UK appeal court dismisses mod chip conviction

The UK court of appeal this week ruled that games console mod chips do not bypass copy protection systems and are, therefore, effectively legal here. The ruling comes more than six months after Neil Stanley Higgs of Speedwell Road, Speedwell, Bristol was found guilty at Bristol Crown Court of 26 offences under a 2003 amendment …

[Jamie]

4 weeks!!!

That is about how long before some Labour knob jumps on the band wagon and tries to rally the groups to grab pitchforks and torches then march to destroy all Mod Chip sellers. The law will be changed and most likely in quick fashion.

[Wayland Sothcott]

Finally common sense on this issue

When you by some electronic hardware, you own it. If you want to modify it or upgrade it then fine. If you turn it into a gun, a transmitter or a vehicle then you might expect to cross the law. But if all it's doing is computing stuff then how can that be illegal?

I expect this battle is not over. Companies will try to bring in laws that make it illegal to modify a product in any way. I am thinking of Apple with it's iPhone. (The Linksys WRT54G is another one.) This is a joke since Apple started as a couple of hackers who joined a hackers club and built their own computer. This culture is still going strong and is the origin of everything techie.

[Mad Mike]

Bit rich

It really is rich of companies to complain about mod chips when one of their primary purposes is to prevent people from buying games from other 'regions' and using them. Selling disks in Europe at very high prices when selling them for far less elsewhere is a simple rip off. They should learn the reality, as should the music and film companies. Rip off the consumer using 'region' and similar technology, and the customers will return the favour. And the company will never win as a way round whatever they do will always be found.

[Jack Harrer]

Good

I don't think we should ban modchips because those can *possibly* by used for playing pirated games. Although probably over 90% of people use is this way anyway, *sigh*.

[Anonymous Coward]

Aren't there 2 types?

Aren't there modchips that allow you to play copies, and modchips that let us play import games?

I assume that's how they get around the law in the first place, actualy. So all manufacturers would have to do to make mod chips effectively worthless is stop shafting their european customers.

[Anonymous Coward]

Thank goodness

Common sense still prevails in some corners of the UK legal system.

You buy a product - you modify it as you please. EOF

[Secretgeek]

Alternative uses.

I've just bought a shovel. I might use it to bury the bodies of some media executives.

Would somebody like to sue B & Q?

[frank denton]

@Wayland re. WRT54G

I've got a Linksys WRT54G, (it sits there and just works). What did you mean by your comment?

I don't expect you to write an article for me but please provide an informative link if you can.

[Anonymous Coward]

Listen up Nintendo, MS and Sony

Why don't you simply make the consoles open to all regions and effectively kill the mod chip market dead?

Consider this ... how many DVD players have a code you can tap in to make them region free? Why not do the the same to your consoles? Want to play a US game? tap in the code, presto changeo! Want the same console to play a UK game? tap in the region code - presto changeo!

You only then have to make a single console ... no extra hardware needed for various countries as it's all built-in.

Simple? Yes it really is ...

[Anonymous Coward]

I almost wish the case had gone the other way...

...if only because the ensuing slew of court cases against kitchen knife manufacturers, car dealers and handgun companies would have been most entertaining.

[Anonymous Coward]

I've just bought a shovel. I might use it to bury the bodies of some media executives.

"I've just bought a shovel. I might use it to bury the bodies of some media executives.

Would somebody like to sue B & Q?"

Now, you're just being silly.

It's Spear & Jackson you should sue ....

[Mark]

@ Frank

Check this out..

http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/tutorials/print.php/3562391

[Anonymous Coward]

Regioning could be fixed!

I have had mod chips for all my different consoles (Dreamcast, PS, PS2). I had them for the express purpose of playing games from any region. Not because I wanted to import cheap games but actually because my family were moving country almost yearly due to my father's job and I had to buy any games locally. I would much rather have not had to use a mod chip but it was either that or have to buy a second console to allow me to play the local games.

I understand why manufacturers want to segregate the market using "regions", it is far more profitable for them and it may even help prevent some piracy. I may not agree with them, but I can understand the reasoning.

However, given they do do this I expect them to actually support people in my sort of situation. They could do this by offering a service that allows you to swap a working console and games from one region for the same console and games for the new region. The service could be supported by charging a small fee. (replacement would be based on requirement that console isn't damaged).

Alternatively, given how clever new consoles are something like the following. Why not allow the console to have the region changed using some code input based on the serial number (or whatever else). To get this code you buy a cheaply priced code change authorisation package, you then phone (or contact over the web) the manufacturer and give them the serial number of the console and some code listed in the package. Then you report what current region games you own (some way of validating this would be useful - say by loading the media and reporting some cryptographic hash of game serial and machine serial). You then receive a code to input into the machine that tells it to change to the new region "z" you have requested.

Then for each game you have reported you get a code to input into the machine that tells the console that although it is region "z" now, it is allowed to play the region "y" version of game "x". Should the machine lose this info (say after a particularly hard reset!), all you do is phone the manufacturer and list the serial number and they will give you all the codes again. Since the codes are machine specific they can give them out as often as they like.

The system is fairly robust since you can always recover the codes via phone (or just write them down somewhere). Should the machine die completely you send it to the manufacturer and either they replace the machine (and give you new codes to allow you to play your old games on it) or if it isn't under guarantee (and you replaced it personally) allow you to register your previously listed games for the replacement.

A fringe benefit for the companies is it allows them to "de-region" games after a given time (i.e. allow anyone to get play code for a reserved region "k") or even eventually allow the system itself to be "de-regionalised" and thus play games from any region. Heck, they could even set it so specific content only turns up on certain regions (eg "elite" versions of a console would allow extra stuff).

The requirement for a small fee to change the region would prevent people changing region just to allow them to play an imported game. Also the companies could put a limit on how often the region could be changed (say no more than once every 6 months or something similar!)

Anyways that is my couple of quid's worth!!

[Shane McCarrick]

Re: Linksys WRT54G

Re: Linksys WRT54G -the company originally allowed anyone develop their own software/firmware, when they made its specifications available through the GNU GPL. This resulted in some of the routers having mad transmission powers and ranges (up to 120mW transmission power with the most recent version of Tomato).

Linksys then brought out new versions of their router (Version 5 or later) and chopped its RAM to 8Mb and flash memory to 2Mb (the previous versions had double this), and dumped the open source firmware in favour of a proprietory firmware of their own called Vxworks, which effectively neutered the potential to mod the device. The older versions of the device, despite having much slower processers (200MHz ARMs versus 280MHz ARMs in the new ones) are massively popular and do a flying trade on ebay and in tech bazaars.......

Shane McCarrick

[Anonymous Coward]

Hooray!

That's all.

Nice to have some good news for the weekend :)

[phil]

wrt modding

@frank denton

www.openwrt.org

[Anthony]

Re: Regioning could be fixed!

I think you'll find games consoles aren't "regioned" as such. They are tied to broadcasting standards: PAL, NTSC, SECAM et al. So I can play a game from Australia in the UK because they both use PAL. However, if you move out of one broadcasting standard (or want to LEGALLY import), you are stuffed.

There is no need for a complex scheme to "fix" it! It would clearly be easy to make a multi-standard console and doing this would have ZERO effect on piracy. But they'd rather screw as much money out of the RoW (i.e. PAL) customers instead.

If consoles weren't monopolies, I think you'd find the issue would go away. Look at DVD players; they've got to deal with mulit-regions and multi-standards, and somehow seem to do so with little difficulty...

[frank denton]

WRT54G InfoThanks

Thank you Shane and Mark, and anyone else who writes in with that info.

[Anonymous Coward]

@Anthony - Re: Regioning could be fixed!

Actually some of the players are regioned using the DVD regions. Hence why my Canadian PS2 couldn't play UK DVDs. However, my point is rather more that the companies like regioning! The differing TV standards are just an excuse. I mean the fact that with a boot disc my UK PS2 can play my US games clearly shows it isn't a hardware problem but only a software one...

I was going to say more but it's friday and quitting time so i'm off home....

[miknik]

No region for PS3 games

The PS3 will play any PS3 game from anywhere out of the box. I bet you can still get a mod chip for it though

[Wayland Sothcott]

@frank denton wrt54g

also www.dd-wrt.com is the one I like since it's very easy to use and they have squeezed it into the smaller memory size.

AC, come off it, since when has smaller FLASH and smaller RAM been cheaper when those sizes are obsolete. Keeping the design exactly the same would have cut down on design costs and using the same memory it would have got cheaper anyway. In fact the origonal boards were tracked out for larger memory. Even worse they fit larger memory but cut the address line to reduce the memory size, this can be fixed with some soldering.

Trust me the reduction in memory size was not to save costs. This is an example of a company battling to retain control of it's products. They are deluded since allowing 3rd party firmware did not do the PC any harm and piracy is the secret of success of the PlayStation over the Nintendo 64.

The problem is that it changes the whole industry. A cheap router is then capable of out performing a far more expensive product. Answer: make faster hardware that still compatible with wrt54g. I was involved with a group who almost did this. Except we realised that Mikrotik do it far better than we could.

[Anonymous Coward]

Regioning is a rip-off

And always has been. Why in the world should media makers have control over hardware (like your cd/dvd drive on your pc)?

Only one simple reason. Screw you. Screw anyone buying their shite. Yeah, and good luck making a legal backup of that

expensive dvd, never mind a legal copy backup of your music cd which you probably already bought on vinyl.

'cos she like hard copies

[Mark Berry]

Consumer rights......

I was under the impression you had a right to make a backup of computer software in the UK.

By only allowing copy protected discs, surely this infringes our rights?

[Anonymous Coward]

Reason to Mod

I have never mod'ed any of my consoles, however I am tempted for the singular reason of allowing me to backup my discs. I have 2 youngish children and all optical discs have a life of around 2 weeks before they are scratched and unusable.

As a result, the consoles I do have are usually packed away and I rarely buy games (who wants to pay $100 for a new release only to have it destroyed within 2 weeks).

While I'm sure there are those that need to mod for playing games from different regions, this has never been a problem for me and As for pirating - I've never had any pirated console games and in 20 years I've probably only ever had 2 PC games that were not entirely legitimate and I didn't end up liking them anyway.

We all know optical discs are not indestructible like they told us back in the late 80s, and making backups of the games we purchase is a legitimate reason to mod a console. The console makers like the RIAA and MPAA need to learn that most of their customers are not out to rip them off.

[Ken Ryan]

RE: WRT54G

The newer WRT54G is based on VxWorks, which is not a Linksys OS - it's by a company called Wind River, and is a very popular real-time embedded OS.

Also, the Linux version continues to be available as WRT54GL.

[Chris P]

@ Mark Berry, re consumer rights

You're absolutely spot on.

In the UK, you're permitted to make ONE backup copy of any copyrighted title that you purchase, for your own personal use.

Copy protection came about because rules like this were flouted and abused.

And in response to the genius above that said 'killing the copy protection will kill the mod-chip/disc market' - you're right. Mod-chip development and retail has been caused by the very people who are trying to stamp it out. Common sense is one of those optional extras that gets binned these days, usually because it costs too much money.