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Sony Sued Over PS3 "Other OS" Removal
Stoobalou writes "A Californian Playstation 3 user has filed the first class action lawsuit against Sony over removal of the 'Install Other OS' function from the Playstation 3. The action seeks to redress Sony's 'intentional disablement of the valuable functionalities originally advertised as available with the Sony Playstation 3 video game console.' The suit claims that the disablement breaches the sales contract between Sony and its customers and constitutes 'an unfair and deceptive business practice perpetrated on millions of unsuspecting customers.'"
Sony's standard EULA states that if the machine
1) didn't work,
2) didn't do what the expensive advertisements said,
3) electrocuted the immediate neighborhood,
4) and in fact failed entirely to be inside the expensive box when you opened it,
This was expressly, absolutely, implicitly and in no event the fault or responsibility of the manufacturer,
5) that the purchaser should consider himself lucky to be allowed to give his money to the manufacturer, /cite{Good Omens}
6) that any attempt to treat what had just been paid for as the purchaser's own property would result in the attentions of serious men with menacing briefcases and very thin watches.
They just added
7) If the machine does work, we will break it the next time we want your money or feel like it.
I think you're all missing the point. The path the GP poster made was not necessarily to Best buy or whoever but to Sony. There's two scenarios:
1) You call the 1-800 Sony line and get Prakesh on the other line. For all you know he sympothizes with you but is powerless to do anything. He can't give you back Other OS, he can maybe apologize and bring it to management who proceeds to ROFL (yes, on the floor) and then scrap your complaint.
2) You take your purchase back to Best Buy: under law they are forced to return your price and then duke it out against Sony about the return charge.
Who do you think Sony listens to? Joe, who is upset with their firmware on the line, or Best Buy USA whose upper management is yelling at you because they got a surplus of PS3s that they've been forced to refund because of your shit decision?
I don't think you realize exactly what Sony did here. Back when they were fighting the war against HD-DVD, they loved these Linux sales. Every user who bought a PS3 for reasons besides playing games was listed on the headcount of active Bluray players, and therefore served their master plan to kill off their competitor though showing superior market share.
Now that said competitor is gone, they'd prefer not to sell to or support those users, and so they're just killing them off. Sony has finished with using them now and now is actively fucking them over. All of us who leaned toward buying a PS3 due the Linux feature have been intentionally played here.