Both articles on the front page here fail to mention that he was doing this as an advertised commercial service.
As soon as you ask somebody to pay for something you lose control over every aspect of it. If that is not your intention you should rent your devices to people.
What really amazes me is that the law enforcement people are so eager to comply with this stuff that they even set up a special hotline for it.
As far as I'm concerned these kids are doing honest work, they're breaking a chain of control that should not even be there.
That's more or less what these companies are doing. If you read the mouseprint, you're effectively buying a licence to use their device on their terms. :P
If there is a bill of sale I'm buying it.
If there is a rental agreement and I have to return it at the end of the agreement then I'm renting it.
More or less doesn't cut it.
He could also potentially counter-sue with a class-action lawsuit claiming that the video game systems makers committed fraud by way of falsely advertising to people that they were "buying" the game systems, when in fact, they were actually leasing them.
(Yes, this guy was doing it to pirate video games. But handgun manufacturers build guns solely to murder other human beings, and auto mechanics can install equipment that allows you to exceed the speed limit. Neither of those are crimes, so why should modifying a game console be one?)
When did it turn out? It neither 'should' nor 'should not' be a crime, objectively, that I can see.
Neither of those are crimes, so why should modifying a game console be one?
You can't kill or speed without large and noticable external signals, such as a speeding car or a dead/missing person. You can also target shoot and race on private tracks.
You can pirate video games without any significantly noticable events, and there isn't much else you can do with a chipped console.
Video game piracy has more justification for legal blocks earlier in the process.
I purchased several original xbox's and modded them to run linux for a clustering project.
That's a gross oversimplification of a complex issue. Very few people obtain a handgun legally for the purpose of Murdering somebody. (Less than 1% of legally obtained firearms are used in a crime) The primary reason to own one is for personal protection which implies the direct preservation of life. Ignoring that fact is intellectually dishonest.
Gun ownership is widespread in the US, and lots of people have them in perfectly safe regions. So do they not create a source of danger where there was none? Accidents do happen.
In my country, gun deaths went down considerably after the police started taking them out of circulation. As one police officer put it, bar fights became a lot less deadly in the suburbs.
Okay, that's fine...
If all else fails then yes, I'm sorry, but yes, if somebody breaks into a house and threatens my family I will threaten them with force. The lives of 4 people who are innocent are greater than that of one who willingly put themselves into a criminal position. Do I wish that that wasn't necessary, sure, but that's not the reality of human nature. The threat of force has always been a factor in survival. Even in nature.
Poison caterpillars rarely get eaten, the birds learn to avoid them.
I was talking to a VP of a game company in Europe about 3rd party servers for games like World of Warcraft. He said that they don't really pay attention to them, except for when they run it for a profit. The minute $$ is involved, they have a special phone # at the FBI to call and get the servers raided the next day.