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The Videogame Industry Is Fighting 'Right To Repair' Laws (vice.com)
An anonymous reader quotes Motherboard:
The video game industry is lobbying against legislation that would make it easier for gamers to repair their consoles and for consumers to repair all electronics more generally. The Entertainment Software Association, a trade organization that includes Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, as well as dozens of video game developers and publishers, is opposing a "right to repair" bill in Nebraska, which would give hardware manufacturers fewer rights to control the end-of-life of electronics that they have sold to their customers...
Bills making their way through the Nebraska, New York, Minnesota, Wyoming, Tennessee, Kansas, Massachusetts, and Illinois statehouses will require manufacturers to sell replacement parts and repair tools to independent repair companies and consumers at the same price they are sold to authorized repair centers. The bill also requires that manufacturers make diagnostic manuals public and requires them to offer software tools or firmware to revert an electronic device to its original functioning state in the case that software locks that prevent independent repair are built into a device. The bills are a huge threat to the repair monopolies these companies have enjoyed, and so just about every major manufacturer has brought lobbyists to Nebraska, where the legislation is currently furthest along... This setup has allowed companies like Apple to monopolize iPhone repair, John Deere to monopolize tractor repair, and Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo to monopolize console repair...
Motherboard's reporter was unable to get a comment from Microsoft, Apple, and Sony, and adds that "In two years of covering this issue, no manufacturer has ever spoken to me about it either on or off the record."
Bills making their way through the Nebraska, New York, Minnesota, Wyoming, Tennessee, Kansas, Massachusetts, and Illinois statehouses will require manufacturers to sell replacement parts and repair tools to independent repair companies and consumers at the same price they are sold to authorized repair centers. The bill also requires that manufacturers make diagnostic manuals public and requires them to offer software tools or firmware to revert an electronic device to its original functioning state in the case that software locks that prevent independent repair are built into a device. The bills are a huge threat to the repair monopolies these companies have enjoyed, and so just about every major manufacturer has brought lobbyists to Nebraska, where the legislation is currently furthest along... This setup has allowed companies like Apple to monopolize iPhone repair, John Deere to monopolize tractor repair, and Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo to monopolize console repair...
Motherboard's reporter was unable to get a comment from Microsoft, Apple, and Sony, and adds that "In two years of covering this issue, no manufacturer has ever spoken to me about it either on or off the record."
ok, so you're going to require manufacturers to make repair manuals and parts available to the general public. What's to stop them from writing in the manual, "purchase and install Comprehensive Assembly #012934" and selling that part which is basically a replacement for the entire unit? Who's to contradict them if they say that the unit is not serviceable?
Understand when you sell something it then belongs to the buyer.
If you want to retain rights to it you have to rent the item then it is still yours.
When I buy something I will do what I want with it and die defending it.
...is why you are not required to only have the dealer repair your vehicle. Consumers must have the same freedom with electronic devices.
When you brought a Sony radio there would be a schematic sheet inside the case so you could repair the electrical device yourself.
When you make HUGE price tags to repair items, people are going to repair it themselves. I previously worked for Lenovo/Asus repair depot. To replace an LCD was over $300. Part on eBay is about$60 takes maybe 10 mins depending on the model. So when you flease the customer long enough, they attempt it themselves because the $300+tax or buy a new one for $400. Most think I'll give it a shot for $50.
An industry that makes bank on people buying replacement consoles and software titles to replace "damaged" product, fighting to prevent end users plugging that revenue stream!?
SAY IT AIN'T SO! /s
For those that dont understand how software can be an issue:
Suppose that Nintendo or Microsoft or Sony decide that they want to not tie software downloads to a user account, but instead to a hardware unique key. Now when your console dies, that's all she wrote.
Another possibility is that they fear that tools to recover data (which would naturally develop from open standards and tools to 'repair' a console, such as from a failed firmware update semi-brick) will allow users to back up their downloads, and or, share pirated content.
Nevermind that at least in Nintendo's case, the ability to fake an install ticket on Wii-U allows users to download directly from Nintendo's NUS service, and install titles on their wii-u free of charge. This outstanding, existing, channel for piracy takes second fiddle to trying to plug a hypothetical future one. (because that makes total sense! /s)
In reality, Nintendo and pals are worried that people will keep obsolete consoles well past their expected service lifes, and that this will impact the residual revenue stream of re-released titles later. (Like all the times they have released the zelda titles. 3 times each now for Twilight princess, twice for WindWaker, more than 5 times now for the original NES zelda titles, etc.) They are worried that these old consoles will develop cult follower status, that indie developers will continue to develop for those consoles without paying developer licenses or royalties, due to their being past end of life-- (much like say, Tepples who posts here does for NES and SNES) heaven forbid if any of those are better than what Nintendo/MS/Sony/etc, are currently offering-- or worse, game houses decide to target an obsolete platform just to avoid platform license fees using open SDKs.
They fear losing the privilege of being the gatekeepers, and becoming less relevant in the face of very powerful obsolete consoles remaining in the market.
That they would be terrified of right to repair is a no-brainer.
The reality that the public requires this right is also a no-brainer.
One of those has to win out, and consequences will follow.
Yes it is. If you own the item, then all of the rights of ownership are to be afforded to you. You get to do with it as you please, and that includes repairing it.
It's a derived right, to be sure, but it is a right, nonetheless.
Always your best friend until they get your money. Soon we will just be a rat getting a food pill in a cage.
This story directly followed one on Comcast and CATV, so it's worth pointing out the difference.
Comcast is a monopoly and a profit-making machine; in spite of their piss poor service (they were the lowest rated in U. of Mich's survey of several hundred businesses) they stashed away enough to buy NBC. You can do that when you collect $100/month or more from the majority of Americans in many communities, and most of that money is pure profit.
Video game consoles are not a great business. Sony and MS are both in the business basically so they won't get shut out of the living room by a major competitor the big profits they hoped for never materialized. So they make money in miscellaneous ways, such as overcharging for accessories and repairs. Not great, but this is what allows them to sell consoles for $250-$300 instead of a lot more than that. You get what you pay for.
So I'm inclined to look the other way when it comes to this particular set of sharp practices in the videogame console industry. CATV is different. The Feds and state govts should throw the book at Comcast and Charter when ever they get a chance.
Right to Repair should be on each countries constitution !
Is it the basic step to be creative. Because we (the people) dont have all the tools that the manufacturer has and still we dont must have the right to repair !
I have a NES with more than 25 years and still works. Why my PS3 with less than 5 years is already falty and I cant fix it ?
Right to Repair is like the right to breath. So dont be foolish SONY, MICROSOFT, APPLE or whatever company thinks we dont have the right to open up the product and hack, solder, fix each inch of it. On a Hardware, Software or Firmware layer.
Oh please. The scenario you described could be easily prevented by writing these Right to Repair laws so that requiring consumers to ship devices out of the country (or maybe even the state) is illegal, and consumers are entitled to a full refund from the retailer if a manufacturers tries this.
The point of the law is to make it so that farmers can repair their tractors and other equipment. In the past decade, big tractor companies have been locking down their machines using the DMCA. Since it could take days or weeks for a repairman to come by and fix it, and that time lost without the machine could cost the farmer their livelihood, it has put them in an impossible position. That this affects pretty much every other market besides farm equipment and vehicles is an unintended side effect of the computerization of everything and application of the DMCA to lock down all those things.
Software is a little different in machines. When safety interlocks are provided by software, the manufacturer wants to ensure that such features can't be deleted from the firmware. This may require embedded controllers to separate monolithic software into a BIOS/self-test ROM and an 'operating system' ROM, which is easy to upgrade. Then, when a user-supplied operating system demands the drive-train shift into reverse while doing 50, the BIOS will conduct sanity checks that prevent the machine obeying it.
I do not care about the 3rd party service. I do not want to deal with authorized service. I want a service manual (the same one given to the employees of the authorized service) and for the manufacturer to sell me the needed spare parts.
MS used to ban people for useing there own hdd's (much cheaper ones) in the 360. And the 360 used Ext case ones. At the same time the ps3 was open to any 2.5 one.
This reminds me of a true story that keeps rearing it's head up ever few years. A certain computer company charged their clients thousands of dollars to upgrade each of their mainframes. Sure enough the upgrade worked great. Without flaw. The Problem: All the technician did was flip a switch inside the machine. While this discussion is about repair service, it falls under the same logic. A lot of the little tweaks to fix something could be done with little or no cost.
Care killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back.
Do you want $100+ oil changes at the dealer ship?
DRM'ed tires that need an dealer install and maybe even an max miles limit?
Exactly correct. The right to repair is a blatantly obvious ramification of ownership rights.
actually they are not given much now a days ... they just replace boards and if they don't work they replace another board, there is not really a "Manual" given anymore to actually repair the defective board.
"The bill also requires that manufacturers make diagnostic manuals public and requires them to offer software tools or firmware to revert an electronic device to its original functioning state in the case that software locks that prevent independent repair are built into a device."
Since this would require 2 copies of the OS and firmware to be stored in the unit (which will have to be stored somewhere that won't be overwritten accidentally), this will just bump the price up.
I can't tell you how many Atari joysticks I've broke — or fixed — back in the day. I even tried building my own light pen on a few occasions, but those things never worked.
Want to know the actual difference between a "legitimate" HDD, and a not-legitimate one?
A small PNG image file loaded onto some magic sectors, and an 8 byte magic number written directly afterward. The drive's firmware was default factory, but only a small handful of drives were supported.
That image was of the microsoft logo.
Yes. The presence or absence of that little png file is SO TOTALLY going to change how a game is played online. /s
No-- Microsoft KNEW that they were vastly overcharging for a COTS component that was not special in any way except for the data stored on the platter, which is very inexpensive to replicate. They did not care. They were the gatekeepers, and were milking people dry by purposefully selling base systems without HDDs, or with very tiny ones, while pushing digital downloads.
Know what else? When it came to the "USB" storage options, I put various very high speed USB2.0 devices that I had PERSONALLY TESTED the raw performance of and verified that they were bitching fast, on my 360 to see if MS was full of shit when the console did its own testing-- Sure enough, it was premium bullshit. It would consistently say the device did not meet recommended speed requirements. Know what I did? I went out and bought one of the shitty USB memory sticks MS was hawking, and tested it myself. It underperformed compared to the units I had been attaching. The magic? The USB string-- For real.
Bullshit. Premium bullshit all around, and people just ignore it, because there is no alternative. Fuck that noise.
We don't need a right to repair law. All we need is a law that says if a manufacturer adds something to a product to make it harder for the end-user to fix, then they must fix the product for free forever.
The rationale being that if the end-user is not free to fix the product, then the end-user is not the owner. The end-user has merely rented the product. The manufacturer is still the owner, and thus is responsible for the cost of repairs.
Boards - yes, might be a bit difficult to repair a modern board, though my friend works at a cell phone repair company and they do solder things on the base board of the cellphone. Still, I would like to be able to buy the spare parts from the manufacturer instead of searching for them on ebay etc. And some devices have mechanical components - I would really like to get a replacement gear, pulley or something like that.
Sounds a lot like ink cartridges.
Do you want $100+ oil changes at the dealer ship?
DRM'ed tires that need an dealer install and maybe even an max miles limit?
Hmm, how could I implement that? First off, if the oil does react as predicted with temperature and pressures the ECM could shut down. I suppose you could implement some kind of sensor inside the oil pan that checked for that particular oil, perhaps by requiring a special additive that would react with elements in/ the sensor. The sensor would just be an oil level sensor, but using the wrong oil would detect as no oil and no start.
DRM tires. Meh, that is even easier. I'd be surprised if you couldn't embed some kind of rfid tags that somehow was checked by the ECM. The computer would just refuse to shift into gear if your tires were too old, or if the tread had worn down to the point where the tag was gone.
Of course, getting this kind of stuff into after the fact is harder. People will fight it, but it is certainly doable. In fact making any change at all that can be detected by the ECM is enough to possibly have to have the whole configuration retested and resigned by the dealership. After all, if there are changes, then you may be violating environmental or safety laws...
Let's go on.. just for fun
AC compressor: As with the oil, use modified chemicals and such that are easily lost. Sensors will flag the missing substances and shut down.
alternator: The 3 phase waveforms from the alternator are used by the ECM to optimize part of the close loop operation, but these signals can only be recorded if the alternator successfully authenticates with the control processor.
Power steering: Electric is common. Just have it authenticate with the control processor.
water pump; Require non standard chemicals to service. Use the wrong radiator fluid and your water pump self destructs.
Internal engine parts can be the same.
Spark plugs. What, you thought DRM was only for complex things? The new spark plugs are integrated into the coil through proprietary connectors, and each coil must authenticate with the control processor. Coils will automatically report as bad after so many days.
automatic transmissions: speciality fluids for one. You can measure transmission slip and determine if your running out of spec. the electronics in the transmission must of course authenticate, but they should also monitor transmission systems.
In short, while I don't bet all these ideas are doable, I'd bet you could lock down almost are car maintenance if you wanted to. Never forget the usual one of requiring car specific speciality tools to get anything done.
Personally, I still haven't bought a new car, and may never do so.
Think of the console hardware makers children!
It makes me wonder if they will react by not selling anything anymore and instead move to a subscription or lease model. Thay way you never technically own the console therefore you have no right to repair it. Plus it would give them ongoing revenue which could end up higher than the initial console purchase.
No idea if this would be financially viable as they would have to repair the unit for free (for a fault) and keep track of millions of units and arrange returns when people give up their lease, plus potential loss from people not paying etc.
Seems to be the way things are going (streaming, Adobe etc)
If you built your own PC this is a non-issue.
~ People that think they are better than anyone else for any reason are the cause of all the strife in the world.
Not really IMHO.
They are at the same level as people who buy industrial plant and expect it to last for decades as well.
They are buying commercial grade equipment and expect commercial grade parts availability instead of the cheap short lifetime stuff the retail consumer is expected to put up with. I once visited a foundry for an agricultural pump manufacturer. They had the patterns for up to 70 year old equipment and cast those parts every now and again to maintain their policy of "lifetime" support. While that's an extreme example that is what is sometimes expected of equipment that is used in production instead of the throwaway consumer items we are expected to put up with.
So if I order takeout from a restaurant and I get it home to find it undercooked I just have to eat it like that?
I'm not allowed to pop it in my oven and fix it?
What if I want to put salt on it at home? Should I have to pay you for that too massa?
Drm oil change is easy. A physical lock on the lid. And force regular service by an ecu that shuts down when it is time to pay up.
I sure am happy that I can repair my old pinball machines, that every nut and bolt has a part number so I can find a replacement part.
Addams Family Pinball Repair - Part 1 of 2, The Transistor
They sure wouldn't have lasted for 30 years without repairs.
They still fulfilled their role and made money for the original owner somewhere.
Now shut the fuck up and send more money.
Signed - Microsoft, Apple, Sony
My ism, it's full of beliefs.
Did you really just use the phrase "high speed USB2.0"...
USB2.0 is faster than many optical disc drives, AC.
For reference, the max bandwidth of USB2.0 is 480mbit, or about 60MB/sec.
A typical DVD drive (we will even say that this is a fancy 12x drive, just to give it the benefit of the doubt), such as found in an xbox360, has a max potential bandwidth of 132mbits. (16.5MB/sec)
So YES, AC. A "Fast" USB2.0 device is one that favors the top possible speed allowable by the bus, which mechanical disk drives have no problems whatsoever providing.
The drives in question were capable of sustained sequential reads in excess of 40MB/sec, and arbitrary random reads of about 20mb/sec.
The Microsoft branded flash module? about half that.
This is a TERRIBLE IDEA!
Get a clue. If a state makes a law that anyone can get access to repair parts and manuals the manufacturer will close all authorized service in that state. Require shipping the device out of state for repair.
Congrats, you just described APPLE _right now_. Yes, Get a clue.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Who logs in to gdm? Not I, said the duck.
>require manufacturers to sell replacement parts and repair tools to independent repair companies and consumers at the same price they are sold to authorized repair centers
It so happens Apple does NOT sell any parts/tools/manuals to their "authorized repair centers". What they do is let you use the name, and in exchange get paid $18 per item you ship to Apples Texas facility for exchange, all while charging your client $149-1299.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Who logs in to gdm? Not I, said the duck.
It's not, or this wouldn't be a story.
Console is dead.
In Capitalist US, the commerce controls the Government.
That was because you had to mod the console to use your own HDD originally, you weren't banned for using your own HDD, you were banned for breaking the online service terms and conditions of not using a modded console.
Those terms and service were illegal right on their face, because the Magnuson-Moss act prohibits voiding a warranty for a repair if the repair uses compatible parts. And the video game companies already lost the legal battle to prohibit people from using their trademarks as an unlock; if you make that the unlock, then you simultaneously give everyone permission to use it for that purpose.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
I'm not making this up. I bought something. It stopped working. It had to be shipped to China for warranty repair. It wasn't expensive and I threw it out. Lesson learned.
You should get better at talking to eBay. A recent dispute I was in which culminated with a refund was won by me with a statement about how the seller wanted me to become an expert in international shipping law so that they can get back their counterfeit product and see where it went wrong. Problem solved.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Being able to get *access* to schematics and boardviews in a timely, and legal manner would be a real nice thing and one of the big pushes behind trying to get this "Right to repair" bill through. Seems a lot of the counter-fight is trying to detail how "poor dumb consumers" shouldn't be near this stuff in the first place ( and to a degree they're right ) as opposed to techs already skilled in the processes involved in the repair work., In reality what a lot of people such as myself and Louis Rossmann (who'll be there speaking in favour of the bill) would like to have is the ability to obtain the information required directly from the manufacturer, even at a fair-and-reasonable price.
In the old days (80's~90's) you could call up the service dept of most equipment manufacturers and for $15~$20 they would mail you the documents you wanted. These days you have to hope someone leaks it out to the internet. The businesses claim "trade secrets" but in reality there's nothing secret in those schematics, almost every section is pretty much a lift from the 'suggested/example layouts' from the part/chip manufacturer in the first place.
Ultimately it's all about preventing people from holding off buying a new product, but rebuffed under the guise of "safety" or "secrets".
Yes it is. If you own the item, then all of the rights of ownership are to be afforded to you. You get to do with it as you please, and that includes repairing it.
It's a derived right, to be sure, but it is a right, nonetheless.
Wake up as to what is happening today. From cell phones to SaaS, the concept of true ownership is becoming extinct.
Once cars become autonomous, it will be "too dangerous" to allow Joe Mechanic to work on one. Autonomous taxi service vehicles will be owned by a corporation for the same reason.
Computers are already become non-serviceable devices (e.g. New Macbook Pro sealed and soldered case design), so the argument of repair has become moot.
Whether it's an bubble-wrapped version of liability, damage to sensitive designs, or merely attempts to prevent "hacking", traditional ownership will continue to die off, in favor of Greed.
And I strongly doubt there's anything that anyone is going to be able to do to stop it.
And I strongly doubt there's anything that anyone is going to be able to do to stop it.
Well, people could buy modular and easily repairable PCs and not "sealed and soldered" models.
Of course, t hat would require people think about the future.
The US Government (the UK's too) says "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" to save the planet.
Conspicuous by its absence is "Repair", despite the fact that it would have made a nice 4th "R". A lot of the problem is that politicians are the sort of people (PPE graduates mostly) who have never repaired anything in their lives and regard repairing as doing something dodgy and disreputable
This is how politicians see DiY repairs
Ebay always sides with the buyer, open the case and ebay will simply refund the money paid if returning the item is too difficult. in international cases from china ebay wil even say, "here is your money, keep the item" because if the auction is marked "no returns" that means that the seller does not want it back for any reason at all even damaged so the buyer can get a refund and keep the item.
If he did not open a case with ebay then he is either very stupid or just started using ebay.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Anyone that owns a performance car has been paying $100 oil changes at even a quickie lube for a while now. MY dealer oil changes are $160.00 If I buy the oil and filter myself it comes out to be $65.00 to do it in the driveway.
I'm guessing that you have not owned a car and taken it in for an oil change cince 1980? Even my Honda Civic was $70 for an oil change just yesterday at a Valvoline quick lube.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
is the same as right-to-alter? I hope so. HP beware! ( printer issues ).
It is really time for the right of ownership to be established, permanently.
Ownership used to mean being able to soup up the family car a bit. ( HP inkjet cartridges...)
Ownershiip used to mean being able to repair the motherboard circuitry. ( well, when things were simpler and larger...)
Ownership used to mean being able to sell a functioning unit. (DRM and licensing eulas )
The design of cars, computers, TVs, appliances to NOT be fixable or to last past the warranty is deliberate, and a shameful business practice.
They get on my lawn...
You are a paranoid delusional person. But you somehow got "greed" worked into your screed.
This is a TERRIBLE IDEA!..... the manufacturer will close all authorized service in that state. Require shipping the device out of state for repair. They could go as far as requiring shipping out of the US for repair.
What BS. There will always be a proportion of the population who will be prepared to pay more for an authorised dealer repair. I have a top-of-the range Pentax camera needing repair. In the UK there is no restriction on anyone repairing a camera but I still took it to a Pentax authorised repairer. But I repair my own cars and computers.
There are some good reasons why an authorised repairer should cost more than an unauthorised one, such as having attended the manufacturer's training course. There are also some no-good reasons : I approaced an "authorised repairer" for my phone (listed as such on the phone maker's website) and it transpired that they were not even aware that they were one. I guess some previous manager had paid the maker for the right to say they were one, and there was nothing more to it than that.
I bought something. It stopped working. It had to be shipped to China for warranty repair. It wasn't expensive and I threw it out. Lesson learned.
WTF has that got to do with this discussion?
They're actually fighting the obligation to provide information on how things work, because:
a) people would be able to compare products and see that product B is a thousand times easier to repair than product A;
b) people would be able to fix their products somewhat and that would mean more competition.
So it's the age old fight between earning money by questionable means versus doing what's decent. We will soon see people posting that "capitalism knows no Morals", "Morals suck", "profit is the only criterion" and other BS.
Now, what is important is that these guys gets patents on these devices. Do you know why is it called patent? Because that is supposed to be "open, visible" -- because that is what patent means.
You get the rights to explore an invention if you open the specs for society to learn, and improve upon what was invented. That's how progress happens. But that's not what they want, is it? How can they sell suckers the same thing next year if everybody knows it's the same thing inside?
That is what a patent has become nowadays. A way to prevent access to knowledge instead of its original intent.
It's not, or this wouldn't be a story.
You've got that backwards: it is, which is why there is a story. Lawmakers regularly pass new laws to make it explicitly clear that rights do, in fact, extend to particular areas. Our rights already exist there, but our ability to exercise them has been obstructed, and lawmakers are pushing back.
Manufacturers have gone to great lengths to prevent people from exercising their rights (e.g. licensing instead of selling, adding terms of usage that limit rights, etc., most of which have yet to be challenged heavily in court since the manufacturers are trying to avoid setting a precedent they don't like), and states are starting to push back, saying that those rights cannot be given up as a condition of sale or use.
No real surprise but Apple is fighting this https://9to5mac.com/2017/02/15/apple-nebraska-right-to-repair/
You, as the owner of the item, already have the right to repair it. Nobody is going to arrest you for opening it up and doing whatever you want.
The question is whether the manufacturer has the right to sell, or not sell, what they choose. That includes replacement parts and service manuals. It really is that simple.
Yes. The presence or absence of that little png file is SO TOTALLY going to change how a game is played online. /s
You're right, it won't. But the console mod that was required to allow you to use an HDD without that little png file will.
Now then, show me someone who got banned for using their own HDD, who did not mod their console, and I will concede. Until then, my point stands. You weren't banned for using a non-MS HDD, you were banned for modding your console. Or for a car analogy, I didn't arrest you for the broken tail light, I arrested you because you ran 3 red lights at 50mph over the limit.
The Entertainment Software Association, a trade organization that includes Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo, as well as dozens of video game developers and publishers, is opposing a "right to repair" bill in Nebraska, which would give hardware manufacturers fewer rights to control the end-of-life of electronics that they have sold to their customers...
Typical Rick and his buddies must be against this. I'm just surprised that there aren't video game development studios against it. ;)
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Copyright and Rights Licensing
Upon which the GPL is based, as well as just about the entire entertainment industry. It's difficult to imagine a studio spending tens or hundreds of millions on a production based on the hope that no one would copy and distribute the resulting product without seeing to it that they were compensated.
Patents
Upon which the drug industry, chip industry, etc., is based.
While these mechanisms are clearly not optimum, they do seem to benefit society in general. Certainly they are strong supporting factors for progress in the fields that they act as rights bulwarks for.
I really don't see that business models based on associated laws are inherently broken. Would you care to elaborate on your position?
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
You're just going to end up with proprietary chips and such all throughout every device with no way to source parts except the manufacturer. This is a no-win situation for the consumer.
From the point where it is actually implemented, onwards.
The rights of people who have done no wrong are (okay, should be) higher priority.
Ideally, create fair laws that describe the bounds of legitimate behavior. Punish people who break these laws. Don't do things to people who are not breaking the law that prevent them from doing legitimate things based on the idea that someone, somewhere, might break the law.
The problem with DRM (Digital Rights Management) as it is presently constituted, is that the only rights that are being managed are those of the publishers. The rights of the consumer are being roundly trampled. It's appalling, really.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
very easy fix to your problem. Buy your own hdd.. install it and the xbox hdd in your pc, start linux, open command line 'dd if=path/to/xbox/drive of=path/of/non/shitty/ms/drive bs=1042' wait until it finishes.. Brand new 3tb fast microsoft hdd.
almost forgot. google how to truncate hdd afterwards to get full drive space.
I call BS
What gives them the right to have ANY "control over the end-of-life" of ANY piece of hardware that I have purchased? That's my property, not theirs, full stop. If it's not my property, why aren't they leasing it to me on a monthly basis instead of selling it at retail for several hundred dollars? I'll do what I want with my own goddamn hardware.
Fuck you. Fuck you in the ass with a rake.
Note: Lumpy meant if you buy full synthetic.
If you don't buy synthetic, price is half to a third. Lumpy tends to frequently post things he doesn't fully understand usually insulting people based on his ignorance.
Conventional oil 0.99 a quart.
Synthetic oil 9.29 a quart.
Difference of $50 in oil alone for a 6 quart engine.
Thanks for spreading more misinformation.
The HDDs on the original 360 hardware was an external attachment that was purchased separately, and attached to the side of the console. You could open the attachment housing up and replace the HDD, but that would get you kicked off of Microsoft, without any modifications to the console.
Wrong! The HDDs weren't even inside the console. They were separate hardware and could be detached easily without voiding the warranty. When I had to send in my 360 to repair the RRoD, they asked me to remove the hard drive before sending it in. The HDD enclosures were trivial to open up, and the drives were easy to replace. They just charged an arm and a leg for the drive+enclosure when you could get a drive 10x the size at the same price.
If they ban all that, then maybe we should be looking elsewhere for entertainment. Money deprivation is a great deterrent for abuse!!
I've been a tinkerer all my life. I mess around with whatever hardware (and software) I want. I like to build stuff, and I even like to modify stuff to work better than their original intention.
now, while I completely understand the manufacturers wish to control sales of ALL their extra parts, original parts and even future parts they didn't even think of - the hardware they sell to YOU are YOURS - period!
The minute the law changes on this, you have gone from a democracy to a dictatorship sort of regime where you can't do as you wish with even your own property. I can even support their wish to forbid reverse engineering with malicious intent to run pirated games on their consoles - fully understandable! But still - the HARDWARE itself is the owners property, the one who purchased the hardware in the first place.
A solution to this could of course be to RENT you the hardware, that would fix their woes right there.
I'm old enough to remember these hardware debates for several decenniums, and they are equally hilarious (and also a bit scary) each time because it's all about controlling the "idiot" consumers. Most of the consumers don't give a hoot about meddling around with hardware and won't even notice. But people like me and my buddies (and probably a lot of the Slashdot originally intended audience) are DIY'ers that love to mess around with their hard-earned hardware, my Atari 2600 is only out of date when I say it is.
Remember the TV with the V-Chip? Remember how the microprocessors in the future Intel generation should be able to be "switched off" if they didn't have some "policing" software that the gov. could control in order to "prevent terrorism"?. Remember when Linux readers/users used to be seen as terrorists and vigilantes?
Anyone - who is capable of doing things on their own - are potential terrorists and troublemakers according to the powers that be, because you have the power to tinker, you have the power to make your opinion HEARD, you have the power to think, act, reverse engineer, modify, learn and educate on your own, in other words - you have POWERS that they don't want you to have.
What this world is coming to - is for you and me to decide.
So the same thing goes for a DVD, since you own it, after you purchased it? To me they are trying to expand disgusting regulations to the gaming industry.
And the video game companies already lost the legal battle to prohibit people from using their trademarks as an unlock; if you make that the unlock, then you simultaneously give everyone permission to use it for that purpose.
Specifically, in the case Sega vs Accolade.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
So the same thing goes for a DVD, since you own it, after you purchased it?
It does, hence the First-sale doctrine, which is the foundation on which things like the video rental industry are built. Now, your rights do have limits, of course, among them being that you can't infringe on their right of ownership by copying the DVDs as much as you want and selling the copies for a profit, given that they still own the rights to the content on that DVD, but you own the DVD itself, so you can do with it as you please.
..you don't own it. Way past time for electronics makers to fess up to their 'engineered to fail in 2 years' and 'engineered to be made, not repaired' design rules. If you can't fix it, you really don't own it.
Microsoft still is the same pig with lipstick.
Don't you remember the AARD_code Microsoft embedded in Windows 3.1 to artificially generate errors and if needed with the change of a single byte kill the competence's OS DR-DOS and force the users to buy their MS-DOS instead?
This is no much different, except that this time Microsoft enforced it and got scot-free.
The Gameboy uses a similar trick - I mean the original one, the first. The firmware in the device (such as it is, it's really tiny) checks for the presence of a certain byte sequence, an encoded image. If the bytes match expectations, it gets displayed. If they aren't there, the firmware locks the device. That's why if you power it on without a cartridge in you see a scrolling blank box: The image is the Nintendo logo.
The intention was to use trademark law to prevent unlicensed publishers selling games: In order to make a game cartridge run on the Gameboy, it had to include the Nintendo logo, and thus any unlicensed publishers would get sued by Nintendo for trademark infringement. I understand that a later supreme court ruling determined that a trademark could not be considered a trademark if it was incorporated into a functional element, but that was post-Gameboy.
I'm guessing Microsoft pull the same trick. Perhaps it still works in some countries.
You're paying those prices for synthetic oils. Synthetic blends and natural oil are cheaper.
Make BIOS Whitelisting illegal. Finding out I've got another Lenovo laptop locked in to using a small pool of sub-par WLAN cards just ruins my day. I get their wanting to cut costs by going with lower-tier components, the lower cost was what made their product my choice, but WHY punish me by blocking any possible upgrade path?
I've never heard of the mpaa going after people for resurfacing DVDs.
I think the AC was snarking on the fact that USB2 has a terrible design which makes it much slower than its nominal speed.
Firewire400 is 400 Mbps and gets 39,7 MB/s transfer rates.
USB2 is 480 Mbps and gets 20-30 MB/s transfer rates.
Or that is my experience anyway.
I went out and bought one of the shitty USB memory sticks MS was hawking
You sure showed them!
The ONLY reason this happened now and not decades ago is because chipped modern farm equipment has been causing huge problems. It has to do with the fact that farmers like to be able to fix their own stuff or have a local fix it or even mix parts. It is important to their business to be able to do things like this.
The reason it took a small number of farmers to get this to happen is because of how our political system places too much emphasis upon geography vs population. All that rural representation is mighty powerful... it's also a much less diverse area so the people there are more like minded and easier to represent.... and manipulate.
YES their will still be special chipped parts at unfair prices! but that fight will come later on and be lost only if the farmers get screwed over enough.
Democracy Now! - uncensored, anti-establishment news
Perhaps someone will go after them retroactively to recover deliberate damages (substitute appropriate legal term) on behalf of all those gouged ?
I find it pretty distasteful that there's so little appreciation shown towards customers who appear to be seen as a necessary evil.
Requiem for the American Dream
Some time ago my phone slipped out of my pocket and fell on concrete. As I have the iPhone 5c, the plastic on one of the corners chipped away. I thought that it wasn't a big deal and I could replace the panel very easy. I ran a query on YouTube and saw a video, which was close to 2 hours with a very detailed explanation on how to disassemble and assemble. Needles to say - I decided that I don't have the patience to go through the whole process. My previous two phone were a Blackberry and a Lumia 525 none of them had this problem.
For reference, the max bandwidth of USB2.0 is 480mbit, or about 60MB/sec.
60MB/sec includes low level protocol overhead. You cannot achieve that number. The actual maximum theoretical transfer speed for useful data is 53 MB/s. This can be further limited by the used HW/SW. If you have really good HW/SW then you should achieve at least 43 MB/s.
you can't infringe on their right of ownership by copying the DVDs
There is no such thing as a "right of ownership" over the content of the DVDs. The poorly named legal fiction of "copyright" is not a right at all, but merely a privilege; and like all other instances of legal privilege, it can only exist by infringing on the actual ownership rights of others.
The difference is obvious even to a cursory inspection. If copyright were about ownership then it wouldn't expire after a limited duration, or be subject to exceptions for fair use or (in some cases) compulsory licensing. More importantly, if copyright were treated as a right of ownership, then the liability for infringement would be determined by the extent to which the infringement diminished the copyright holder's ability to make use of the copyrighted content—which is, of course, impossible, since the creation of a new copy does not in any way diminish the utility of any existing copy. Copyright is not a right, it's an example of misguided social engineering run amok, a legal parasite intent on strangling its host.
"The state is that great fiction by which everyone tries to live at the expense of everyone else." - Bastiat
You're quite correct that it's not actually ownership and that I misspoke in saying it was. Thank you for that correction.
That said, the idea that it is a mere privilege instead of a right is demonstrably false, given that the Copyright Clause of the U.S. Constitution refers to this idea as an "exclusive right" secured to the author of the work. As you said, it only exists for a particular duration and there are other limitations placed on it, but it clearly is a right. You can quibble over whether we should call it "copyright" or not, but it's undeniable that the right exists, regardless of what we choose to call it.
Of course, the degree to which copyright succeeds at implementing that right is a subject for some debate. I agree that copyright laws (and other IP-related laws) have gotten out of control and are in desperate need of reform, but that's a separate topic over the oughtness of the situation, rather than its reality, and I honestly don't feel like hashing that topic out right now.
So, swinging back around to the quote you originally pulled from my previous comment, what I should have said was that you can't copy the DVD because doing so would infringe on their exclusive rights to the material they authored. Again, there's the question of whether or not things should be that way, but there's no denying that that's how things work today.
Removing and replacing surface-mounted electronics is not for the faint-hearted. But I'd like to see manuals and schematics come back.
The "right to repair" has been upheld against corporate giants from Hewlett-Packard to the Big-3 Auto makers.