Slashdot Mirror
Nintendo Cracks Down on Copying Devices
Adrian Lopez writes "Nintendo is cracking down on mod chips and copying devices with the help of the Hong Kong government. 'The Hong Kong High Court has intervened, at Nintendo's request, to help stop a global distribution operation involving game copying devices and modification chips that violate the copyrights and trademarks of Nintendo DS and Wii. On Oct. 8th, the court ordered the raid of Supreme Factory Limited facilities, through which Nintendo representatives seized more than 10,000 game copying devices and mod chips over the course of three days. The devices seized are used to copy and play Nintendo DS games offered unlawfully over the Internet, and the mod chips allow the play of pirated Wii discs or illegal copies of downloaded Nintendo games.'"
Its like taking piss out of a swimming pool, you can make wii chips out of commonly availible materials for $5 (WiiFree, OpenWii etc)
The devices seized are used to copy and play Nintendo DS games offered unlawfully over the Internet, and the mod chips allow the play of pirated Wii discs or illegal copies of downloaded Nintendo games.
And personal backups of your own media so that you don't have to buy a new copy when your friend/pet/child/"significant other" scratches it.
I don't know what the laws are like in HK, but I feel that the continued erosion of this right in the media (and thus the public perception) is wrong.
I can't help but notice that every article on the Main Page has been posted by ScuttleMonkey...where did everyone else go? Was there a party last night that Scuttlemonkey wasn't invited to?
If Nintendo is 0% successful at this, they will have wasted a lot of money and time for nothing.
If Nintendo is 100% successful, on the other hand, they will save some revenue, but at the cost of pissing off a lot of users, legitimate and otherwise, who might decide to take their business elsewhere.
Odds are pretty good that their actual success rate will fall somewhere between 0% and 100% (most probably close to the low end of the scale), making this endeavor slightly annoying to the users, while being in the main a big waste of time.
Any way you slice it, it's a dumb idea.
____
~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
Ripping Wii Discs
You don't need any mods at all. Just copy.
...the way this article is spun.
Yes, mod chips could be used for illegal activities, but also for good. The article really fails to highlight that. With a tone like this, you'd wonder how tape recorders ever got sold.
B.
Every experiment which ends in a big bang is a good experiment.
Software piracy is the norm. You can acquire scandalously cheap, perfect-looking copies of everything from Office to Everquest for dirt cheap, i.e. cents, not dollars. The Chinese government has been remarkably slow in taking action to support the authority of nations seeking the enforcement of copyright laws, and while I doubt this action will have any real effect, if it's the sign of a larger commitment to action-- and it well could be, what with China's footprint in the global economy increasing every day-- this could well be a major sign of things to come.
I'm funny. If you come see me perform, I will make you laugh.
I've always wondered if those that use R4 cards (I don't have one) for the DS and play online are at risk of being caught and having their doors knocked down by the SS..err I mean Police. Surely they're logging users and have means of identifying legitimate/illegitimate users?
ilovegeorgebush
The requirement should be, create a back up copy for the end user which cannot be used; easily; by anyone else. Granted many companies won't like that either but it may be easier to keep it off their radar if the system truly doesn't make it easy to just copy and distribute paid content.
The problem comes down to the fact that the "innocent" users are being lumped together with the abusers. Yet who do people bitch about? The company being negatively affected. Do you know people who have pirated games? Have you told them to take a hike? If not, why?
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
"It can destroy years of hard work by a team of very talented software developers, who strive to create games consumers enjoy playing."
It -can-, but it doesn't. Instead, it allows people that don't have the money to buy the game to play it anyhow, and get their friends excited, and get them interested in sequels and spinoffs. Instead of forcing the penniless gamer to go out and play in the yard for free, it keeps them addicted to video games.
On the other hand, people that -can- afford the games buy them, for the most part. I'm not talking the teenagers that have to skip lunch this month to buy a game, but the people with full-time jobs and disposable income.
And when it comes right down to it, the only difference between someone "stealing" a game using a modchip and that same person buying the game used is the timeframe. The developer doesn't get any money from either way. (Of course, GameStop gets some money on the used route, but that's irrelevant to this discussion.)
My current tactic? Rental. Any game I don't absolutely have to have right away, I just rent it. For 1/3 of a game per month, I can rent 2-4 by mail. For 3/4 of a game per month, I can rent 4-8. Since I lose interest in most games after a few hours anyhow, this works great for me. I've had some games that I thought I'd love that I spent less than an hour playing them before they were back in the mail. GameFly (and probably other services) will even let you buy the game at a reduced price if you want to keep it. That makes it really hard to justify buying it brand new.
So in the end, Nintendo can rid the market of these devices and it won't change things for the better. That isn't their goal, though. Their goal is to remind people that they are illegal and 'wrong'. And they did that.
"If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; But if you really make them think, they'll hate you." - DM
I've not made a habit of backing up CD / DVD media based games or content, primarily due to the hassle. For the adult stuff my wife and I are careful enough with the disks that the risk of the disk becoming damaged through normal use is reasonably low. (read as not worth the hassle and cost of obtaining technically illegal software and quality media)
:-)
An incident last weekend however has me reconsidering my current practices, at least where my kids CDs, DVDs and games are concerned.
Over the course of the last few years I've had to use the furniture polish trick on a few game CDs. Usually after one of the kids left them sliding around in a drawer and the PS2 or 'puter couldn't read them anymore. With I think one exception, so far I've been lucky and they've all be playable.
Last weekend however my son had a friend over for cooperative HALO3 fest. On the second evening they're setting up the friends system when my son decides to "stand up XBox so it can get some cooling". After this the system says the disk is unreadable, and it's discovered that their is a perfectly circular series of scratches about a quarter inch from the out edge and an eighth of an inch wide.
After multiple attempts with the furniture polish and toothpaste tricks I finally get the disk to read. I have NO doubt I'll be buying the young man a new HALO3 disk in the near future.
The moral of the story?
It should be EASY and LEGAL to make backups of your media. It doesn't matter whether it is music, a video or a game!
Oh, by the way, anyone have any favorite, tried and true, game disk restoration tips?
Never ascribe to malice or conspiracy that which can be adequately explained by ignorance or stupidity.
The devices seized are used to copy and play Nintendo DS games offered unlawfully over the Internet, and the mod chips allow the play of pirated Wii discs or illegal copies of downloaded Nintendo game
They're also used to play games that aren't available for sale in the USA (and won't run on a North American Wii even if you import them legally), and they're used to play legal ("Fair Use") backups of game discs that have been damaged.
All of you MAFIAA shills can whine "oh but that's not what you guys are REALLY using them for!" all you want, but my both my sister and my girlfriend like Japanese date sims (weird, yes), and I've known several people who've had a game disc damaged beyond playability--usually by dogs or small children.
Many years ago MS turned a blind eye to rampant piracy of their products. They knew people would get used to their applications and stick with them over time, often ensuring the workplace purchased new versions trigging the costly upgrade cycles we see.
Nintendo have been doing the same with the Wii and NDS, it's the reason so many people are buying them. There is a large amount of "free" software available, so the units sell like hot-cakes. Now that they've beaten the xbox and ps3 by selling incredible numbers, they're closing the doors. Now they want you all to buy lots of games. Don't forget, Wii games can update your OS and can render the drive hacks to do strange things.
The same thing happened to the playstation. It was ticking along, then the modchips came out and people were going nuts buying playstations to chip. I only have to look around the office to see that they all pretty much bought Wiis because of what they can download. Just in my 20 person dept, there are 11 Wiis, 3 xboxes and 4 ps3, two people own all three. The recurring conversation is when will the ps3 get an iso loader. 5 people claim to be holding off the ps3 until it has one. Strangely, there's not much interest in the xbox despite it having a nice catalogue of games and priate scene.
He, I can mod my Wii? Never knew that, thanks.
You would be suprised how many people learn about filesharing from the medias attack on it.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Try harder next time moron. That joke is old and stupid.
Damn them.
The DS has a thriving homebrew community. I'm working on a home brew game. And I've written at least one program that helped turn my DS into a PDA. If Nintendo wants to stop the mod chips, they need to at least provide the same value these mod chips provide. It sucks when a company makes such features unavailable when you know they are easy to add.
I do understand why they do this though. I am amongst a group of engineers who all have DS's and mod chips. And what did the group do with their mod chips? Obviously, they pirated games! Not a single one of them thought twice about buying $100 worth of games for steam, so they could play games on their $1000 40" high-def LCD panels. They aren't hurting for money, they aren't making a statement against the RIAA or the MPAA. This also shows how DRM works. While they no longer buy games for the DS since they can copy them, they do buy games on steam since they can't copy those as easily.
So while I'm excited about home brew and what I can do with the DS, people are using these things for piracy so naturally Nintendo will go after them. It pisses me off to have things I use taken away because other people use them to cheat.
I'm sorry, but to all those who say that they're using their mod-chips for legitimate purposes: who are you trying to fool? I can see the point that you might not want your kids or your dogs chewing on your games. Here's your legal solution: DON'T FEED THEM TO YOUR DOGS. If you're too stupid or lazy to keep them out of harm's reach, then you don't deserve to have them. God help your kids if you ever decide to own firearms.
If you were actually serious about being worried that your game would break, you simply would have gone to GameStop or Toys'R'Us or the local equivalent and gotten one of their game warranties. I think its $3 for a $50 game and it gets cheaper for cheaper games. I used to work at a GameStop and have seen disks that were scratched, cracked in half, chewed on, mangled, we even replaced the one with a bullet hole in it. Now that TRU is getting into the same racket, I bet other stores follow too.
Having lived in a college dorm, I can tell you the real use of mod-chips is for downloading games that you don't own and playing them. I remember a big event back them was that the French version of Halo 2 was leaked right before the American release. In my dorm you could walk up and down the hall and hear a lot of zapping, followed by French profanity. If you listen to only slashdotters, you would swear that the only people that buy and use modchips are little old ladies that have piles of legally purchased pristine discs locked away, and bring out copies for their rowdy grandchildren to play with on weekends. In my experience, I've never seen them used for that.
I have a "hacked" ps2 (softmod, not hardmod, using HD Advance) and use it to store games on the HD. The advantage? No more scratches and wrecked disks, no more worn out lasers and much faster loading times (in game it makes a huge difference). It also allows me to play out of region games.
I'm not a pirate, so leave me the hell alone.
Fortunately, the auctions ended & the buyers had paid me before eBay informed me that they were taking the F2A listings down due to software piracy. When I questioned eBay as to why this had been done when I was not advertising any commercially copied software with the cartridges, they told me to get in touch with the ESA (Entertainment Software Association) who had asked for the listings to be removed.
So far, I have emailed the officious tosspots at the ESA four times & demanded an explanation as to why they insisted the F2As be removed when eBay can still advertise writable CDs & DVDs, USB flash keys and DVD writers, all of which can be used for piracy in a similar fashion.
In over 4 weeks now, I have not received one reply from the ESA who, as far as I am concerned, have accused me of being a software pirate & been heavy-handed in their attitude - even though I made it clear to them that the F2A can be a legitimate developer tool for homebrew GBA ROMs.
All these heavy-handed corporations are just assholes!
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Wii Mod chips dont crack the encryption, really they dont do much of anything. They wire to the serial programming interface of the drive controller, and tell it to lie to the console about the disc's authenticity. Past that the chip shuts off and any encryption on the disc is being decoded by the console.
I'm surprised that no one has mentioned the impact on the homebrew scene. I don't really think of backup as neccessary for cartridges, but AFAIK these devices are the only way to make a http://www.littlesounddj.com/lsd/ or http://www.nanoloop.de/ cartridge. I don't know much about the DS/Wii scene, but I bet they are also targeting stuff that affects thriving GBA and GBC homebrew projects. The problem here seems to be that console makers don't offer any legitimate means for users to create software for their platforms without forking over lots of cash for a developer license (and a machine that runs unsigned code).
Given that nintendo DS is so cheap to develop hombrew apps with a backup devices, I could only be worried about this.
hotOFF topic! yea!
In many countries with socialized medicine, the free health care is a basic safety net, but in addition to it one can also purchase private insurance. However, since the private health care industry is competing with the free public system, it must keep costs very low. For example, in Spain, I was paying 200 euro a year for private insurance. Sounds like a win for everyone except those who would let the poor suffer to pad their own wallets.
In many countries one gets a card in the mail every few months to alert them to a routine dental appointment.
Have you ever lived in a country with socialized medicine? Don't knock it if you haven't tried it. In the U.S., I could hardly afford decent health care, but in the countries I've lived in since leaving the U.S., health matters are quite comfortable.
I live in Canada, and we have socialized healthcare. If I call up my doctor, i can get an appointment within days, or the same day if it's actually something that I really need to have looked at on that day. Scheduled appointments are booked in advance. There's no problem getting one. There's a lot of horror stories that get passed around, like long waiting times, and not being able to find a family doctor. Some are true, some are hyperbole, some are outright false. But none of those are as bad as the ones I hear about the US health system. Where even people who have been paying their insurance, are denied payment, because of some inconsistency in the way they filled out the forms, or because a certain type of treatment isn't covered, or because they didn't get pre-approval (for emergency care no less). I probably sound a lot like a certain Michael Moore movie, but to me, that is what I find to be the worst thing about privatized health care. Even if you are paying, and you have insurance, you may not be covered, and you may still not be able to afford treatment when you get sick.
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
"They're chasing down copyright thieves "
No, they're pumping up profits. Stop portraying this as a moral crusade. Big companies break copyright all the time. For them it's a prelude to negotiation.
But some guy wants to play a few games off the internet, and it's the end of Nintendo, Japan, and the American Way of Life (TM).
Get a little perspective.
I have a Cyclo DS Evolution. I thought it would save me money by not having to buy the games. The Evoution and the 2GB micro SD came out to about $90. I'd only have to pirate 3 games to save money. Ironically the only game I ever play on it is Tetris. Oh and get this. I've owned two versions of Tetris in the past. And I intend to buy Tetris again for my Xbox. I owned Tetris for the Apple II, (at least I think I owned a legitimate copy, it might have been pirated; My Dad bought it for me.) And I bought Tetris for the Game Boy Advanced. I lost the catridge. Does that mean that whoever has it now is now the legal owner? Or am I within my rights to aquire another copy of Tetris even though it's not the same exact version I used to have? Alexi Pajitnov lives like a pauper anyway. Is this the fairness of capitalism distributing wealth to those who have the most talent that you apologists are talking about?
So I bought a DS flash card to pirate games and ironically I don't use it to pirate very much at all. I would have been better off buying a legit Tetris catridge again if it weren't for the legal applications. Ironically those might not be all that legal either. I like to use the video player to play TV shows that I pirate off the internet. Hey, if I captured the shows myself and transcoded them to fit on my DS that would be legal, but if I download what someone else has already done for me then it's piracy right? I also like to use my DS as a wifi AP detector. So I can crack their WEP keys. Ha ha. Funny thing, one of the big reasons I bought the damn DS was because I was expecting to be able to play homebrew Doom on it. Nintendo and ID won't release a legit Doom for DS. Now that I actually have one I can't get Doom to run because of some technical issue. Damn it. BTW my Dad definitely bought me a legit copy of Doom 2. I remember he bought it at Costco. And that's ignoring the coolest application of all. I have friends who carry around huge purses filled with DS games. It looks very unwieldy. I can carry 30 games in one card. Which would be legal if I chose to purchase those games. Is it the device manufacturer's fault what the users do with their product? Is piracy really crushing the industry? Or maybe if there were still manufacturing jobs left in America workers would be able to afford video games.
PS I could really use a hand getting homebrew Doom to work. I have friends with DS's and I think they'd enjoy deathmatching via the wifi. Are you listening ID? I'll pay $100 for a legit copy.
Console manufacturers have been eliminating freedom for years. This is why people should be going with a PC with GNU/Linux as an operating system and open-source games. No more lockout and it is totally legal. Pretendo, Sony-Bony, and Microshaft are all in it for the money and are willing to eliminate freedom by cracking down on the mod chips and copying devices to earn that money. The Mod chips give people the freedom to play open-source games on their console, something Microshaft, Sony-Bony, and Pretendo don't want. The copying devices and mod chips allows someone to back up their games, something else the big three don't want so they can milk even more money from their sheep. GNU/Linux has no need for mod chips. A copying device for GNU/Linux is a cd/dvd burner, flash drive, hard drive, solid state drive, etc.
As anyone can see, GNU/Linux and open-source wins hands down when compared to Sony-Bony, Microshaft, and Pretendo.
My family owns an original Nintendo NES, Super Nintendo, Nintendo64, Nintendo Gamecube, and a Nintendo Gameboy Advanced. We are a Nintendo specific game family. We have purchased litterly hundreds of ORIGINAL cartridges and CD's for these systems that totals up to A LOT of money spent. I was able to get ahold of a Super Wildcard for my super nintendo a few years back and yes I did backup ALL my cartridges for my Super Nintendo and I am glad I did. I now have two that won't work anymore becuase the contacts on the cartridge are so worn. Even cleaning them didn't help. Do you know how HARD it is to find OLD nintendo cartridges to replace them? Even GameStop is slowly phasing out nintendo stuff to put in more XCrock shit! I don't own an XBox, I WON'T own an XBox. I'm starting to think Microsoft bought up GameStop too. At least I can still play my LEGALLY purchased Super Nintendo games on ZNes on the PC in Linux. At this rate I don't know if I will buy a Wii. Anyone know of a legit place that won't rip you off to purchase backup devices for the old nintendo NES, nintendo64's and gamecubes. I have one gamecube Cd that is starting to have problems now too! I want to be able to LEGALLY backup my games damit! Fuck the RIAA, MPAA, Nintedo et al.. If I won't be allowed to backup up my LEGALLY purchased stuff I won't be doing anymore purchasing. It will save me a lot of money at least and less in the pockets of the media outlets that seem to think it is their god given right to get my money!
My thought is that the game console makers should produce their own game backup units that would allow you to legally backup your games. Even if it put like a serial number into the backup of the game so it could be traced back to the original owner if they decided to "pirate" them. This I think would protect BOTH the consumer and the media outlets rights. The consumer could legally backup his legally purchased media and if they gave out a copy to someone else and the meida outlet found a copy floating around they could trace it back to whoomever gave it out and prosecute them. Simple I think.
At least I have my old Amiga 2000 system and all the tons of games I bought for it. Oh that's right I am glad I made backup copies of those too so I could play them on UAE under Linux on my PC, since my Amiga 2000 floppy drive died and try to get a replacement for one of those!
Starting to see the LEGITIMATE need for backup software/devices??????
The Truth is a Virus!!!
I definately do. For all 4 of you that will use these devices legitimately. The line between something legitimate and something thats not is in how people use it. If the vast majority uses it for something legitimate, then no law will be written against it, and it will stay legitimate. If the vast majority doesn't, well....
Thats why butterknives are mostly legal everywhere. If everyone started to use bufferknives as weapons, actions would be taken against em. Everything's legal (even murder!) until too many people start using it the wrong way.
I've tried GameFly in the states, and had nothing but trouble with them (somehow quite a few games got lost in mail ... OTOH I had no trouble with a parallel Netflix subscription. WTF?). Almost all mail-driven rental services in the States have really poor ratings and come with similar horror stories.
The Raven
I am not a gamer, I can count on one hand the number of games I actually completed. I get easily bored and only keep play if the game is really amazing me.
I actively pirate games and I am looking forward to mod my new wii because there is no way I am going to spend 60 euros for a game I play for 3 times and then forget about. If I really like a game I usually end up buying it sooner or later, even if I pirated it the first time. Most games cost too much and are total crap, if I could not download and try them I wouldn't even have bought my console in the first place.
I hope Nintendo starts giving away demos in their online store just as MS and Sony do (I mean _real_ demos, not stupid trailers like Metroid)., then I would have very little reason to pirate them.
China is cracking down on piracy. LOL. Good one.
When I was in high school, I bought a Flash2Advance for gobs and gobs of money because I wanted to play NES games on my Gameboy Advance. I did that for a few days, and then got sick of it. A few months later I decided to try my hand at GBA game development, and made a few demos and a complete game over the course of a few months. I entered the game in a Homebrew GBA competition and got an honorable mention... My parents thought it was the biggest waste of money and for a while I did too, until three years later when I mentioned it on my resume. I got a job at an embedded engineering company, and my boss later told me that the whole reason they called me in for an interview was because of they downloaded my GBA game and tried it out. Before that I had never even heard of "embedded engineering," and now it is my passion and specialty.
I never thought a $500 video game would change the direction of my life, but I will never doubt that homebrew is great. Certainly it can be used to steal games, but it is also one of the cheapest and most effective ways for a novice programmer to get into a booming industry. And, yes, developing for emulators is also valid, but testing on real hardware was an invaluable experience that an emulator cannot replicate.
I'm not quite sure what to say. You seem to have a very basic misunderstanding of how health care in other countries works. Government health care does not mean that you can't also have private insurance. Actually, in many countries, all insurance is provided by private companies, even if it's... You know what, this will take too long. I'm not going to explain how this works. I'll just tell you that you obviously don't understand how the system works in other countries or how it could be changed in the US, and I'll encourage you to just educate yourself.
Don't forget that you need some kind of homebrew device (I refuse to call them 'pirate devices') to run DSLinux. http://www.dslinux.org/
Blaming the private market ignores the other half of the picture. Why is health care in the US so expensive? Malpractice insurance for doctors and hospitals is one oft-referenced factor. Looking solely at the cost of malpractice insurance, however, underestimates the total cost that this screwed up tort system contributes. A very large chunk of administration is dedicated to dealing with the insurance industry, introducing an substantial cost burden above and beyond malpractice insurance costs. This cost is passed on to patients and their insurance, which must then foot the bill for this increased expense which they were the cause of in the first place, further driving up insurance costs.
Clearly there's a problem with this system, but is socialized health care going to do anything other than shift your insurance premium into your taxes? By all means, let's provide the means for healthcare for those who otherwise can't afford it, but involve the private market, and make the market fucking compete. The competition that exists now is a joke, and everyone's paying for it.
I might be on Nintendo's side for stuff like this if it wasn't for the #$&(U@#$ region lock codes.
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
I think pretty much everyone agrees that the current US system is broken and badly in need of reform. The real issue is whether a socialized system is the best way to do it... it's pretty counter to the American way of thinking, so it's going to really need to prove itself before people can get behind it. And, who knows, there's always the possibility we'll find something better which makes more use of the free market we all love.
Comment of the year
The Datel GnM isn't designed for playing warez. It was actually a semi reasonable attempt at producing a homebrew device for the masses. Yes it can be used for playing backups/copies/whatever you want to call piracy, but compared to other cheaper cards it's compatibilty is poor. I would be over the moon if someone produced a card capable of running homebrew that wouldn't be able to run backups, which I thought the GnM would do. It is very annoying the fact that there is a great DS homebrew scene that gets tainted by the fact that most of the devices used to boot homebrew can also boot warez.
Try to get a Amiga 2000 replacement drive? http://cgi.ebay.com/Amiga-2000-2MB-RAM-C-Card-Genlock-OCS-Joystick_W0QQitemZ200164535987QQihZ010QQcategoryZ4598QQcmdZViewItem You can buy a whole system including an external drive and genlock for less than $30, so your argument falls flat on it's face.
... you get piracy. We have a modchip in our Gamecube and primarily (by far) it is used for homebrew, backups of our purchased games (sorry, but I do think I should be allowed to backup our purchased games), and to play games from other regions (region-coding is extremely irritating and stupid - why make it hard for us to buy and play games we want to play?) Have I ever downloaded a game ("pirated")? Yes, I have. I've only done it a handful of times, and have always ended up tossing it out (or buying the game), but none-the-less, when the possibility is there, you're bound to try it at some point. And some will continue to do it and won't toss out their pirated games.
If Nintendo et. al. provided a means for backing up games, free tools for developing and running homebrew (or for a very nominal fee), and eliminated region-coding, then modchips wouldn't be necessary for these legitimate purposes, and there wouldn't be the temptation to try pirating games at all. They choose not to provide these things. Wouldn't it be easier and less costly to them to provide this stuff? It would also make customers happy.
--- What?
How is it counter to the American way of thinking. Education (through highschool), police, firefighters, highway system, social security (I know this doesn't work well), and many other things are provided to the American people in a socialized fashion. What makes healthcare any different from the services that are already provided?
Anthropic principle: We see the universe the way it is because if it were different we would not be here to see it.
You mean, like data? That stuff on CDs, DVDs and the like?
Wait, now I'm confused. So backing stuff up is for information, or isn't? And can I borrow your couch?
I hate to tell you this but in America, it is a democracy! The president should execute the will of "THE PEOPLE" not what he personally thinks is correct. That's the problem we are having now, a president that does whatever the fuck HE wants regardless of what the PEOPLE he represents are asking for! -FataL (A US ARMY Soldier currently deployed in Bush's private war!)
How would they identify it? It just bypasses the boot-up "is this a legit game" check. Once you load a game into RAM, the DS has no way to know how it got there or wether you think its "legit" or not. And plenty of people have R4s and play downloaded games that are perfectly legit. I don't like to carry around 15 cartridges all the time. I have them all on my microSD card in my R4 instead, along with a little music to listen to.
Oddly enough, in Canada, private insurance is outlawed. That in itself seems pretty repressive.
[PowerPoint] is a tool for capitalist presentation
You dont know anything about the American system, you live in Canada. Michael Moore is a blowhard that consistently distorts facts. Google the false claims in pretty much every one of his movies. The Atlanta Children's hospital has a sign in their admissions area that says "We do not refuse service to anyone, regardless of their ability to pay". Pretty much every emergency room will treat anyone that shows up, even if they cant pay. Publix supermarkets are now offering free anti-biotics for common problems like ear-infections and UTI. I haven't heard of anyone having problems getting their insured level of treatment. Sure there are cases of insurances companies trying to screw people out of paying a claim, but its not the norm. Many people come to America to get the best medical treatment possible. The system is by no means perfect, but its at least as good or better than anywhere else. -David
WTF?
You're not DragonMinded, author of DSOrganize, are you?
But seriously, Nintendo's argument would be "If hobbyists want an open handheld development platform, they should go buy a PDA that runs Windows Mobile." The Windows Mobile homebrew community even has its own wannabe PocketNES.
Clearly there's a problem with this system, but is socialized health care going to do anything other than shift your insurance premium into your taxes? By all means, let's provide the means for healthcare for those who otherwise can't afford it, but involve the private market, and make the market fucking compete. The competition that exists now is a joke, and everyone's paying for it.
A little known fact, Canada's "socialized" health care is a "single payer" partly private industry. The various GP and Labs compete with each other to provide services. Major institutions like hospitals are public but many of the medi-centres are private. It's not open competition as such since demand is far out stripped by supply right now due to demographics, as well as having the price regulated but we do get fairly reasonable care for our dollar while the US spends x2 in total for a worser average, median, and modal performance. The only upside is the US gets better care if your at the top. All other segments would have done better in Canada. The increased cost is mostly due to the "profit" margin on products and your right there isn't that much competition in the US market. When I hear of people pushing for privatized Canadian health care I have to point out all the parties pushing for it can be linked backed to the highly corrupt, inefficient, and inhumanr US health care industry.
"There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy."
More commonly known in the Hong Kong and Chicago underground as "Goombas".
(How do they get from Chicago to Hong Kong so fast? Pipes, my friend. Pipes.)
I had to get that out. Not only are you incapable of imagining one of the many points made by the many people who responded to your troll, but you waste everyone else's time by posting a stupid fucking post that is sympathetic to companies taking away our Right Of First Sale Doctrine. Go fuck yourself.
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
Two points:
1. In almost the same breath that you acknowledge that some stories about your health care problems are hyperbole, you then then spout hyperbole about the US health care system. Don't believe everything you're told.
2. Canada does not honor US patent laws with respect to drugs (it has an 8 year patent period and even allows generics if the brand name cannot fulfill demand). That is why they are so much cheaper in Canada. So much so, that some politicians in the US, that have never passed an economics 101 course, suggest that we buy our drugs from Canada. In other words, that we should also not honor US patent laws with respect to drugs. I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader to both extrapolate the effect that decision would have on research and development AND to guestimate the amount the US markets end up subsidizing Canadian health care. If the US were to adopt a socialized health care system, there would be profound consequences in research and development. Perhaps it is worth it, but it's not the simplistic choice you make it out to be.
Just curious. Does Wiikey still work?
-Clio
Karma: Bad (mostly from not giving a fuck)
Blog: http://clintjcl.wordpress.com
If the US went to socialized care, I have a feeling that a lot of hospitals would slow their growth, and eventually become under-funded because people don't like to pay taxes. (look at our education system).
The average US citizen is so damned irresponsible with their money (government isn't much better) that they don't know how to pay for things they need first. I live in the Twin Cities (MN). What you have is tons of people who basically expend their credit to the point of breaking with expensive cars, TV, stereos... And kids that they can't feed on their welfare checks, and houses that were purchased on a First Time Buyer's or Low Income program (some are literally better than most people with excellent credit can get) who don't/can't pay their mortgages, and they're losing these houses at an alarming rate. This is becoming 'normal'. The average US citizen is $8562 in debt (2004). These are not the only people who don't want to pay the taxes for better schools or better health care... but they don't know how to spend the money they do have and vote down anyone who mentions taxes. Nobody likes taxes, but when the people who are served by them don't want them, it's a problem. Burden on society? Yeah. But some how they need to be educated and helped. Or it just gets worse.
THAT is why social health care cannot work in the US. We already see the ugly side of commercial health care in the US. Reform is needed. But so is education, responsibility, accountability...
This sig isn't original enough, it's time to come up with something witty...
Thats the whole point I was trying to make: as long as butter knives are used in significant proportion for good purposes, you can use that argument. Once the overwhelming majority of people carrying butterknives around do so with the intent of harming somebody, they'll get regulated and/or banned.
If the overwhelming majority of people using stuff like R4 and modchips used em for backups, no one would say anything, or would simply deal with the "crime", not the tool as you put it. Thats why you can buy CDs and DVD-Rs at Best Buys, but you can't buy R4s there, and thats why PC games have stupidly awkward copy protection bullsh*t (still better than not being able to buy CDs).
Yes, I understand where you're coming from, and I too will use backup tools to make backups (and absolutely nothing else), but when you see someone with an R4 in the bus, if you have to place bets on if the game they're playing is a backup or a so called illegal copy, I sure as hell would not bet on the former.
That' not the point.
/. you get the impression "the only people that buy and use modchips are little old ladies that have piles of legally purchased pristine discs locked away, and bring out copies for their rowdy grandchildren to play with on weekends.", but that doesn't mean you're not within your rights to backup.
/.ers are so zealous, is a steady erosion of the rights of consumers in the interest of protecting copyright holders from a dubious threat. And many people feel that there are powerful monied interests in our society that see the scenario described in Stallman's "Right to Read" as their eventual end goal.
OK, you're right, to read
What we're seeing here, and the reason many
The actions of pirates/infringers is only worth worrying about if you accept the copyright holders' ludicrous assertion that every incident of copyright infringement = 1 lost sale. The thing that companies have trouble accepting is that there's some people who will use your product if they can get it free, but are STILL UNWILLING TO PAY $$ for it!
Commercial operations in China/former soviet characters that are cranking out hundreds or thousands of disks, and selling them? Throw the book at them. Those are the people copyright law was designed to stop.
But non-commercial copyright infringement? Who cares? When I was poor, living hand to mouth, and I pirated games from whatever source, but if pirating had been made non-feasible by whatever means (technical or legal) that wouldn't have made me magically be able to afford all the games I was pirating. It just would've meant I would've spent more time reading or something. Which would've got me less in the habit of playing and enjoying video games in general.
If a small number of individuals can't afford games, and pirate, the best thing to do is let em run free. When those people can afford it, the vast majority of them will just buy the games.
The plural form of "anecdote" is "anecdotes", not "evidence".
Well I'd like to be able to play multiple games on the DS without swapping. What does that have to do with pirating? I think this is just flamebait.
No, my point is that if everyone uses butter knives to kill each other, banning butter knives should be the lowest priority of lawmakers.
Citation needed that you can't move things around the screen in Meteos using the stylus.
Your arguments are arguments for Game Boy Advance homebrew, not specifically for DS homebrew.
Which is another thing that the other guy mentioned, but I think needs elaboration: There is a smaller audience for games on a PDA than there is on the DS.Nintendo subsidizes this audience. If you want access to this audience, Nintendo wants you to have a couple hundred thousand in the bank to show that you mean business.
I'm a fan of DS homebrew and a DS homebrew developer myself. But somebody needs to explain the devil's advocate arguments.
I think it's important for you to understand, the only reason your point has any traction is because you're posting it on Slashdot.
Much of the world hears your justification for copying and thinks "really? that's the best he could come up with?"
Making backups, while convenient, is really not going to get you the support you need in this argument.
And, honestly, the whole idea wounds contrived as a means to find legitimate reasons for making copies. Which, frankly, is exactly what it is.
I only go to buffets for the unlimited soft serve.
im writing a game for the ds now cunt, just because you have no talent does'nt mean you have to trip
"because Nintendo made a poor marketing decision when they decided to region lock their console."
Then what does that say about your decision to purchase said console, knowing full well that it was region locked (which you did)?
Stop blaming Nintendo for something you were fully aware of beforehand.
You want to copy games, save the silly justifications and admit it. No one believes the "backup" or "homebrew" stuff anyway, so stop trying to sell it.
Doom and Doom II are both available on for the GBA, and quite playable! (Though it is not easy to find copies...)
"There are people who do not love their fellow human being, and I _hate_ people like that!" - Tom Lehrer
That you're talking about lies while trying to sell the idea that people are using these mod chips to play "backups" and imports.
It's exactly your kind of post (the disingenuous kind) that make me take Nintendo's side here. None of you people want to admit you play copies you never paid for, while insisting at the top of your lungs that you don't.
I don't think your argument gets anywhere unless it's at a site like Slashdot. The rest of the world simply dismisses you because of your obvious unwillingness to acknowledge what the chips are primarily used for.
BUt keep ranting, it won't get you what you want, but it'll make your karma look better.
PS I wasn't able to find one, so could someone link to a post of someone here on Slashdot who admits they primarily use the chips to play copied games?
I'd prefer one that's modded up. I suspect that will be exceedingly difficult to find...
"Supreme Factory"? Did the HK police have to fight the "Final Boss", too?!
"The fight for freedom has only just begun." - Geert Wilders
"Methinks he doth protest too much."
That's the feeling I get when I read these "I don't play copied games, I use it to play imports and my own backups" posts.
Of course you do guys, of course you do...
I only go to buffets for the unlimited soft serve.
Good to know you wish to ban my rights on the basis of unsubstantiated (indeed, indefensible really, were you to actually know me) blanket attempts to impugn my character.
You are a vile, wretched creature indeed.
--
Given enough personal experience, all stereotypes are shallow.
Sorry, I was being overly harsh. I apologize.
The point stands, however. I am not using backups to justify breaking my side of the copyright bargain, despite your baseless accusation.
Would you like to have a second attempt to address my actual post instead of launching off into tangential land?
--
Given enough personal experience, all stereotypes are shallow.
just brick all the modded Wii's?
We replaced a FDD in our A1200 (10+ years ago!) with a modified Panasonic JU257, which are quite common. Try this
."Nintendo is cracking down on mod chips and copying devices with the help of the Hong Kong government. 'The Hong Kong High Court has intervened, at Nintendo's request, to help stop a global distribution operation involving game copying devices and modification chips that can potentially be used to violate the copyrights and trademarks of Nintendo DS and Wii. On Oct. 8th, the court ordered the raid of Supreme Factory Limited facilities, through which Nintendo representatives seized more than 10,000 game copying devices and mod chips over the course of three days. The devices seized are used to copy and play Nintendo DS games backed up by their owner, not wishing to damage their expensive purchases, and to enable homebrew, and the mod chips allow the play of legally backed up Wii discs or homebrew games.'"
Seriously... you pay $70-100 for a game and then it gets damaged and u r up shit creek, mod chips enable the backing up of your valuable purchase.
Tahnkfully mod chips are still legal here in Australia
-- Sex is the antonym of pringles. Once you pop it's time to stop.
Our democracy is not a continuous thing. The will of the people is heard every four years in the case of the presidency. The president is not obliged to change his actions or opinions every time a new poll comes out.
But the U.S. isn't run like a corporation. Sorry. If you don't like it, campaign to have the rules changed.
The economy went to shit when the dot-com bubble burst. This happened around January 2000, before Bush was inaugurated. The attacks on September 11th fucked things up much more.
I think that mileage can vary quite greatly on this issue.
I have a co-worker who had pneumonia, and he suffered with it for weeks before it was diagnosed. When he eventually got a doctor's appointment he was essentially put on aspirin without any testing. When things got worse he was sent for an X-Ray. The X-Ray took 1 week to be read by a radiologist. Then he was diagnosed and finally put on antibiotics, at the cost of weeks of recovery during which he was unproductive. This was in the UK - and he actually has private supplemental insurance.
In the US I've known people who have walked into emergency rooms with similar symptoms at 11PM. They were triaged, given O2/steroids to clear up the acute issue, X-Rayed within 1 hour, and diagnosed within an hour after that. After about 2-3 hours total they were discharged with an initial supply of antibiotics and a prescription. Within a few days they were feeling completely normal - because it wasn't allowed to fester for a month. This same treatment would probably be given to a homeless person if they stumbled into the ER or called 911 - it is an acute problem and is required to be treated by law.
The plural of anecdote isn't data, but the private/public healthcare debate isn't a simple one - there are a lot of pros and cons to both systems and we need discussion more than rhetoric to shape things up.