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Hardware Your Rights Online

Taking Aim At The Mod Squads 165

Posted by timothy from the put-the-screwdriver-down dept.
Cutriss writes "CNN's usually dry and uninspired reporting was interrupted today by this interesting and rather well-informed piece by Eric Hellweg from the Technical Investor section. It compares and contrasts efforts from various companies in squashing/supporting the hobbyist community. It's rather well-timed, considering recent events."
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Taking Aim At The Mod Squads More

Taking Aim At The Mod Squads

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  • Rather wrong headed, in spots (Score:5, Insightful)

    by unicorn ( 8060 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @05:59PM (#4449451)
    With regards to Microsoft, he's comparing selling a legitimate product, that was created using tools that were opened by the developer. To selling a chip, that likely uses copyrighted code in the chip, that's primarily designed to allow pirating of games for the Xbox.
    • I see what you're saying with that, but I'm going to have to disagree. The article is talking about weather it's good business for companies to let consumers mod their products. Microsoft clearly didn't think that was the case and thus the entire liksang thing. Of course, there isn't a clear cut line as far as this goes.

      • But the author (Score:3, Insightful)

        by unicorn ( 8060 )
        counterpoints himself, saying that MS appears to support the mod market, by selling CounterStrike.

        There's a world of difference between a legitimate commercial product that is produced using open toolsets. And a hacked illegitimate product.
        • Duh, did you read the article? It wasn't talking about open toolsets, it was talking about puting Linux on the xbox. It even mentions the DMCA.

          What's that CounterStrike thing supposed to mean anyway?
          • In paragraph 5, he talks about MS getting the Xbox mod chip pulled off the market. No mention of Linux at all.

            In paragraphs 9-10 he talks about Valve selling Counter-Strike, which was created after the Halflife engine was released source (aka an open toolset).

            In the second half of paragraph 10, he claims that MS allowing Counter-Strike on the Xbox, is some sort of validation by MS of the Mod community.

            MS selling Counter-strike on the XBox, is selling a product. Nothing more. Not deeper political meaning at all. Just merchants selling a packaged good.

          • Re:But the author (Score:4, Insightful)

            by aronc ( 258501 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @07:05PM (#4449821)
            What's that CounterStrike thing supposed to mean anyway?

            It shows MS's true colors. They will reap the benifits of other's allowed mods but they will tolerate no loss of control over [i]their[/i] stuff. Shortsighted and greedy, as the article says near the end.
    • Yes, I was rather disappointed by that segment. What the author should have mentioned is that in addition to allowing pirating, mod chips allow software such as Linux that was not originally intended to run on it work.
    • Stupid microshaft. Now the mod chips will be sold at flea markets and swap meets instead of conventional retailers. They will be a bigger hit than ever.

    • Re:Rather wrong headed, in spots (Score:5, Insightful)

      by stwrtpj ( 518864 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:58PM (#4449783) Journal
      With regards to Microsoft, he's comparing selling a legitimate product, that was created using tools that were opened by the developer. To selling a chip, that likely uses copyrighted code in the chip, that's primarily designed to allow pirating of games for the Xbox. [Emphasis mine]

      Prove it.

      Prove to me that X-Box modchips were created primarily to play pirated games. I don't think you can. Certainly, I am not so naive as to think that this would not be a purpose that one might put the modchip too. But then again, people used to use the VCR to rip off pre-recorded movies, and a judge has long since decided that the VCR's primary purpose was not to make illegal copies of movies. The mere fact that it could do it is not enough.

      Most hobbyists do not look at modchips and say "hey, I could play lots of ripped games and not pay a cent with this". They look at them and say "hey, look at the amazing things I can make this box do with this modchip!"

      A great deal of hackery in software and hobbyist-ing (?) in hardware is motivated by the coolness factor. It's cool to pick apart something and learn how it works. I know that's what motivates me. On the rare occassion that I run proprietary software on my Linux machine, if something goes wrong with it, my first reaction is not just simply to contact customer support, but to whip out strace and similar tools and try to track down the source of the problem myself. An argument could be made that I'm violating the DMCA in doing this, since this is a form of reverse-engineering. I don't care, because I know I'm not trying to gain knowledge for illicit purposes. I just want to know how the damn thing works for my own purposes.

      So I would say that there is really no way to make a blanket statement about the purpose of modchips.

      • Point granted (Score:3, Interesting)

        by unicorn ( 8060 )
        You're entirely correct, in that there are definitely "honest" uses for the mod chip. And that I don't know the exact motives of the sellers.

        But by and large, the mod chip likely uses pirated code from an existing chip off the Xbox board. I would be truly amazed, if the developers reverse engineered the needed chip, using completely legitimate means, completely "black box/clean room" etc. And the mod chip wouldn't be nearly as viable as a commercial product if it wasn't designed to allow playing pirated games.

        If you had the skill to build your own chip that does everything the exisiting one does, in a clean room way, you could just as easily leave the copy protection code intact, and still make it capable of running Linux I bet. And you'd have a much better legal leg to stand on, in the process.

        • Point contested (Score:3, Insightful)

          by frovingslosh ( 582462 )
          If you had the skill to build your own chip that does everything the exisiting one does, in a clean room way, you could just as easily leave the copy protection code intact, and still make it capable of running Linux I bet. And you'd have a much better legal leg to stand on, in the process.

          I have to differ with this conclusion. If one were to completely "clear room" a mod chip, building an entirely new BIOS from scratch, you certainly could not "leave the copy protection code intact", you couldn't have it at all. And the DCMA would make it illegal to understand the copy protection mechanism well enough to duplicate it, as you had to in some way reverse engineer it to duplicate it!

      • You are correct. But:

        It is irrelevant what the intended use for the chip is. If it contains any Microsoft code then it's not legally saleable. That's the bottom line.
        • It is irrelevant what the intended use for the chip is. If it contains any Microsoft code then it's not legally saleable. That's the bottom line.

          While this is a strong point, there would be viable ways around it. After all, each box the mod chip is installed in aready has the needed code. Rather than make a copy of xbox code, a mod chip should simply copy the existing code at boot time and then make the needed adjustments (patches). Unfortunately, that still leaves the DMCA to deal with even if you go to the trouble to make a chip with no M$ code.

        • Give me any piece of code and I will reimplement it within 10 minutes to do exactly the same thing, using none of the original code.

          Won't help with patents, but that's not a copyright issue.

      • Re:Rather wrong headed, in spots (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Anonvmous Coward ( 589068 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @07:42PM (#4450040)
        "Prove to me that X-Box modchips were created primarily to play pirated games."

        M.A.M.E.? Let's face facts: There's yet to be any constructive reason to run MOD on an XBOX for anything other than MAME. It's either an under-utilized PC, or it's an over-priced MP3 player. But MAME, though, is a nice little fit for the XBOX.

        It is, illegal (technically) to download ROMS and play them with MAME unless you have a license to do so.

        Disclaimer: I am playing Devil's Advocate. Don't flame me over my response, I'm just answering the guy's question. It is very obvious that mod chips could and would be used for piracy. Instead, he should be asking 'In what ways could the mod chip be used legally, and why would people flock to them?'

        He's going to lose the "how's it illegal?" qusetion, but when the modders have enough reason to say "here's a legit reason to do it", then the piracy argument is dissolved.

        You all remember Jack Valenti and his 'VCRS will destroy the broadcast industry' FUD? The key reason that VCRs were deteremined to be legal was because there was enough legitimate reason to justify their existence. The MPAA was worried that people'd trade pirated movies back and forth, but the court said "as long as a significant chunk of them are using it to time-shift TV shows, then it is not a piracy device."

        See my point? Ask how it's illegal and all kinds of not-so-relevant reasons (like my MAME one) will pop up and they'll be believed. Ask what can be done with the modded XBOX that doesn't involve piracy, and you've got a case.

        Note to XBOX modders: Find something CONSTRUCTIVE to do with the XBOX. Turn it into a webserver. Turn it into Lightwave rendering node. Turn it into a development kit where garage developers can create games. Do something besides get MAME running on it! You're only hurting yourselves.
        • There's nothing at all illegal in my dumping my various arcade boards, or having someone do this for me, and running those roms in MAME. Which I've already done for many of them.

          An Xbox makes one hell of a nice platform to run a MAME cabinet on.

          • "There's nothing at all illegal in my dumping my various arcade boards, or having someone do this for me, and running those roms in MAME. Which I've already done for many of them."

            Somebody against the XBOX modding would say: "Oh yes, as your one (1) example points out, every single person on earth who uses MAME would have the arcade board to dump the ROM From. They wouldn't conceive of just downloading the ROMS from the web."

            I will state again: That's what they would say, so don't flame me for it.

    • Mod chips have legitamate uses too. But even if you use it for 'illegitimate' uses, does that do more harm than good for MS? If someone mods his Xbox to run linux, isn't he probably going to leave it dual boot to play games. One more Xbox sold, more games, more market penatration, more money for MS. And in the online market, penatration is everything. If you have a massive multiplayer game, the piracy can actually help. Legit users will buy the games at a slower rate, but the pirates will be on the system as soon as they can. For the first couple of months, pirates will give your world the critical mass it needs to attract legit users, and then when you have enough legit users, a company has a lot of options for locking out pirated versions.
    • He's not making that comparison at all. He says this flat out:

      ...it's understandable that Redmond would shut down a company making money off unlicensed Microsoft knockoffs...

      and compares it to:

      ...the DMCA providing legal ammunition, companies are all too willing to clamp down on this unique-to-the-era form of customer loyalty.

      As an investor, it's a matter of money to him. All he can see are $, and does not care that the SAME thing is done by the "knock off" company and the customer. He misses altogether the absurdity of outlawing modifications to one's own property because he has believes the DMCA was made so that big companies can make more money. Oh yeah, he's right about that. Your rights are not important to him.

      You seem to have bought into that slavish logic too when you say, "a chip, that likely uses copyrighted code in the chip, that's primarily designed to allow pirating of games for the Xbox." First, likely is weak stuff even if you buy the whole copyright gig. Second, "pirate" is a silly word to use for copying your own games, even for mass publication of someone else's games. Copyright violation is not murder on the high seas. Third, suppose I did take M$ BIOS and put is a little patch that defeats M$'s silly "use dis box dis way or no way" code? If I were to sell it, would I really be violating M$ copyright by publishing it? Can you really compare this to a book or other human readable copyrightable works where both the modified and unmodified versions can NOT be used at the same time? In boat design, it's called a splash - you take your competitor's boat make a mold of it and then mod the mold - poof, it's your boat. Think about it! Copyright has gotten way out of hand when it's being applied to what is acutally a machine part so that other parts can not interact with the machine.

      The DCMA is an evil and unAmerican extension of copyright. Outlawing tools that can be used to circumvent copyright protections makes the tools of publication illegal. Obviously, a printing press can be used to print other people's work. Yet protecting the rights of Americans to use printing presses is what the first amendment is all about. This whole business of "licensing" to do things to your own property or say things is outragous.

  • You gotta stop the hobbyists... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:00PM (#4449463)
    Someone must stop those gosh dang hobbyists. First they're modding dreamcasts, and next thing you know they're stealing cars and seducing virgins!

  • Sony is a good example (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Ryu2 ( 89645 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:04PM (#4449482) Homepage Journal
    They've actually embraced the independent developer very nicely, by first offering their "Net Yaroze" for the Playstation, and now, a actual port of Linux for the Playstation 2. [playstation2-linux.com].

    Sony (and on the software side, many game software companies like id and Valve, with their mod-friendly games) seems to understand that the hobbyists/indie developers of today often are the professional game developers of tomorrow, unlike Microsoft and their efforts toward an Xbox (they've got their "incubator" program, but that is still only for actual game developers, not individuals).

    It would be good to provide feedback to other companies to embrace such models like Sony has.

    • Re:Sony is a good example (Score:4, Insightful)

      by realmolo ( 574068 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:12PM (#4449544)
      Though I think it was shitty of MS to come down on Lik-Sang (and modchips in general), the idea that you NEED a modchip to learn X-Box game development is wrong.

      An X-Box is, fundamentally, the same as a Windows machine. If you can make games for a PC, you can make games for an X-Box. The tools are essentially the same.

      So the modchip as a "learning tool" idea is out the window. I mean, c'mon, modchips are for playing pirated games. Especially on the X-Box, where there aren't even any imported games that need a chip to play.
      • So the Xbox will run a homebrewed game not licensed by Microsoft to run without the mod chip?
      • You can't run any unsigned code on the xbox without using a mod chip. period.

        Even linux.

        So, it is quite possible to argue that a mod chip exists to allow linux to be used. On the other hand, Microsoft (etc) don't sue the consumer with the mod chip, they sue the resellers.

        • Why would somebody want to run Linux on an XBOX. Because 'they can'? Or because 'they can' run MAME or some other emulator on it?

          I mean seriously: The screen is fuzzy, it's not significantly cheaper than a full-blown PC, and running it on the XBOX adds nothing to running a normal PC with it.

          So tell me: Why run Linux at all? I'm not against mod-chips, but you all seriously need a better reason than "I wanna run Linux on it". How about "I wanna run Linux on it so I can make my XBOX into a cheap webserver."
          • Personally I'm not going to bother with the hassle of getting my xbox modded.

            But I also think manufaturers should get their ass kicked for preventing me do WHATEVER I want with stuff I purchase.

            To each his own.
        • Keep in mind that unlike everyone else currently alive in the industry MS cannot allow that to happen. The mod chips esentially allow you to turn an X-BOX into a cheap PC that MS lost money selling in the hopes that users will buy enugh games to make up the loss.

          Having said that; the law should not be used to protect idiot buisness plans.

        • If you can make games for a PC, you can make games for an X-Box. The tools are essentially the same

        If I can work on a Chevy engine, then I can work on a Ford engine. The tools are essentially the same.

        However, if a para-legal EULA with my Ford (backed up by threats of tort) prohibited me from working on the engine, then how would I know that? What good would it do me?

        Your argument is valid, and yet at the same time utterly bunk. You can develop an X-box game on a PC all the way through the life cycle, sure, so long as you don't mind not testing it, or for that matter, running it at all. I infer from your attitude that you think that all you have to do is to take your game to a Real Live Microsoft Approved Publisher to actually finish it off (hey, that should just take a few hours, right?), which is much like saying that my Ford can only be serviced by a Ford approved dealer, and that if I do it myself I'm on the side of the terrorists.

    • Exactly. Although Half-Life is a great game and many people enjoy it, it's not my type. However, I ended up buying it. Why? Counter-Strike. Think of how many people that would not have purchased HL if it weren't for this and so many other great mods.
    • It would be good to provide feedback to other companies to embrace such models like Sony has.

      While I agree with this, keep in mind that Microsoft is selling XBoxen at a loss with the intention of making up for it by selling games.

      The XBox is essentially just a crippled computer; it is a pc that can only run XBox games. By using a modchip and a Linux installation, the XBox suddenly becomes a full-fledged computer again.

      If Linux can be made to run reliably enough on the XBox, the XBox suddenly becomes a great source of decent computing power for a really cheap price. The result: lots of people buy XBoxen but they don't buy games. Microsoft gets screwed big time.

      I don't have any sympathy for Microsoft, but I can understand why they want to crack down on modchips and the XBox Linux Project.
      • If Linux can be made to run reliably enough on the XBox, the XBox suddenly becomes a great source of decent computing power for a really cheap price. The result: lots of people buy XBoxen but they don't buy games. Microsoft gets screwed big time.

        So you would rather support Microsoft's flawed business plan (selling standard/close to standard PC hardware at a loss) than actually uphold 200 years of first sale doctrine?

        I bought the box at the price they wanted to sell it. What I do with/to it from there is my business. And no, the mods chips did [i]not[/i] contain any copyrighted code. You have to program them yourself. It is the end users problem to do so without breaking copyright. The mod chippers were 100% in the right.
    • Yeah, Microsoft stifles the mod community. That's why Dungeon Seige and Flight Simulator aren't gmax ready...ooops, I'm sorry, they are gmax ready. Perhaps this was an oversight on MS' part? Nope, Dungeon Seige has released the actual toolkit for developing the levels as well documentation to build your own adventures. Numerous SDKs are available for modders to enahnce MS Flight Similator 2002 as well. Hmmm...I thought you said MS stifles the modding community? Perhaps you were wrong? I think you were.

  • question (Score:1, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    If I buy an x-box and then in a protest to Microsoft's business practices, I destroy it, does that also constitute illegally modding it? :)
  • I had no idea. While I read Anandtech [anandtech.com], Timshardware [tomshardware.com], and BugTraq for hardware-related technical or security news, what would the Slashdot crew consider a "good" news source? Slashdot, of course, being a metanews site--where would one read daily to be informed and educated about general issues, such as gaming?

  • A bit of bias, but overall good (Score:5, Insightful)

    by pla ( 258480 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:10PM (#4449524) Journal
    I think people need to keep in mind how much publicity their mods generate, and whether they benefit or detract from the original product FROM THE POINT OF VIEW of the manufacturer.

    With the Aibo, clearly Sony screwed up big-time. Making the thing dance didn't harm them in any way, earned them *tons* of free, POSITIVE publicity (until they tried to squash it), and actually made their product in some way "better".

    At the opposite end of the spectrum, Microsoft has put themselves in a very awkward position. By not making money on the console itself, anyone who buys it *only* to run Linux on costs them money. At the same time, having a vested interest in a particular OS (ie, Windows), seeing it used specifically to run what arguably counts as their biggest competition *really* galls them. OTOH, I see no valid reason why consumers should lack the right to do whatever they want with an XBox. While they can license the *media*, can they actually say the purchaser doesn't own the hardware itself? Tricky.

    Hmm, okay, I guess I didn't have as much to say on this as I thought. Basically, I fully support modders, and just suggest that, if it will obviously piss off the company involved (ie, the XBox Linux effort), try to keep it quiet.

    • Re:A bit of bias, but overall good (Score:4, Informative)

      by srmalloy ( 263556 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:23PM (#4449609) Homepage
      OTOH, I see no valid reason why consumers should lack the right to do whatever they want with an XBox. While they can license the *media*, can they actually say the purchaser doesn't own the hardware itself? Tricky.

      Particularly in that, unlike a software package on CD, the unit isn't sealed in an envelope with a shrinkwrap license agreement on it. You pay your money, the dealer gives you an Xbox, and you take it home; the transaction is a sale, not a license, and you own the hardware -- you can do anything to it you want to, whether it's installing modified BIOS chips to run other software or using the unit as a boat anchor.

      Now, the creator of a mod chip is in a much grayer area; they have to take steps to ensure that they don't use Microsoft's code when creating their chip, or they are in violation of copyright on the code.
    • The death nail [slashdot.org] of Netpliance. Built a machine for $400 and sold for $100... Service extra. The same could be said for Replay [replay.com] and TiVo [tivo.com] both boxs are being sold undervalue but it is the monthly checks that keep them working.
    • While they can license the *media*, can they actually say the purchaser doesn't own the hardware itself?

      You can do whatever you want with the X-Box hardware, it is your Hardware. You bought it, it is now yours. You can even resell it without getting sued for piracy and other EULA crap. You can't copyright hardware cuase it can't be copied, only manufactured, that's why you don't need licsense agreements for harware. There is no "good-faith" agreement with hardware (i.e. a EULA is a "good-faith" contract to a court of law, between you and the software manufacturer).

      What you CAN'T do is run MS X-Box games and other MS Software on a Mod'd X-Box, that violates the terms of use of MS software. Which is why they don't want you to Mod-Chip-It, becuase then you are not legally able to run X-Box games on that console.

      It has nothing to do with Linux. If you could get Linux to run on an X-Box without mod'ing the bios in some fashion...MS wouldn't care, becuase you could still legally run games on it. They are trying to make they're draconian licsensing more legalease by adopting this stance, in case they have to go to court.

      The above is not legal advice. That can only come from a qualified attorney who is familiar with all the facts and circumstances of a particular, specific case and the relevant law.

  • Sony and Aibo (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:11PM (#4449530)

    Unfortunately the author failed to mention that one of the reasons Sony went after the author of the Aibo software was that he had copied some of Sony's code.

    The author also fails to mention that Sony subsequently opened up the Aibo's API [eetimes.com].

  • If they did not, the X-box could be a real money-loser. After all, how many computer geeks would pay ~$250 for a linux box which costs Microsoft a good $50 in losses?
    • FYI: I think that Xbox production has reached volume levels where the Cost Per Unit is no longer -$50 to MS.
      • No, it's gone UP.

        Thanks to that price drop ($300 -> $200) it costs Microsoft at LEAST $150 per xbox.

        They still do not have the volume being made to counter that, primarily because they don't sell fast enough to justify increased production.

        Sony and Nintendo both have highly optimized designs (sony because they own all the silicon designs, nintendo because of requirements at outset for a tiny footprint) so they can better consolidate components, and they have 3 continents (at least) where their systems are selling very well. This is where using almost stock Intel and Nvidia components, IMO, hurts Microsoft.
        • Thanks to that price drop ($300 -> $200) it costs Microsoft at LEAST $150 per xbox. They still do not have the volume being made to counter that, primarily because they don't sell fast enough to justify increased production.

          The volume is key here. What hurts MS worse...buying an Xbox for $200 (net cost to MS = $150) or not buying an Xbox at all (net cost to MS =? $250)??

    • Re:Microsoft HAS to take a hard line... (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      so because they make a decision that hurts them, its somehow the customer's fault?

      you are right, they have to do something, but it doesnt involve screwing the customers who want to do something outside of what MS would want.

      just because they have a losing business plan, thats not my problem.

      i dont go an sell cars for $10 because i expect the customer to purchase only my gasoline
    • There aren't enough Linux users out there to hurt MS at all with this action. With a comany with assets in the tens of billions of US Dollars, how many units would have to be sold at a $50.00 (US) loss in order for them to even feel it? Even if one million Linux geeks went for it, that would only be 50-million dollars. Bill Gates spends that in a week on lunch!

      You'd have better luck trying to kill a blue whale with a nerf bat.
      • "There aren't enough Linux users out there to hurt MS at all with this action."

        You guys'd screw yourselves more than you'd screw MS. "I spent $200 and I have a game machine I won't play". Yeah, that'd send a message to Microsoft: "We can make people buy ANYTHING!"

        heh.
    • But if the action is perfectly legal (as running Linux on an xbox most certainly is) then how is it neccesary to take a hard line?

      I mean, why shouldn't Microsoft go after companies who sell Xboxes without requiring the customer to purchase any games? If they only buy one or two games they'll still lose money overall, shouldn't they HAVE to take a hard line with that as well?

      The Xbox already was a major league money loser before Linux came along. Blaming the mod community is just silly.
    • "If they did not, the X-box could be a real money-loser."

      So What? Is it the community's fault that Microsoft is taking a loss on the X-Box hardware? No. Microsoft chose to loose money on it.

      The X-Box is a well featured, robustly constructed, and fairly powerful PC at an unbeatable price. I have to admit that I have been tempted to buy one for the sole purpose of having another cheap Linux machine. Can I be at fault for using a PC as a PC just because it is called an "X-Box"? It belongs to me doesn't it?

      If I decided to put $100 bills in picture frames and sell them for $50 as artwork, whose fault is it if people destroy the "art" that I sold them to get to the $100? It's my fault for not selling the artwork for what it was worth.

      And it is Microsoft's fault for not selling the X-Box for what it is worth.

  • Counter Strike article (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:13PM (#4449550)
    here's the link to counter strike article [business2.com]

    • Scary (Score:2, Interesting)

      by MagPulse ( 316 )
      Le, author of CounterStrike, which has sold over $40 million, still lives in his parents' basement? That doesn't make me want to drop what I'm doing (graphics programming) and write mods any time soon.

  • Mods Completely In Line with World Use (Score:5, Insightful)

    by mugnyte ( 203225 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:13PM (#4449551) Journal
    Gutting devices and mod'ing them is a part of life and innovation. Once you own an appliance, you own the guts too. Trying to stop the flow of Information That Wants To Be Free is niave.

    Are we going to end up with a set of categories for appliances? Can Mod / Cannot Mod? Will I have to pay more for a dryer I want to hack to cook clothes for an extra 60 minutes? For an Xbox that I want to re-chip to play any copy from any source?

    Hot rod your car; cut the annoying ringer out of the extra phone in the study; rip a few choice capacitors out of the TV (they make great joy-buzzers), etc.

    I relaly don't see how this could be stopped. Stopping the info flow is silly, but thats all they can do.
    • do not take the above poster's advice. Ripping caps off your TV's PCB can accumulate an electric charge otherwise dampened by the horizontal flux, aiming the CRT electron gun at a choice point with full intensity. You have been warned.

      In other news, there be's regulations one must follow legally. The removal of capacitors or resistors often violates FCC regulations and you'll face jail or at least a slap on the wrist, Big Brother's wrist.

      • Um, dude. the TV is not going on after that.

  • If an XBox were a car (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:14PM (#4449556)
    Seems to me hardware vendors don't have a leg to stand on concerning aftermarket modifications to their hardware. People have been moding cars for years with aftermarket parts.

    Dangit, if I buy the hardware and want to modify it, I payed for it--it's mine--why shouldn't I be able to? Void the warranty, yes. But don't tell me I'm doing something legally wrong.

    • Re: If an XBox were a car (Score:5, Interesting)

      by 1984 ( 56406 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:56PM (#4449775)
      Companies will always tell you you're doing something wrong if you're doing something that pisses them off. Then they'll tell you it's illegal, perhaps even say it loudly with plenty of money and lawyers, such that you can't afford to point out loudly enough that it *is* legal. Then everyone (alright, "joe public") will believe (alright, "have the impression") they were right because you backed off. And if you manage to point out it *is* legal, then they'll work hard to change things so it becomes illegal.

      This is just how companies will tend to be, since it's what the selection pressure favours. Why are people continually surprised by this?

  • It could be a tennis racket, it could be software, you own it you're going to tinker with it and make it yours... sounds like all my relationships

  • Not bad but it only touchesthe surface (Score:5, Interesting)

    by hillct ( 230132 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:21PM (#4449593) Homepage Journal
    There is nothing new in this article, although there is one phrase I liked vary much:
    This kind of cultish devotion is every marketer's dream -- a product perceived as so cool that owners will subjugate their normal lives to embrace it.
    Not because it presents a new idea or take on the issue but simply because it is well constructed and is phrased in such a way as to appeal to corporate marketoids so maybe they'll pay attention.

    It is good to see this sort of thing in the main stream media although I would have liked to see more focus on how ill-concieved legislation like the DNCA, hastilly written with little or no understanding of the ramifications [slashdot.org] is coming back to bite these corporations in their collective ass. Oh well. It's a good start.

    --CTH

  • gaming mods (Score:4, Interesting)

    by jeremyferg ( 570997 ) <.moc.oohay. .ta. .207htimsbob.> on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:21PM (#4449597)
    I have always found mods to games to be a good thing for consumers and also for companies making the games. The mods (assuming they are of good quality) give extra incentive to the players to continue playing the games long after they have finished the original game. The perfect example of this is Counterstrike for Half Life. I know I continued playing Half Life for about two extra years all because of Counterstrike. The plus for the software companies is the extra revenue. Valve Software has probably made a lot more money than they would have if Counterstrike did not exist.

  • Let's mod Eric Hellweg's article (Score:4, Insightful)

    by HillClimber ( 530465 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:25PM (#4449624)
    I wonder how Eric would like it if someone "modded" his article to change the conclusion and then posted it on their website?
    I actually agree with his point that encouraging a customizing fan club can be a good thing. However, we have to allow IP creators to be able to control what people are allowed to do with their IP, and definitely whether others are allowed to pirate it.

    If you don't like a game or gaming platform's mod policy, then vote with your dollars -- don't buy it!

    • Re:Let's mod Eric Hellweg's article (Score:5, Insightful)

      by medeii ( 472309 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:48PM (#4449744)

      I wonder how Eric would like it if someone "modded" his article to change the conclusion and then posted it on their website?

      He might not like it, but that doesn't mean he has the right to do anything about it. Unless, of course, fair use is suddenly not inclusive of commentary?

      Of course, if the person neglected to properly attribute the article, then that would be copyright infringement. But that wasn't specified, so let's not beat that horse.

      I actually agree with his point that encouraging a customizing fan club can be a good thing. However, we have to allow IP creators to be able to control what people are allowed to do with their IP, and definitely whether others are allowed to pirate it.

      This isn't necessarily piracy. The mod chips may contain legitimately reverse-engineered code; they may contain pirated code; or they may not contain any similar code at all. Until there's a definitive answer to why Lik-Sang was taken down, don't presume that it was legal or illegal.

      And no, we don't have to let IP creators control everything that happens to their work. I personally like quoting others' forum posts so that I can reply to them more accurately -- which is a very legal 'infringement' of copyright. Just because Microsoft doesn't like mod chips doesn't mean they have a legal right to shut down an operation, and until we know exactly what went on, speculating on the cause is a waste of time and bandwidth.

    • I wonder how Eric would like it if someone "modded" his article to change the conclusion and then posted it on their website?

      I suppose the Feds would have to raid Microsoft's HQ because MS Word is a tool that could mod Eric's article in violation of the DMCA.

    • go for it (Score:4, Informative)

      by js7a ( 579872 ) <james @ b o v i k .org> on Tuesday October 15, 2002 @05:03AM (#4452288) Homepage Journal
      I wonder how Eric would like it if someone "modded" his article to change the conclusion and then posted it on their website?

      I think this is a more interesting question than everyone else who has yet responded to the thread.

      First of all, even a literal quotation with certain small twists in a serious work has been accepted as "satire" by U.S. courts. The question is, when the work infringes commercially with potential profit in the same target audience market then the work is no longer considered satire. But satire is some of the most protected speech in the U.S. (unless it is directed against judges or law enforcement, which gives the authors a much rougher time.)

      Second of all, the fair use doctrine of the Berne convention and U.S. law allows the extensive literal reproduction of and derivation from news articles. Many nonprofit [truthout.org] and commercial sites [google.com] take advantage of this fact. You could claim that a changed conclusion results in a derivative work, even if you copied all the quotes and facts verbatim.

      Third of all, every single reporter in the world LOVES it when his or her work shows up in thousands of email inboxes, even in edited or truncated form. The only real problems in this realm occured when freelance work with limited publication rights started ending up verbatim in LEXIS/NEXIS, which was a big messy lawsuit around 1995 or so. If anyone is losing anything in article redistribution, it's the publishers, not the reporters, and even the publishers in practice acknoledge that the free advertising from widely-disseminated quality work is worth a lot more than the possible market value loss.

      Fourth of all, I think this is a remarkably good idea. Why don't you do it and ask the author what he thinks of it?

      I have a feeling that there is more to the question than was meant to be in it. An interesting experiment awaits!

  • Customer is always right? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by theBraindonor ( 577245 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:26PM (#4449629) Homepage
    Most important, these modifications raise a question: In the digital age, is the customer always right?
    Not only does action against modification enforce that the customer isn't always right, it enforces that the customer doesn't actual own something he purchases.

    A customer purchases a product. By modifying said product, a customer has actually increased the value of a product. They have used it to do something additional. When this information is distributed to the public, it potential increases the value of the entire product base. Just how many people purchased an XBox only after they found out how to run Linux on it?

    Hopefully more companies will wake up to the economic reality that they can employ a bunch of slashdotters for free!

    • Re:Customer is always right? (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward
      That's not really true. When you purchase something, you're actually purchasing a license to use it. And if the license says you can't modify it, then you have to abide by it.

      Sure, it's completely moronic, but that's the way things work. It's really an excuse for companies to do a half-assed job of protecting their products from this sort of thing. Just like DeCSS and everything else.. if you don't want people reverse engineering and want to control your IP, put the time into it and come up with a good scheme. Don't rely on moronic laws to do it for you.

  • Why? (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Geminatron ( 616988 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:30PM (#4449648)
    I mean, honestly, once I purchase the system, isn't it mine to do with as I please? I know several people who have an X-Box, and have mod'ed the system, dropped in a bigger hdd, and then put their own games on it to increase the performance of the game. Big deal. They own the hardware, and I can't remember having to accept any EULA in order to game on the thing.

    Microsoft has to realize, that if they want to prevent people from hacking their systems, or OS or whatever, they need to ensure that it is more secure, instead of doing something as stupid as shutting down a site. I could just go on IRC and find a new place to get some chips, if I wanted. Oh, and those chips, once the hardware is flashed, you can take them out and give them to the next person anyways.

  • The Mod Squads... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Embedded Geek ( 532893 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:31PM (#4449656) Homepage
    Will nail me -1 for this post, no doubt. Still, I couldn't resist.

    *SIGH* There goes my karma.

  • Legal Vs. Illegal Mods (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Greyfox ( 87712 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:31PM (#4449658) Homepage Journal
    IANAL but...


    If I buy an X box and stick a chip in it so I can run Linux, I'm technically violating the DMCA (MS would argue that the chip's primary purpose being to run pirated games vs. running Linux, despite the fact that all I may want to do is run Linux.)


    If I buy 10,000 X boxes and super glue them together to make a giant tux sculpture, I do believe that would be legal.


    As far as I'm concerned, one is no less speech than the other.

  • And who's corporate opinion is this? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:34PM (#4449670)
    So sayeth CNN/Money, a joint venture of two companies within the AOL-Time-Warner family.

    *shrug*

    I agree with what he says, but lets read between the lines as to why he's _allowed_ to say such nasty things about Sony and MS, two of ATW's most hated rivals.

  • Counter-Strike Mod is a Great Example (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:38PM (#4449700)
    This story [business2.com] is a good example of how complete mod can definitely benefit the original manufacturer.

  • If CNN is slow, repost on business2.com (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I also found the same story [business2.com] at business 2.0.

  • Customer vs. Consumer (Score:5, Insightful)

    by PineHall ( 206441 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:50PM (#4449751)
    Unfortunately it seems that many companies have abandoned the maxim that the customer is always right. Ultimately, on this issue, these firms will find out that they've been dead wrong.

    Those that limit the customer rights are those that call the customer a consumer. They think of the customer as consuming their product, not purchasing it, but that is not the way the customer views it. I see the entertainment industry trying to limit "consumption" to individual times so they can make more money. Unfortunately they will discover that their customer thinks differently and they will have to scramble to save their business.

  • "Usually dry reporting" -- a.k.a. objective. CNN is a news organization, and as such they are obligated to present the facts in an objective manner.

    This article, however, is known as an "editorial."

  • Bad logic (Score:3, Informative)

    by M.C. Hampster ( 541262 ) <M.C.TheHampster@gma[ ]com ['il.' in gap]> on Monday October 14, 2002 @06:57PM (#4449779) Journal

    First, let me point out this statement:

    While it's understandable that Redmond would shut down a company making money off unlicensed Microsoft knockoffs, the company doesn't believe that consumers have the right to tinker, even as hobbyists.

    Is this actually true? Microsoft has not gone after the modder's themselves, only companies that are distributed modified BIOS's (which I've read elsewhere are copyrighted). I don't think I've ever seen Microsoft saying that those who purchases XBox's don't have a right to modify them.

    The fallacy of his argument is that he believes the modifications to the XBox will lead to more sold. Even if that were true (which I don't think is true), will this directly lead to more legitimately sold software for the XBox? (which is where they make their money... a fact that I realize has been repeated a billion times on this board) So for him to argue that the modifications are, in fact, good for Microsoft is very weak. He compares them to the Lego Mindstorm products, which is a terrible comparison due to the fact that Lego's are made for the very purpose of creating your own work. The XBox business strategy is very different from that.

    Important Note: Before I get 400 responses talking about bad business models, I want to make something clear: I am not saying it is a good business model, or that the laws should protect flawed business models. I am simply showing that the author's logic is failed in arguing that the modifications are good for Microsoft.

  • Actually (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    ...this CNN piece is rather thin, considering the history behind mods at large

    How many years now have we been able to buy showroom stock automobiles, motorcycles, etc., that are ripe for modifications and changes? How much of a market for hot-rodding/racing exists today (huge) and how have the manufacturers responded over time (warranty trashed, but otherwise knockyourselfout)?

    We need not look very far for precedent on this topic. You guys seem to think the world revolves around tech....it doesn't.

  • Missing the point (Score:3)

    by Sylver Dragon ( 445237 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @07:23PM (#4449908) Journal
    I don't think that the article is quite as enlighted as the poster would have us belive. The article seems to miss a subtle difference between the XBox mod chips and the Couterstrike mod for Half-Life. The difference is that in the HL-CS mod, the source code was made freely available to the public to use, though I would guess that there were certain licensing terms attached to it. With the Xbox mod chip, there was some use of MS source code, which MS did not authorize. Same with the dancing Abio mod. You are not allowed to plagerize source code, even before the DMCA that was a crime. If you want to add a mod chip to the Xbox, fine, that's not a problem, but if you make a mod chip by plagerizing some of MS's code, then you are commiting a crime, and if you sell that chip, with plagerized code, then I don't feel any sympathy for you when MS nails you in court.
    Consider what would happen if we turned this type of thing around. Imagine that I was to take some of the Linux source code, dump it in my own program, and then sell that program. To start with, I have violated the license that allowed me to have that code. Second I have commited plagerism by copying that code. I should get nailed to the wall for it. Moreover, the /. community would be in an uproar about somone 'stealing' the Linux source code. But when its the other way around its ok? No, get real, if you copy source code, you are commiting a crime, period.

  • There are mods, and mods (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Fiveeight ( 610936 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @07:35PM (#4450001)
    This stuff can be slightly confusing, as there are huge differences, legally speaking, between making/using hardware to modify consoles, and making software mods (additional levels, art etc) for PC games.

    Mod chips are not popular with console companies. At all. The huge majority of them (based on my personal knowledge) are used for either piracy (obviously illegal) or playing import games (legal, but annoying to console companies that like to operate region coding systems. And yes, regioning sucks.) People who buy mod chips for other reasons (are there any apart from running Linux and homebrew gaming?) are not contributing much to the normal revenue stream, and might even be competing with it (producing cheap or freeware games and utilities. This becomes more of an issue when you start adding HDs and broadband connections).

    Game mods, on the other hand, are great for the developers and publishers, they get lots of free (or nearly free, producing an SDK and doing a bit of patching) content and press, and guess what, everyone who plays them needs a copy of the game. Part of the reason that game mods are so good for the developers is that they have a lot of control. Read the license agreement on the SDK, they own any content you distribute for their game. Produce something offensive (or outrageously profitable), and they can take it all away from you. Obviously this would be a world of bad publicity, but they can still do it.

    What would be nice for consoles is to

    A)Throw away the regioning
    B)Seperate the protection of copyrighted disks from the ability to read CD-Rs and unsigned code, both of which are pretty much essential for home development.
    C)Produce a really cheap/free dev kit, possibly with some restrictions (ie, game can only be distributed for free or through console makers publishers). I have no idea how much they make through selling dev kits

    This would get the benefits of PC game style mods and allow them to reduce piracy by drawing a clear line between enthusiasts and pirates (yes, they're often the same people, but it seperates the behaviour), making piracy less generally accepted and easier to attack legally.

    Of course, when do that, people want more freedom, more customisablity etc, and pretty soon you end up with a PC (or at least an Atari/Amiga style "home computer")...

  • Modders or Script Kiddies: You decide (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 14, 2002 @07:40PM (#4450029)
    The true modders are the ones that create the mods. What if to rip an audio CD or DVD you just had information on the media's (and in the case of DVD the encryption algorithm) specs, and your standard Windows (or your platform of choice) API list and YOU had to write your own ripper from scratch? Code your own modchip? Write your own MP3 encoder? "Here's the concept, here is how the data is structured, now write the application."

    Of course, it doesn't work like that... Once someone else has done the work, you can simply download some precompiled code and run it. Isn't that what script kiddies do?

    I'm not trying to troll here, I'm just trying to throw out a different perspective. If everyone who modded or hacked just did a writeup about their findings and no one released any code (compiled or otherwise), would companies like Microsoft have as much of an issue? From past hacks like the Netpliance I-Opener (original BIOS code that allowed booting of any OS released onto the Internet), the CueCat (decoding utilities for almost every OS) and the PlayStation (Buy a modchip) it seems the mods only become a problem once they're trivial to implement by someone who otherwise would NOT have modded the device themselves.

    Would the RIAA be up in arms if no one shared their MP3s that they made from CDs they weren't legally allowed to be sharing? If EVERYONE kept their MP3s to themselves, the "mod" of being able to rip and compress your music would be NO threat to the music industry.

    Being able to change something you have purchased is a great power. In the wrong hands, it can and WILL be misused.

    This is probably an unpopular message here on Slashdot, so I'm going to check that Anon box down there...

  • Mindstorms at Lego (Score:5, Informative)

    by Ektanoor ( 9949 ) on Monday October 14, 2002 @07:53PM (#4450112) Journal
    Well, here Lego Mindstorms story is not being clearly covered...

    When Mindstorms came, Lego was only willing to deliver a little more complex toy for older kids (~12 years old). In their minds, this was just an extension of Technics, nothing else. But then it came the surprise. Some crazy hackers broke into the robot and realized that it had a relatively powerful chip inside. And some realized that this chip was in accordance to some MIT basic theories on Robotronics. And that made a boom of all kinds, even US Air Force had one guy porting Ada to Mindstorms.

    Meanwhile sales were not looking so good. As far as stories go, Lego planned to make a small launch of 10000 units and forget the matter. At that time they saw what hackers were doing and started the get mad. Back then there were a few articles with disgruntled managers claiming that hackers were hurting Lego by violating its property rights. There were even some voices that hinted about Lego preparing a run to courts. However, this mood suddenly stopped. Why? Because Mindstorms sales hicked. And Lego came to create three robot versions and sell some 100000 units.

    Frankly, as I could see over one shop nearby, it was not 12 year-old kids that helped Lego in this. It were hackers. The clerks told me that they tried hard to sell two units, but, not even the big daddy with golden rings and buckstuffed pockets was willing to buy such a toy for his kid. Absolutely no one was interested on it, except two weird guys. One was some middle-aged guy from some institute, the other was me who is also not a teenager. Interesting to note that my box was gaining dust on the shop for some 6 monthes before I bought it.

    The robot is some marvel. You may think it is crazy to play such a thing, that an adult should have much more important things to do. Wrong. Try to run over the deep bottom of programming a $200 robot and you may realize that there are a few things that make you look as a teenager in front of his first Z80, typing its first BASIC program. There are a few things on robots, which are outside the scope of your usual programming skills. Before you try, programming Mindstorms may look simple and stupid. But, when you see the robot going nuts or breaking his leg, you realize that you still have something to learn.

    Presently, Lego is still fighting with that brief lack of vision, however, its support over the hacker community has been slowly rising. It were all those big kiddies, some with little kids who barely understand why daddy/uncle also plays Lego, that made the Robot a success.

  • In Other News: Radio Shack closes operations... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 14, 2002 @11:58PM (#4451475)
    (Fort Worth TX, AP)... effective immediatley, Radio Shack will cease operations and all employees will be sent home. Radio Shack has been sued by an alphabet soup "Who's Who" of companies for selling what they have dubbed "Hacker Parts" in the form of diodes, resistors, and other "items that most people only use to [pirate] game consoles and satellite television signals." Radio Shack's Board of Directors was not available for comment. It is widely believed that they are being held in anticipation of pending charges for violating the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DCMA) by selling basic components which could be used to build a non-region encoded DVD player, or could be used to modify any of several modern game consoles into doing something more than the manufactuers intended them to do.
  • Tivo should have been mentioned in this article. It's quite a give and take situation between Tivo, Inc. and the tivo-hacker community. On one hand, they didn't object to an ethernet card being un-officially added to the unit so that users could bypass the daily dialup. In fact, they started officially supporting the hack in the newer (3.0) versions of the software.

    Yet at the same time, they strictly prohibit mpeg streams being extracted off the hard drive. Popular opinion has it that one or more established Tivo hackers have the ability to cleanly extract data, but Tivo threatened that they'd stop being hacker-friendly if the code was ever released.

    There are a couple of small groups out there currently trying to extract data from the Tivo, but it's not an easy, 100% reliable procedure.

    • FWIW, The Tivo Series II boxes use signature checking code in the PROM to make sure the kernel is signed then they check each file in the root filesystem from an initrd before / is mounted. This has not yet been broken and the only modification for the Series 2 to date is a disk space upgrade. While Tivo has been tolerant of hackers in the past, it looks as if those days are over.
  • OK -

    lets examine some products similar to the X-Box. Your cellphone, a central office pbx, a game cube, a PS2, your cable box (or Dish network reciever)

    How legal is it to hack a cell phone so that you can make unauthorized use of their network (note, I'm not asking how easy)? How about a PBX from Cisco?

    I'm just playing devils advocate here - but while you may _own_ the box, I think MS has a vested interest in protecting the internals of the X-Box, and in attempting to keep it secure (keep it secret, keep it safe) - as their goal is the usage of the X-Box as an end-point of a network.

    I also think it's relatively silly to waste time running Linux on one of these. Not to mention the time that MS is wasting going after the (at most) 1% of X-Box owners who are doing it. Hey - if you enjoy the challenge and hours that could be better spent constructively - then more power to ya.

    PS: How come people aren't bent over the whole Game Cube thing? Where's the outcry about not being able to run this or that on it? BAH. Your OS is not a religion, and you're better off not being a brainwashed free software ideolog.

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