Mr ModChips gets a kicking
http://www.reghardware.co.uk/2007/10/26/higgs_modding_bristol/
Mr Modchips gets done for supplying errrr Modchips.
Could be bad news for those people who like to use there console as a multi media centre.
Mr Modchips gets done for supplying errrr Modchips.
Could be bad news for those people who like to use there console as a multi media centre.
Post edited by ADJB on
Comments
you can still get most stuff for the main consoles tho
Surely it's your console you can do what you like with it providing you stay within the bounds of the law and don't use your mod to illigaly obtain copywrited material and games.
The onus should then be placed on you not the seller of the chips surely?? Is is that too simple, for this crazy country.
But if you want to do anything to it, that doesn't actually break the law (breaking the law such as hitting someone over the head with it, or filling it with poison and send it to someone you hate) then surely you're allowed to? And I can't see why mod chips are illegal, as they're just a hardware modification? I added a disk drive switch to my Atari STe years ago, and a year or two before that my +2 loaded games much more reliable using an external casette player (done via a couple of wires and a 50p tape socket, as published in Crash (I think, it was about twenty years ago now) than with it's official, internal cassette drive.
My XBox's mod chip allows me to run emulators, homebrew, unofficial ports of Doom, Duke Nukem 3D and others, and the all conquering XBMX (a media centre that plays anything, well apart from Apple .mb4 files - they're the only thing I've found so far that won't play). The mod chip transformed my XBox from a games machine to a better games machine and a first class media centre, which is fantastic, especially since it's saved me money on a new DVD player and Hi-Fi, and saved me space (just an XBox, rather than an XBox, a DVD player and a Hi-Fi). Just because you have a mod chip doesn't mean you'll use it to pirate games.
When you buy a console, you don't sign a contract saying that you won't physical alter or mod it. You pay your money, and the console becomes your property. Alright, so you can't break criminal law with it, by throwing it off a motorway bridge onto a passing car, for example, and such a law is certainly right. But criminal law does not, and should not, prohibit you from altering your own possesions, so why is it illegal to seel or own mod chips?
Incidentally, this bloke sells mod chips, and goes to prison. The same week, some b*****d assaults a 90 year old man, blinding him in one eye, and doesn't go to prison. British Justice, eh?
actually, knowing microsoft you probably do
it would surprise me a great deal if there wasn't some form of EULA or whatever prohibiting it
Doesn't work like that (though no doubt Microsoft and other big companies wish it did) - by law, unless you are shown and agree to a contract, then it's null and void, and when you by something, unless you are given a clear, readable copy of the contract, and you willingly sign it, then that contract is not recognised under law.
When you buy a console from a shop, you give your money, and receive the console. The only rights or rules applicable there are the standard rights and rules that the law applies to all such purchasing; goods must be fit for the purpose that they are sold, they cannot be stolen goods, etc. You have not read or signed any further contract with the shop or with Microsoft, and so no such contract legally exists.
It's the same if you buy something mail order, from e-bay, from a stall holder or anything.
If you order something, and the company insists that you sign a contract before they provide the goods, then if you do sign then you'll be legally obliged to honour the contract, providing:
1) The contract is legally acceptable (so they can insist that you cannot play pirate games on your XBox, but they cannot insist that you eat it, or attack other people with it in the street),
2) They made you aware before you paid your money that you must sign the contract; they can't wait until you paid your money before saying "We'll give you the item when you sign here", you must understand the terms of the agreement first.
The exception is with software, and the licensing agreement that you don't get to see until you try to install the program, but that's apparently because by law software is intellectual property rather than physical property, so it's subject to different rules (so I've read on the 'net, so take that for what it's worth). I have wondered, though, just how legally binding are these contracts in software, that you don't see or read when you actually buy the software from a shop or WWW site?
The point is, when buying anything, you are only subject to the normal consumer rules of the country you are in, and on more, unless you've read and signed a contract agreeing to submit to more rules or clauses. And I've bought four consoles in my life (three from shops and one from ebay), along with several computers, and yet I've never signed, or been asked to sign a contract. And to my mind, and surely according to law, they are mine to do with as I like, providing I don't break the law with them, regardless of what Microsoft or others might claim.
So why are mod chips now illegal? And by the same logic, if mod chips are illegal, what about blank DVDs? Blank VHS cassettes? They can all be used to pirate copyrighted goods. And what about blank paper? You can right down scripts of TV shows that you've seen, or song lyrics that you've heard, for example. Does this mean that blank paper will be banned too?
ah yes, but the xbox bios is software, and it's copyright microsoft and the mod chip is designed to alter or circumvent software code
I think this is the bit where it all gets awkward. According to wikipedia anyway...
its like another forum i frquent where even the faintest hint of file share talk was banned, but i argued that you can use these networks / apps for legal stuff aswell, as long as people dont discuss illegal stuff then wheres the problem?
just helping somebody with a problem to do with an app / network isnt illegal, depends what you do with it that is
Yes, some XBox mod chips contain a modified version of the XBox's BIOS, but you buy XBox mod chips that don't have a copy of the XBox's BIOS (or any of the XBoxes code at all) or even blank mod chips. There is (at least) one for running Linux on the XBox, that contains no Microsoft code whatsoever.
And anyway, since you've bought an XBox, then surely you've bought the right to use that code, and so using it in a mod chip on the same XBox is morally OK? I don't insist on that, but I do insist that buy a mod chip that contains no stolen copyright code is morally OK, and therefore should be legally OK too.
And I can't see that a mod chip should be illegal if it circumvents copy protection, as it's your console you're modifying, from your own free will. It's your console, you can do what you like with it, PROVIDING YOU DON'T BREAK THE LAW, and British law, so far as I know, doesn't (and should not) forbid you from altering the running of your own console.
Trouble is, it's the courts who decide these things, and courts are influenced by lawyers, and lawyers are paid by the rich, and it's the rich who own the big companies, and it's the big companies who want mod chips and other freedoms made illegal.
http://www.ludibria.com/nfo.php?sys=wii&sysid=451
However, it appears that Nintendo have found a way to detect Wii modchips. The disc does a system update. Then if you insert the ripped game it does not load ("Unauthorised Device Detected"). However, the original and previous "back ups" still work.
I can't see it being long before sceners and/or the modchip companies "fix" this. I bet there'll be modchip firmware updates out soon (I hope so anyway :-p). Now, where did I put my eye patch?