Geohot Hypocrisy

[Burwood123]

I can't seem to grasp you guys, most of the user base here are crazy against piracy, yet most of you agree with what George Hotz is doing in the PS3 court battle. Why? Is that not the same thing? Everyone agree's to Sony's DCMA (Digital Copyright Millenium Act) when they sign up to use the PSN. This solely prevents you from doing anything to the system, because you have agreed to use the console how sony has intended.

What's that? They took away Linux? Right, that wouldn't have happened if George kept his narcissistic mouth shut when he was blabbing on about hacking the PS3, a year or so ago, he basically made sony remove linux support from their machine, and you guys still spur him on... Sure they could patch over it, but why should they, they aren't recieving revenue from linux, it's the smartest move for them. I don't think the people here should even be angry about linux being removed, because seriously, how many of you actually used linux on your PS3's?

So tell me, why do you guys love Geohot even though you hate piracy? Even though it's the same thing? And you cannot seriously tell me he's only hacking the system for linux, because you all know, people will use it for free games and hacking the PSN... So inb4 any and all linux based responses...

 

[DefunctTheory]

Because Sony is evil.

 

[Radeonx]

I wish I knew who the hell Geohot is.
From what I'm gathering he is some sort of hacker or something and everyone is cheering him on. I don't really give a shit because I don't really give a shit about piracy so it doesn't really matter to me.

 

[maddawg IAJI]

I don't have a PS3, so why would I support Geohot? Generalizing the whole forum based on a handful of opinions is hardly what I would call good observation.

 

[DonMartin]

So tell me, why do you guys love Geohot even though you hate piracy? Even though it's the same thing?

Strange, I was under the impression that everyone here loves piracy?


...or maybe we should both just be a little bit more careful about generalizing the escapists?

 

[Aeshi]

People would probably support Serial Killers if they only targeted Sony Employees.

 

[AmrasCalmacil]

GeoHot doesn't support the piracy in any way. He made that pretty clear on his blog. And Sony are being pointlessly evil, so, yeah. For once I'm gonna stand up for the little guy.

Now if only I could find that CriticalMiss comic where they predict what was going to happen about this.

 

[Lazier Than Thou]

You can't talk about this and disallow Linux remarks, that's like the main point.

The thing is that if you buy hardware you should be able to chop it up however you want because it's yours. Yes some people really want Linux on the PS3 and if you were involved with Linux you'd know that, these lot really REALLY like Linux.

I support him because if you mod your PS3 and commit piracy then you've committed piracy, if you mod your PS3 and don't you've done nothing wrong.

But it's not about if you can or can't modify your PS3. It's about if Sony should be able to tell people that they can't modify their PS3 AND play on the online servers. This matters a lot because if you can modify your PS3 you can cheat pretty easy and that destroys fun for everyone.

 

[Nimzar]

Principle. I buy a piece of hardware. I should be able to do with said hardware what I want.
Sony says no. It is our hardware that you have paid to use.

This is why people who may be anti-piracy support George Hotz.

 

[manaman]

Because not supporting draconian measures, and the removal of advertised features without compensation or even real notification means you support piracy.

Sony has shown a total willingness to go as far as the law (or lack of such) will let them. Personally this would turn out to be a good thing of we didn't have decades of media campaignes telling people that companies making billions are all going under and taking away your rights is the only way to solve it.

It's been the same story for much longer the your average forum poster has been alive, always a new technology is going to kill businesses, it never does. Sadly we still have few laws to protect consumers.

 

[Wolfram23]

I can't seem to grasp you guys, most of the user base here are crazy against piracy, yet most of you agree with what George Hotz is doing in the PS3 court battle. Why? Is that not the same thing? Everyone agree's to Sony's DCMA (Digital Copyright Millenium Act) when they sign up to use the PSN. This solely prevents you from doing anything to the system, because you have agreed to use the console how sony has intended.

What's that? They took away Linux? Right, that wouldn't have happened if George kept his narcissistic mouth shut when he was blabbing on about hacking the PS3, a year or so ago, he basically made sony remove linux support from their machine, and you guys still spur him on... Sure they could patch over it, but why should they, they aren't recieving revenue from linux, it's the smartest move for them. I don't think the people here should even be angry about linux being removed, because seriously, how many of you actually used linux on your PS3's?

So tell me, why do you guys love Geohot even though you hate piracy? Even though it's the same thing? And you cannot seriously tell me he's only hacking the system for linux, because you all know, people will use it for free games and hacking the PSN... So inb4 any and all linux based responses...

1) It's his hardware he can do what he wants with it.
2) AFAIK, he didn't use PSN.
3) His "PS3 Hacking" has nothing to do with piracy in the sense that it's not meant to enable piracy. It's meant for other reasons but, yes, it could be used for piracy. GeoHot didn't promote it though.
4) iPhone was jailbroken and Apple took it to court. The court decided that once purchased, the user has the right to do whatever they want with it. Same should apply to consoles.

And finally, we're not all against piracy but it is hugely frowned upon. For me as a Canadian, it's illegal to break copyright protection (using a crack) but I can legally download anything I want - in particular music and movies - so long as it's not used for promotion/profit.

 

[moretimethansense]

You can't talk about this and disallow Linux remarks, that's like the main point.

The thing is that if you buy hardware you should be able to chop it up however you want because it's yours. Yes some people really want Linux on the PS3 and if you were involved with Linux you'd know that, these lot really REALLY like Linux.

I support him because if you mod your PS3 and commit piracy then you've committed piracy, if you mod your PS3 and don't you've done nothing wrong.

But it's not about if you can or can't modify your PS3. It's about if Sony should be able to tell people that they can't modify their PS3 AND play on the online servers. This matters a lot because if you can modify your PS3 you can cheat pretty easy and that destroys fun for everyone.

As has been ssaid, sony bans cheaters anyway but, I was under the impression that he'd never signed up for PSN and as such had never agreed to the... agreement anyway.

Sony's case is pretty much completely unjustified.

 

[Lazier Than Thou]

You could cheat yeah, but don't they ban cheaters anyway? I mean I can cheat on my PC quite easily but it's upon me not to. There are ways to scan a PS3 or a PC for programs running in the background or for config files altered, there are solutions and if they're going to provide servers to a PS3 owner they should continue to provide it regardless of changes made to the unit.

The crime is the crime, not the potential to commit the crime. If Sony get this ruling they'll be able to ban any modified hardware, potentially including third party controllers.

As a person that has been burned many times by hackers, I say good on Sony for getting rid of them. From all I've seen, it's next to impossible to keep on top of hackers that want to cheat and this seems like the best option available.

If you want to modify your PS3, go ahead. You just wont be able to do anything in multi-player if you do.

 

[Sovereignty]

Well I support it, because I dislike they removed a feature some users may have bought the system explicitly for...

But on the other hand, we all should understand and know well that our online game services (XBL, PSN, ETC) are afforded to us on a conditional basis.

We pay for it, and we get a service. But should at any point the ones running it choose to shut it down, we have to suck it up. Same could be said of this. I'm pretty sure if you never updated your PS3 you could keep running Linux on your machine couldn't you?

I mean, sure you lose the benefits of online play, but they never specified you'd be entitled to those benefits without jumping through a few hoops. (Especially for the PSN as it's more or less a free online service provided to PS3 owners.)

So I look down on Sony for taking away a feature from some people, but I still don't see this as Sony really being this super-monster hell bent on destroying things gamers love.

 

[Lazier Than Thou]

As has been ssaid, sony bans cheaters anyway but, I was under the impression that he'd never signed up for PSN and as such had never agreed to the... agreement anyway.

Sony's case is pretty much completely unjustified.

Yeah? What's easier to do, ban people individually for what they do or close the door they come in? I'm not saying this is my favorite idea in the world, I'm saying it sounds very effective and that's what matters to me the most.

Also, I had not heard of Geohot not signing up for PSN. That does change things significantly if true.

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

Piracy is a strawman as they can not show any real damage from it as well as they (large branded companies) own most IP. So its not that big of a deal to mod your system unless you are the white line snorting elites looking to further your bottom line onto the mostly witless masses.

When the powers that be not only owns the right to send but to receive knowledge then you have a society founded on minimalistic rights and freedoms because the powers that be can not afford the public to think and cloth themselfs.

The DMCA and other rules,laws and mindsets wish to enslave us all to our confined boxes and cubicles. We need less laws and rules not more the main things that need to be made illegal are so nothing good comes from criminalizing every other thing because of vague and or obscure slights...