The ACCC are definently the good guys, even if they can't get that judges head out of his own ass

Ok, for those who don't know it is now illegal in australia to have a mod chip installed in you playstation as the previos rulling (were the ACCC kicked sony out of court) has now been overturned. Our legal system sucks. Now though it is true that modchips allow the use of illegaly copied games, they also allow the use of imported games, as sony - being the evil pricks they are - have region coding in they're games, ever since the original Playstation. I am actually fairly sure they came up with the system, which has now been adopted by the film industry for DVDs. Now I am of course a big fan of the Playstion and PS2 but I still think sony are being evil pricks. Mandatory quote time the following snippets are from the Australian Financial Review article ACCC attacks Sony victory.


"The ACCC believes region coding is detrimental to consumers as it severely limits their choice and, in some cases, access to competitively priced goods,"


The "chipping" case also attracted the attention of the Office of the US Trade Representative earlier this year. In March, it noted the US motion picture industry was "increasingly concerned" about Australian law at that time as it allowed the legal modification of DVD players in Australia.

According to legal sources, Sony's victory might mean the modification of DVD players is now also illegal.


Fun Fun fun. So there we have it. Now correct me if I'm wrong but we do have laws against anti-comptitive behavior don't we?? Also if you can't chip a PS2 or PS1, you can't play backup's of original games you own, and I mean BACKUP's, not Illegal copies. Form an article on ZNET sony have told us we do not have the right to backup the software they produce, this seems a bit rude to me, as I'm sure if a disk got dammaged they wouldn't replace it, we've seen that before with DVD's that suffer for DVD rot. The maufacturer will not replace the defective media, and I'm sure sony wouldn't either.
Parallel importing of music was a great thing as it did drop prices, but while Region coding exists, it's not plausable for either for PS1/PS2 or DVD.
What I would like to see about now is a consumer group attempt to sue Sony or force them to produce Pre-chipped PS1/PS2's (even if they stick with no backups, removing the region coding would be good). Now in my oppinion, a attack like this sould win, as it otherwise would be anti-competitive. Once this is done we could send a consumer group against the film industry to deal with the DVD regioning.


The case was given to sony as their region coding also prevents piracy as it creates a barrier to useing illegal copies. I think it is important to note that such resoning could also be used to remove CD and DVD burners form the shelves. Backups can be created on tape, large files could be moved on thumb drives. Only certain regestereg companys would be allowed to own or use burners, you bring in the thumb drive(s) or tape and they produce a CD or DVD for you. Obviosly this would be stupid, but it is possible as if you couldn't use a DVD or CD burner you couldn't create an illegal copy of any sortware. Somethings gotta break, and I'm voting for Sony, followed by the film industry (run by Americans, I think).


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