So how are Geohot and the Sony hackers heros?

[Sean951]

Geohot: Douchebag hacker who HAD a valid point, but then lost if because of his douchy attitude, and the fact that he didn't actually fight his point in court where it mattered.

Unless he had someone like the ACLU behind him, the odds of being able to take on Sony as a young adult with a talent for programming is pretty low.

 

[Agayek]

Geohot was a hero, bringing back lost functionality and showing everyone that big bad corperations can be toppled and defied. The other hackers aren't because they just used Geohots reasons as an excuse to make money.

To be completely fair, it's unlikely they've actually made money. As far as I've been able to determine, the information taken from Sony has not actually been used. There are a few instances of identity theft that might be attributed to it, but one would expect far more than a few, since 76 million people had their data stolen.

 

[Agayek]

They removed it for security reasons, and to prevent piracy, which is a completely valid reason people are just up in arms for the sake of bitching. You can argue all you want but you are wrong, Sony has every right to do anything in their power to prevent piracy and loss of profits. And don't give me any of that "Sony is a greedy mega-corporation" bullshit, it's called capitalism, they make a product that people want, they have every right to make money of it.

Again, what they did and why is irrelevant. They removed functionality customers paid for. This is a gross violation of consumer rights, even if it was legalized by the bullshit TOS/EULA shenanigans they pulled.

It's essentially the same thing as you buying a convertible car, then a year later the salesman comes to your house and replaces it with a hardtop version of the same model. Sure, it'll still work, and it'll still be a car, but you paid for a convertible that you no longer have.

 

[Troublesome Lagomorph]

I have never been able to figure it out. I guess Geohot stands up for hacker rights?

I also suggest we give murderers, rapists and thieves rights along wit the hackers.

 

[Vrach]

I guess I don't understand why these guys are considered the good guys and Sony is evil? Because Sony is big and suing people, so they must be evil and it is geo right to be able to hack shit and post how to hack it online, therefore he is a hero. And now Anonymous and some sort of lolcat hackers are taking up arms against Sony for suing a fellow hacker? How is the honorable? That seems like terrorism. It just seems to me that everyone in this situation has dirty hands.

I don't know, maybe I'm missing something.

GeoHot didn't hack nor post how to hack the PSN online, he just hacked the PS3 into providing the Other OS option (which btw, Sony initially advertised for it's product). He's done what thousands of modders do all the time and are praised for and you might have noticed Microsoft even being helpful and giving him a W7 phone to work with and unlock.

He's viewed as a "hero" (not really, but just using your words), because a bought product is something that should belong to the buyer and not the company that took your money for it. As it is the buyer's, the same way you can mod your car after you buy one, you should be able to mod your PS3 as well (you can see some amazing stuff coming out of Kinect modding, which I think I can safely say everyone on Escapist cheered on at one point or another, when they presented something amazing).

Sony however, is pulling the shit many companies do these days (closest to my memory being WoW, who's ToS is an outrage) and saying that for forking over the money to them, they still retain all the rights to your product and can tell you what you can and cannot do with it. It's basically like someone sold you a car and told you "guess what, if you change the ash tray, we get to sue your ass". It's not even a denial of support and service, which are reasonable, if not supportive, it's literally illegal to mod the damn thing.

Now, Sony on the other hand, turned out to be stupid enough to leave a security hole in the client, and after that came out saying "well, it's not supposed to be hacked, so we don't need to protect it!". Worst excuse I've heard to date and just a finger point at someone other than themselves for anyone stupid enough to buy into it. Heads up, a guy who wants to hack your security system doesn't give half a shit about what you do or don't allow to be done with your console. And a guy capable of hacking your security system is well capable of unlocking PS3 with or without the help of George Hotz.

As for the hackers who've fucked PSN over, no one actually views them as "heroes" or anything of the sort. People are merely enjoying the fact Sony's getting bent over. Yeah, it sucks for the users and overall, the whole thing is bad because the users are getting shafted. It's kinda like 9/11. It's not a good thing cause innocents paid for it, but you still enjoy seeing US as a state get shafted and put into place.

 

[Agayek]

No it isn't "completely irrelevant" what they took away totally matters. If they took away something that even 10% of their users would lose access to THAT WOULD BE AN ISSUES. A feature nobody uses is like the button on the side of your phone your not quite sure of so you just leave it there. If someone came to take it away because it made your phone illegal, then you would shrug it off.

What the thing is entirely matters. I'd support you raving nutters if it was an actual tangible thing that was taken. But it wasn't so i feel the need to defend common sense.

With everything in the world THIS is what you choose to get up in arms about. Waste of energy much.

Yes, it actually is completely irrelevant. What they took away doesn't matter, only that they took it, without repercussion.

It sets a precedent that companies simply need to write in their TOS/EULA "We own everything we sell, our customers only lease it", and they can then do ANYTHING THEY LIKE to something you purchased.

Like I said before, the same logic could then be applied to playing Blu-Ray discs, or connecting to the Internet, or streaming media from your computer, or any of a number of other possibilities. They could remove any or all of them at a whim.

They have set a precedent that they will willfully fuck over their customers if it pleases them. This is not an acceptable business practice.

 

[bob-2000]

These groups are a good example of people with good intentions, but a sadly warped sense of justice. Their problem is that, though they are often fighting for nobel ideals, they don't realize the real-word consequences that their little games will have on innocent people.

 

[Arehexes]

The thing is, by supporting Anonymouse and Geohot, these people are trying to slide into their Che Guevara fantasy, and pretend that they are fighting against an overarcing conspiracy to deprive them of basic rights, meanwhile ignoring the fact that Guevara was very little more than a mass murding terrorist.

Let us not forget, either, that these people are, for the most part, hypocrites. "Fuck Sony!" But, they own every God of War game, and will be happy to download the free shit from the PSN Store, when it gets back up fully. "Fuck EA!" While having pre-orders down on Madden and the next Dragon Age. These are the same people who ***** and moan about capitalism online.... on their iPads..... at Starbucks.

Rex, this never had anything to do with Sony "defending its hardware." The hardware was never the issue. Sony was defending its software.

Thank you someone gets that sony was after the fact that the encryption keys (which is a software thing) was leaked, and sony was made about that. Sony can't complain if someone buys a system and blows it up but if they crack the software to do what ever to the system they go nuts. Which to be fair makes since.

 

[artanis_neravar]

They removed it for security reasons, and to prevent piracy, which is a completely valid reason people are just up in arms for the sake of bitching. You can argue all you want but you are wrong, Sony has every right to do anything in their power to prevent piracy and loss of profits. And don't give me any of that "Sony is a greedy mega-corporation" bullshit, it's called capitalism, they make a product that people want, they have every right to make money of it.

Again, what they did and why is irrelevant. They removed functionality customers paid for. This is a gross violation of consumer rights, even if it was legalized by the bullshit TOS/EULA shenanigans they pulled.

It's essentially the same thing as you buying a convertible car, then a year later the salesman comes to your house and replaces it with a hardtop version of the same model. Sure, it'll still work, and it'll still be a car, but you paid for a convertible that you no longer have.

No it is not irrelevant, it is completely relevant to the case, and your crappy metaphor has nothing to do with it, unless removing the convertible top helped prevent piracy.

 

[Rednog]

That said, the people who took down the PSN are terrible, terrible people.

So just to clarify, you're mad at Sony right? Cause no hackers physically turned off the PSN. Sony willingly turned it off and kept it off for so long. No hacker was blocking it or had any direct hand in taking the PSN down. It was a reaction by Sony when they detected something funny in their systems.

 

[Arehexes]

I guess I don't understand why these guys are considered the good guys and Sony is evil? Because Sony is big and suing people, so they must be evil and it is geo right to be able to hack shit and post how to hack it online, therefore he is a hero. And now Anonymous and some sort of lolcat hackers are taking up arms against Sony for suing a fellow hacker? How is the honorable? That seems like terrorism. It just seems to me that everyone in this situation has dirty hands.

I don't know, maybe I'm missing something.

GeoHot didn't hack nor post how to hack the PSN online, he just hacked the PS3 into providing the Other OS option (which btw, Sony initially advertised for it's product). He's done what thousands of modders do all the time and are praised for and you might have noticed Microsoft even being helpful and giving him a W7 phone to work with and unlock.

He's viewed as a "hero" (not really, but just using your words), because a bought product is something that should belong to the buyer and not the company that took your money for it. As it is the buyer's, the same way you can mod your car after you buy one, you should be able to mod your PS3 as well (you can see some amazing stuff coming out of Kinect modding, which I think I can safely say everyone on Escapist cheered on at one point or another, when they presented something amazing).

Sony however, is pulling the shit many companies do these days (closest to my memory being WoW, who's ToS is an outrage) and saying that for forking over the money to them, they still retain all the rights to your product and can tell you what you can and cannot do with it. It's basically like someone sold you a car and told you "guess what, if you change the ash tray, we get to sue your ass". It's not even a denial of support and service, which are reasonable, if not supportive, it's literally illegal to mod the damn thing.

Now, Sony on the other hand, turned out to be stupid enough to leave a security hole in the client, and after that came out saying "well, it's not supposed to be hacked, so we don't need to protect it!". Worst excuse I've heard to date and just a finger point at someone other than themselves for anyone stupid enough to buy into it. Heads up, a guy who wants to hack your security system doesn't give half a shit about what you do or don't allow to be done with your console. And a guy capable of hacking your security system is well capable of unlocking PS3 with or without the help of George Hotz.

As for the hackers who've fucked PSN over, no one actually views them as "heroes" or anything of the sort. People are merely enjoying the fact Sony's getting bent over. Yeah, it sucks for the users and overall, the whole thing is bad because the users are getting shafted. It's kinda like 9/11. It's not a good thing cause innocents paid for it, but you still enjoy seeing US as a state get shafted and put into place.

Problem is I don't think he was sued for bringing back otherOS because remember these was dongles that unlocked the system and sony could not stop them from being made (much like the pandora battery for the psp which in a nut shell lets you install any firmware you please that supports it and sony could not stop it (since I have one and I have a friend who bought one for himself)). If I remember right he was sued for releasing the encryption keys which allows you to make what ever software and firmware you want to make for what ever reason.

 

[Agayek]

No it is not irrelevant, it is completely relevant to the case, and your crappy metaphor has nothing to do with it, unless removing the convertible top helped prevent piracy.

Yes, it is irrelevant. They have set a precedent that they can remove a feature from something you paid for.

It doesn't matter if it was Other OS, the ability to play Blu-Rays or whatever the fuck else you want. They stripped functionality from something you legally purchased.

The reason behind it is completely and totally irrelevant. All that matters is that they did it.

 

[Arehexes]

That said, the people who took down the PSN are terrible, terrible people.

So just to clarify, you're mad at Sony right? Cause no hackers physically turned off the PSN. Sony willingly turned it off and kept it off for so long. No hacker was blocking it or had any direct hand in taking the PSN down. It was a reaction by Sony when they detected something funny in their systems.

Which they wouldn't have to shut down if the hackers hadn't stole user information.

 

[Arehexes]

No it isn't "completely irrelevant" what they took away totally matters. If they took away something that even 10% of their users would lose access to THAT WOULD BE AN ISSUES. A feature nobody uses is like the button on the side of your phone your not quite sure of so you just leave it there. If someone came to take it away because it made your phone illegal, then you would shrug it off.

What the thing is entirely matters. I'd support you raving nutters if it was an actual tangible thing that was taken. But it wasn't so i feel the need to defend common sense.

With everything in the world THIS is what you choose to get up in arms about. Waste of energy much.

Yes, it actually is completely irrelevant. What they took away doesn't matter, only that they took it, without repercussion.

It sets a precedent that companies simply need to write in their TOS/EULA "We own everything we sell, our customers only lease it", and they can then do ANYTHING THEY LIKE to something you purchased.

Like I said before, the same logic could then be applied to playing Blu-Ray discs, or connecting to the Internet, or streaming media from your computer, or any of a number of other possibilities. They could remove any or all of them at a whim.

They have set a precedent that they will willfully fuck over their customers if it pleases them. This is not an acceptable business practice.

But they didn't fuck over anyone. Or at least a sizeable enough percentage for them to actually you know mount some form of legal defense, the kind that would be very easy to do if it was a used feature.

Basically the crutch of your argument is that you want to hate sony. Regardless of how flimsy the reasoning behind such an act is.

There was a few class action suites against sony when that happened, and people did get a refund in the EU about it (from my understanding) for the removal and it was a advertised as a feature (they bragged about how you can use the system to do your office work and stuff of the like).

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

Geohot is awesome simply for cracking the uncrackable.

The folks who hacked Sony are morons causing irreparable damage, most likely simply because they can. Defacing a home page is one thing...it can be funny when done with class and is all that's needed for a "Nicely done". But stealing information is criminal behaviour and DDOS attacks are juvenile.

 

[Vrach]

Problem is I don't think he was sued for bringing back otherOS because remember these was dongles that unlocked the system and sony could not stop them from being made (much like the pandora battery for the psp which in a nut shell lets you install any firmware you please that supports it and sony could not stop it (since I have one and I have a friend who bought one for himself)). If I remember right he was sued for releasing the encryption keys which allows you to make what ever software and firmware you want to make for what ever reason.

Which goes outside the definition of modding, how?

 

[Cid Silverwing]

It's a two-faced fight.

It would have taught Sony some humility, i.e. to not hype their so-called "team of super lawyers" (or to tl;dr it in trollspeak - "either you do as we say or we will sue you into the streets with our magnificent team of uber lawyers URR DURR") and hopefully stop thinking they can break laws with their EULA.

Then again the hackers wanted to DOX people and because they killed the PSN, they deserve prison sentence. Each and every one of them.

 

[Arehexes]

A FEATURE NOBODY USED.
Seriously the people who used the otherOS
seriously
are still using it. Everyone else only liked it as an option and just enjoys getting up in arms about stuff. Its a complete non-issue. And If you were sony and had a way to shut off pirate access you'd take it too. Because its a hell of a lot less effort than patching for every single game released to check for cracks.

Be angry if you want, but it's not because they were wrong. its because you want to argue about something.

The fact that it's Other OS is almost completely irrelevant to the debate.

The fact of the matter is, Sony removed a feature that their customers paid for, because they felt like it. If this behavior is tolerated, it would not be much of a stretch for them to remove the ability to play Blu-Ray disks, unless you pay them to unlock it, or any of a variety of other silly things. At the end of the day, Sony removed a feature from a product customers had already paid for, without serious repercussion. That is very much a problem.

like removing PS2 emulation which they did and which GeoHot re-enabled.

PS2 emulation was removed to cut cost and was announced on the NEWER PS3 SYSTEMS (while otherOS was removed through a upgrade which if you didn't do you would lose features anyway), I haven't heard anything about older models having that feature removed at all. The PS2 Emotion chip was removed from the system all together