Possession is not nine tenths of the law, but it doesn't matter in this case because the property in question was sold outright to you. I seriously doubt anyone handed you an EULA to sign at the checkout when you bought your console, if they did you were a fool to sign it.
The argument isn't "How much warning must they give before doing this" it is "Should they be able to do this".
The proposal is "No, they should not be able to", not JUST for having a modded console.
Be sarcastic and dismissive of those affected as you want to be, it doesn't change the underlying issue.
Microsoft should not have the right to disable your console simply because you've messed with the hardware, especially concerning functions that do not have a logical reason to be tied to your Live account.
If Microsoft wants to be able to ban you at will from Live, then they should divorce your Live Account from the DRM validation process and make it a completely separate function with a separate type of account.
Only a valid argument when I'm not paying for access to it, when it's not required for DRM validation, or when there are other options out there than it.
As it is, you do pay for access to it, it is required for DRM validation, even of non-online features such as the media extender and content you've previously purchased, and there is no other option out there for access once your box is banned.
I refer you to this for your first statement and remind you that my argument isn't "They should have known MS would do this" but "MS shouldn't have been able to do this" for your second.
Yes yes, and "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss" and "How can you tell when a politician/lawyer is lying" and all the other bullshit people spout about the legal and political system to demonstrate that they aren't just uninformed but willing to get bitter over stuff they have no comprehension over just because they've been told to be.
Do you, me, and the rest of us a favor. Don't. Just don't.
If you were going for a funny, it's one thing. When you are blatantly presenting it as the gospel truth, it's a nother.
They didn't take any functionality from your XBox at all. They booted you off THEIR NETWORK.
I don't have an Xbox but I do have friends with them and they all state that some games and other functions of the 'offline' setup still require working Live Account access.
I do have a PS3 and a Wii and both of them have similar issues.
Yes, you CAN use all three as offline platforms. But in a severely limited fashion.
We don't even get into things like what happens to the stuff you played for on any of these various companies' stores.
When you first got on the network the agreement was that if you mod your XBox your booted off. You AGREED TO THAT and now it has happened. It is COMPLETELY legal and frankly fair.
You can put what ever shit you want in a EULA or TOS. That doesn't make it legal or fair. It just means your legal department knows how to craft a legal document. Kudos for that.
I don't care if they get to buy Fantasy Island out of the settlement money, if a law firm is able, via class action or any other means, to make it illegal for a company to screw with my console and remove functionality from it simply because it was modded (i.e. not because I was cheating, pirating, or because my mod 'broke it') then I say full steam ahead and find someone to yell "Ze Plane! Ze Plane!" cause it's worth it to prove that what I buy is MINE.
Just a bunch of state governments that would eventually loose on appeal but waste millions of tax payer dollars attempting pass laws to allow them to ban it and make a name for their legislators.
I'd take my billion and live it up, to be sure. I wouldn't, however, be upset if people didn't take my one time jackpot as evidence that I knew squat.
He's probably very cool. And I'm happy he got behind some causes that you felt were good.
He was also behind Sharesleuth.com, which was the precursor to Bailoutsleuth.com.
The idea behind the site was people who had 'dirt' on a public traded company would provide it to the site for publication. However Mark in a fit of what I have to call more than a little questionable ethics, decided that it was completely alright for him to short the stocks of companies with info being published on the site, before the site actually published the information. If that wasn't insider trading, it was the closest thing on this side of the law to it.
You yourself say "He buys random companies and starts random websites" and in a way, that's the point. He scatter shots his money out there in hopes of making another jackpot. That isn't sound financial advice, it's just a gambler's "big win" addiction.
Look, I'm not saying he's an idiot. I'm simply saying he's not shown the investing or business chops that would qualify him as someone anyone should be taking money advice from.
P.S. In case anyone thinks that his $6 billion jackpot somehow displayed hidden skill or insight, I also point out that he's currently worth a little over $2 billion. That's right, he's lost $4 billion in networth since being bought out by Yahoo!
The real question is, who would be stupid enough to listen to a man who made almost all of his money soley on the chance decision of buying the domain name "Broadcast.com" and convincing Yahoo! that it was work ~$6 billion dollars to buy out.
In a perfect world yes. In a realistic world, the game developer realizes that skirmish mode is simply what people play when they don't want to bother with going online and finding a human to play against, and the effort spent creating and polishing a seperate AI just for that mode would garner more points with the player if it was spent elsewhere (such as fine tuning the balance of the game, polishing the maps, and etc.)
Most game AI's are not well designed, but not because they can't be. Most game AI's are built from the prespective that the player should be able to win, therefore Grandmaster level thinking is less desirable than preditable patterns that seem impossible to be till the player realizes they can be exploited.
It's even WORSE than that, you'd think by now that Google would have borgified everyone working for it into one huge hive mind, incapable of making mistakes.
Come on people, developers are developers, the folk at Google responsible for the language thought they came up with a cute name and the lawyers didn't find anything trademarked with it. Not everyone is going to do an extensive vanity search on a topic before naming their brain child.
To win a lawsuit, you must be able to last to the end of the lawsuit. Winning a multi-billion dollar lawsuit helps little if you are under Chapter 7 bankrupcy.
Sometimes, as much as it sucks lemons, it's in your best interests to take the offer for pennies on the dollar rather than duke it out.
You honestly think that there aren't people out there with rudimentary WoW servers running? They might not be as robust, but I guareentee you they are out there.
Part of the reason Microsoft got shat on was its history.
1. They illegally tied the sale of Windows to the sale of MS-DOS, a product which they had a number of legitimate competitors for. 2. When they were caught with their hand in the cookie jar, they voluntarily settled rather than go to court. Part of their settlement was they would never ever tie their products together in that way again. 3. They then loosely tied IE (an existing product with an existing competitor) into Windows 95.
On the reverse side of this coin, as much as we might have liked it if they had, Apple has never really had a legitimate competitor to their hardware or OS. The only "Mac clones" that were ever legally sold were still licensed by Apple. Additionally, they've never explictly agreed not to tie their products together in order to avoid a spanking from the Department of Justice.
I'm not a particular fan of Apple, the company is just as arrogant as MS. And though I haven't seen as much unethical behavior (just agressive asshattery) from them as from MS, they still stomp all over the consumer and their rights as a matter of routine.
That said, comparing MS's antitrust trials to Apples current situation shows either a lack of perspective and history or a talent at hyperbole.
A day doesn't go by here on slashdot where someone who is (or thinks they are) some great engineer, programmer, scientist, or whatever shoves their foot in their mouth because they had to opine on something they actually know very little about.
For instance, you. Right now.
People have been spewing shit about smart people all being idiot savants who need to shut up and listen to the 'dumb people' who actually know how the world works since before the story of Icarus. And it's just as wrong then as it is now.
Being ignorant is never an admirable quality, and shunning knowledge under the assumption that "you are going beyond your limits" is asinine. If it weren't for people pushing their limits and being willing to take a chance at being wrong and failing we would all still be living in caves wondering where the next meal was coming from.
What you really mean are "people in general have an inflated sense of their own competency and thus tend to misspeak about things they are not strictly knowledgeable about" which is true regardless of their education. Don't pretend the 'salt of the earth' are some how immune to this effect.
Slashdot Mirror
Possession is not nine tenths of the law, but it doesn't matter in this case because the property in question was sold outright to you. I seriously doubt anyone handed you an EULA to sign at the checkout when you bought your console, if they did you were a fool to sign it.
You notice I didn't say "Microsoft" in my comment, I said "a company". This is an issue with a whole bunch of companies, Apple among them.
The argument isn't "How much warning must they give before doing this" it is "Should they be able to do this".
The proposal is "No, they should not be able to", not JUST for having a modded console.
Be sarcastic and dismissive of those affected as you want to be, it doesn't change the underlying issue.
Microsoft should not have the right to disable your console simply because you've messed with the hardware, especially concerning functions that do not have a logical reason to be tied to your Live account.
If Microsoft wants to be able to ban you at will from Live, then they should divorce your Live Account from the DRM validation process and make it a completely separate function with a separate type of account.
Only a valid argument when I'm not paying for access to it, when it's not required for DRM validation, or when there are other options out there than it.
As it is, you do pay for access to it, it is required for DRM validation, even of non-online features such as the media extender and content you've previously purchased, and there is no other option out there for access once your box is banned.
I refer you to this for your first statement and remind you that my argument isn't "They should have known MS would do this" but "MS shouldn't have been able to do this" for your second.
Prove it.
Yes yes, and "Meet the new boss, same as the old boss" and "How can you tell when a politician/lawyer is lying" and all the other bullshit people spout about the legal and political system to demonstrate that they aren't just uninformed but willing to get bitter over stuff they have no comprehension over just because they've been told to be.
Do you, me, and the rest of us a favor. Don't. Just don't.
If you were going for a funny, it's one thing. When you are blatantly presenting it as the gospel truth, it's a nother.
I don't have an Xbox but I do have friends with them and they all state that some games and other functions of the 'offline' setup still require working Live Account access.
I do have a PS3 and a Wii and both of them have similar issues.
Yes, you CAN use all three as offline platforms. But in a severely limited fashion.
We don't even get into things like what happens to the stuff you played for on any of these various companies' stores.
You can put what ever shit you want in a EULA or TOS. That doesn't make it legal or fair. It just means your legal department knows how to craft a legal document. Kudos for that.
I don't care if they get to buy Fantasy Island out of the settlement money, if a law firm is able, via class action or any other means, to make it illegal for a company to screw with my console and remove functionality from it simply because it was modded (i.e. not because I was cheating, pirating, or because my mod 'broke it') then I say full steam ahead and find someone to yell "Ze Plane! Ze Plane!" cause it's worth it to prove that what I buy is MINE.
Just a bunch of state governments that would eventually loose on appeal but waste millions of tax payer dollars attempting pass laws to allow them to ban it and make a name for their legislators.
I may not, but since it was Forbes that came up with the number, I'm guessing it's closer to the truth than you'd get.
I'd take my billion and live it up, to be sure. I wouldn't, however, be upset if people didn't take my one time jackpot as evidence that I knew squat.
He's probably very cool. And I'm happy he got behind some causes that you felt were good.
He was also behind Sharesleuth.com, which was the precursor to Bailoutsleuth.com.
The idea behind the site was people who had 'dirt' on a public traded company would provide it to the site for publication. However Mark in a fit of what I have to call more than a little questionable ethics, decided that it was completely alright for him to short the stocks of companies with info being published on the site, before the site actually published the information. If that wasn't insider trading, it was the closest thing on this side of the law to it.
You yourself say "He buys random companies and starts random websites" and in a way, that's the point. He scatter shots his money out there in hopes of making another jackpot. That isn't sound financial advice, it's just a gambler's "big win" addiction.
Look, I'm not saying he's an idiot. I'm simply saying he's not shown the investing or business chops that would qualify him as someone anyone should be taking money advice from.
P.S. In case anyone thinks that his $6 billion jackpot somehow displayed hidden skill or insight, I also point out that he's currently worth a little over $2 billion. That's right, he's lost $4 billion in networth since being bought out by Yahoo!
The real question is, who would be stupid enough to listen to a man who made almost all of his money soley on the chance decision of buying the domain name "Broadcast.com" and convincing Yahoo! that it was work ~$6 billion dollars to buy out.
Ventura Ave is a common mis-reading of Ventnor Ave, a yellow property next to the water works.
In a perfect world yes. In a realistic world, the game developer realizes that skirmish mode is simply what people play when they don't want to bother with going online and finding a human to play against, and the effort spent creating and polishing a seperate AI just for that mode would garner more points with the player if it was spent elsewhere (such as fine tuning the balance of the game, polishing the maps, and etc.)
Most game AI's are not well designed, but not because they can't be. Most game AI's are built from the prespective that the player should be able to win, therefore Grandmaster level thinking is less desirable than preditable patterns that seem impossible to be till the player realizes they can be exploited.
It's even WORSE than that, you'd think by now that Google would have borgified everyone working for it into one huge hive mind, incapable of making mistakes.
Come on people, developers are developers, the folk at Google responsible for the language thought they came up with a cute name and the lawyers didn't find anything trademarked with it. Not everyone is going to do an extensive vanity search on a topic before naming their brain child.
Devils Advocate: You'll notice what Bernie didn't have by the time the law caught up with him...
To win a lawsuit, you must be able to last to the end of the lawsuit. Winning a multi-billion dollar lawsuit helps little if you are under Chapter 7 bankrupcy.
Sometimes, as much as it sucks lemons, it's in your best interests to take the offer for pennies on the dollar rather than duke it out.
You honestly think that there aren't people out there with rudimentary WoW servers running? They might not be as robust, but I guareentee you they are out there.
Part of the reason Microsoft got shat on was its history.
1. They illegally tied the sale of Windows to the sale of MS-DOS, a product which they had a number of legitimate competitors for.
2. When they were caught with their hand in the cookie jar, they voluntarily settled rather than go to court. Part of their settlement was they would never ever tie their products together in that way again.
3. They then loosely tied IE (an existing product with an existing competitor) into Windows 95.
On the reverse side of this coin, as much as we might have liked it if they had, Apple has never really had a legitimate competitor to their hardware or OS. The only "Mac clones" that were ever legally sold were still licensed by Apple. Additionally, they've never explictly agreed not to tie their products together in order to avoid a spanking from the Department of Justice.
I'm not a particular fan of Apple, the company is just as arrogant as MS. And though I haven't seen as much unethical behavior (just agressive asshattery) from them as from MS, they still stomp all over the consumer and their rights as a matter of routine.
That said, comparing MS's antitrust trials to Apples current situation shows either a lack of perspective and history or a talent at hyperbole.
I believe that would be Delos D. Harriman!
40 Kiloton, 40. Not 400.
For instance, you. Right now.
People have been spewing shit about smart people all being idiot savants who need to shut up and listen to the 'dumb people' who actually know how the world works since before the story of Icarus. And it's just as wrong then as it is now.
Being ignorant is never an admirable quality, and shunning knowledge under the assumption that "you are going beyond your limits" is asinine. If it weren't for people pushing their limits and being willing to take a chance at being wrong and failing we would all still be living in caves wondering where the next meal was coming from.
What you really mean are "people in general have an inflated sense of their own competency and thus tend to misspeak about things they are not strictly knowledgeable about" which is true regardless of their education. Don't pretend the 'salt of the earth' are some how immune to this effect.