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
Downloading copyrighted material is illegal. It's just that it's much easier from a technological viewpoint to catch the uploaders.
Actually it is prosecutable. Downloading copyrighted material for which you have no permission to do so is illegal. In fact it's a criminal offence.
I don't often support the moderation system, but in this case the parent poster must be modded down so is post is invisible, as he is giving misinformation which could lead to people committing criminal acts when they think they are legal. Why he was modded up I do not know, the moderator must be a pirate.
Cloning Marijuana Made Simple.
According the the BBC http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4650225.stm "the modification of video games consoles has been an illegal practice since October 2003, when the UK enacted the EU Copyright Directive."
This very much depends on your jurisdiction. Slashdot may be an American website, but there are still enough people from other countries here that the blanket statement "It's a criminal offence" is unreasonable.
In Canada downloading *absolutely is* legal. There have been rulings on this point from the high courts, and the CPCC is steamed about it. The comment from the minister in charge of these things was something like "It is very disappointing to discover that this is the case in Canadian law. We'll have to fix that."
They haven't fixed it yet, and Canada is hardly the most IP liberal country in the world. I believe France had similar rulings lately, largely because they have a similar copyright levy system.
Even in the US, though, downloading is *not* a criminal offense. You cannot go to jail for downloading. You can only go to jail for distribution. It's illegal, and you'd have to pay damages to the RIAA, but you will not have a criminal record. The FBI and local police will not and cannot investigate downloading. There will be no wiretaps to find out if you're downloading.
It simply isn't that kind of offense, which is why the RIAA has its own evidence gathering goons.
Even if it were a criminal offense, it would be a stupid thing to try to prosecute. The burden of proof in criminal court is "beyond reasonable doubt." Hard for downloads, only really worth trying for distribution. In civil court it's "the preponderance of evidence", which is easy.
I have reasons to know a little bit about this...after all, it's important to know what laws I am breaking...No, I don't SELL modded xboxes, but I've modded quite a few in my day. The bottom line is this: any mod chip other than the exenium (which has it's own bios) and I believe the new executor (same reason) is illegal because it uses illegally obtained code. Same thing goes for any dashboard other than the linux cromwell setup (which uses no micro$oft code), they are all based on programming which was illegally obtained, therefore, any hardware chip is illegal, any dashboard is illegal, copying games etc is illegal AND all of the above violate the EULA. That hasn't stopped me from modding the crap out of all of my friends boxes...nothing like firing up my xbox and checking /. with firefox !!!
The game systems themselves are sold at a loss inorder to get market share with the games sold for profit.
Stop propagating this myth. It is not common industry practice. A quick google search, a click to slashdot.. a search for "myth" and a link easily refutes your claim.
Well, Webster has as well:
Etymology: Medieval Latin piratia, from Late Greek peirateia, from Greek peiratEs pirate
1 : an act of robbery on the high seas; also : an act resembling such robbery
2 : robbery on the high seas
3 : the unauthorized use of another's production, invention, or conception especially in infringement of a copyright
No,the BBC WERE accurate, the offence was breach of the EU Copyright directive, which makes it illegal to chip the xbox - actually to defeat a copy protection system. That's what the guy did, and thats what he was convicted for. The piracy didn't help but the copying of games was actually just a side issue that didn't help his case at all
And the people shall be oppressed, every one by another, and every one by his neighbour Isaiah 3:5
This is from the introduction to The True-born Englishman by Daniel Defoe, published in 1701.