Sony files for restraining order against Geohot+fail0verflow

[Velotix von Skruviktorrius]

The funny thing is I honestly can't answer that question. Sorry! XD;

[Candescence]

You know... I never actually considered the idea that hardware developers don't have it easy because of closed-source hardware and lack of documentation. Honestly, perhaps an open-hardware console would help the industry considerably. The problem is, who would be willing to make one...

[Dobkeratops]

The amount of baseless, biased conjectures, speculation, misinformation and agenda pushing going on in this thread could fill a tinfoil hat the size of a (start finger quotes) homebrewer's (end finger quotes) ego. What a clusterfuck all around.

Not touching that with a ten foot pole. Why bother? People will believe what they want to believe.

That aside, I'd like to comment on two statements:

("But wait? How has Microsoft made amends for past mistakes?" Microsoft have explicitly come out and stated legally that they will not sue people for making open-source implementations of their critical developer technologies. This is so out-of-character for Microsoft that many people still don't believe it, but there it is in black and white. Hell, you can sell your open-source code. Bravo, MS.)

Bravo! You just ate their little PR stunt like a champ. Nevermind that they're the company behind Windows and their current console is the most draconian propietary shit ever concieved from the hardware to the online system. I'd like to see how MS would react to custom firmware on the 360. Oh wait, they ban the fuck out of everyone.

But I'm sure they'll amend for that too and their next console will be incredibly open with a lot of interchangeable OS and come with a preinstalled homebrew loader!

Simply put then, the PS3 was hacked for the reason that Sony were (and are) too paranoid to release sufficient information and access to their hardware technology to the public. OtherOS was not a sufficient implementation either as it denied access to the PS3's GPU, crippling the technology.

You're buying a gaming console. Not one of those custom homebrew machines like a GP32 or whatever. No manufacturer is in any obligation of providing full access to the hardware to anyone but licensed programmers, and no manufacturer has ever done that, be it Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo or SEGA. And I think it's pretty clear why they don't.

The only ones with that opinion are the retarded "hackers" with a twisted sense of self-entitlement.

As a side note, I'm going to make a bold prediction here: I can guarantee any hampering my PS3 experience suffers will (curiously!) not be originated by the "evil megacorp" that the true sources of the issues hypocritically love to blame.

[Velotix von Skruviktorrius]

RAGE

...plus good points

...then MOAR RAGE

+1ed for making good points and entertaining me. But anyway. Clearing some stuff up:

Bravo! You just ate their little PR stunt like a champ. Nevermind that they're the company behind Windows and their current console is the most draconian propietary shit ever concieved from the hardware to the online system. I'd like to see how MS would react to custom firmware on the 360. Oh wait, they ban the fuck out of everyone.

But I'm sure they'll amend for that too and their next console will be incredibly open with a lot of interchangeable OS and come with a preinstalled homebrew loader!

I'm not against being banned from the online networks, I thought I'd made that clear.

The issue is to be able to do with hardware you've purchased what you'd like with it and to be able to develop for the hardware freely - i.e. if you get banned from the gaming network you can still homebrew an internet connection system without much trouble and then who needs the fecking network? If the knock-on effect is for people to then hack online games and cheat to the nines then damn right they should get banned for it. As an extension to that, continuing to license developers and brand products is absolutely a great idea, as the whole point of that system originally was to guarantee a quality product to the consumer. Now if only they'd stop licensing shovelware...

Also, hilarious as it is imagining Windows going fully open-source too, my point was simply that up to that point, Microsoft had taken the line "OPEN-SOURCE IS LIKE TOTALLY EVIL" and from there, any progress, even a small start like that, is still good progress. Never expect miracles.

You're buying a gaming console. Not one of those custom homebrew machines like a GP32 or whatever. No manufacturer is in any obligation of providing full access to the hardware to anyone but licensed programmers, and no manufacturer has ever done that, be it Sony, Microsoft, Nintendo or SEGA.

Simply because no-one's ever done it is no reason alone to never start doing it. There's a first time for everything, so the saying goes.

With the amount of blatant online cheating and pirating that goes on though, damn right they're going to be careful about it.

As a side note, I'm going to make a bold prediction here: I can guarantee any hampering my PS3 experience suffers will (curiously!) not be originated by the "evil megacorp" that the true sources of the issues hypocritically love to blame.

I never called them evil. They're not evil.

They're trying to protect their interests. They're a hardware company with a finger in the pie of pretty much every single field in the technology industries. Asking a business to be selfless is idiocy; no business would ever survive being so generous.

Asking a business to not shit all over their customers is perfectly reasonable, however.

One last thing.

The amount of baseless

I has bases.

biased conjectures

A biased opinion, who'd have thought?

I am absolutely biased: I'm training to be a games developer myself and although I've recently seen firsthand the benefits of getting licensed access to tech, I've also seen all the garbage that goes with it that is thoroughly unnecessary. To at least some extent my opinion is derived from recent experience.

[Dobkeratops]

I'm not raging pal, it's IRONICAL rage, which is much more sophisticated. Albeit as a legit user that'll no doubt get screwed by those developments and as a friend of several people in the industry that get negatively impacted constantly by piracy I'd have plenty of reason to!

And you're wrong in assuming the parts of the post that aren't a direct reply to your quotes were directed at you specifically.

Now I could say you were pretty quick in assuming I was talking about you in particular. Sensitive subject?

[Velotix von Skruviktorrius]

Maybe.

Funny story that happened today:

I have long distrusted Sony's business ethics and this situation is no different. It is the main reason I do not buy their products.

[Carbo]

Geohot set up a donation pool for extra legal defenses in the upcoming case. Posting it not so much cause I assume people here will actually pitch in, but it sheds some light and interesting tidbits about the case in general. Edited February 20, 2011 by Carbo

[Scar]

Maybe.

Funny story that happened today:

So recently I bought the entire series of Monty Python for £20. Bargain! I load up the DVD, and guess what greets me on startup?

Fuck you Sony.

I don't get the problem with this.

I have long distrusted Sony's business ethics and this situation is no different. It is the main reason I do not buy their products.

What's your main problem with their business ethics?

[eXtaticus]

The recent literal tsunami of bullshit from both sides of this senseless war is currently making me exceptionally ecstatic that I'm migrating to PC gaming next week. Homebrewers should try buying a REAL open-development machine, and console companies should focus on making decent exclusive titles to promote their hardware beyond what the ability to play any unsigned code can.

Geohot and his hacker friends are idiots for bothering with such a waste of time of a machine in the first place, (realistically, the PS3 being decidedly difficult to program - see Hideo Kajima's disappointment in how MGS4 turned out and the legion of cancelled (or released, but ported) exclusives and (sometimes permanently) delayed "launch titles" from E3 2005/6 for plain and honest proof of this - will prevent any truly great homebrew titles from being released within years of the machine's initial breaking - and emulators are ALWAYS better on the PC) and Sony are leeching scumbags who are only suing as an act of revenge, and to put on a territorial threat display to ward off any future invaders of their oh-so-secure "gaming paradise" - it's the human race's tribal nature at it's digital ugliest, with the opposing parties only still participating in this battle to spite eachother.

It is truly sad to see how utterly pathetic the console business has become...

[Scar]

The recent literal tsunami of bullshit from both sides of this senseless war is currently making me exceptionally ecstatic that I'm migrating to PC gaming next week. Homebrewers should try buying a REAL open-development machine, and console companies should focus on making decent exclusive titles to promote their hardware beyond what the ability to play any unsigned code can.

Geohot and his hacker friends are idiots for bothering with such a waste of time of a machine in the first place, (realistically, the PS3 being decidedly difficult to program - see Hideo Kajima's disappointment in how MGS4 turned out and the legion of cancelled (or released, but ported) exclusives and (sometimes permanently) delayed "launch titles" from E3 2005/6 for plain and honest proof of this - will prevent any truly great homebrew titles from being released within years of the machine's initial breaking - and emulators are ALWAYS better on the PC) and Sony are leeching scumbags who are only suing as an act of revenge, and to put on a territorial threat display to ward off any future invaders of their oh-so-secure "gaming paradise" - it's the human race's tribal nature at it's digital ugliest, with the opposing parties only still participating in this battle to spite eachother.

It is truly sad to see how utterly pathetic the console business has become...

Its always been tribal.

Its just Nintendo who were the big thugs back in the old days. Nowadays is Sony and/or Microsoft.

Nothing has changed, this is business, and it always will be business. All this shit will blow over pretty soon anyway.

PC gaming? Way to inaccessible. You have to be insanely good to get any real enjoyment from MMO's and other such competitive games. I'm not entirely sure about single player focused games, because I'd rather play those kind of games on a massive 1080p TV.

Bah, this ain't a console war topic......and I hate console wars.

Edited February 20, 2011 by Scar

[Velotix von Skruviktorrius]

I don't get the problem with this.

I acted smug about never buying a Sony product then just recently ended up buying a Sony-licensed product by mistake. I lost the game.

What's your main problem with their business ethics?

Primarily that they're actually willing to break the law to protect their interests; no company should be prepared to do that.

[Scar]

Primarily that they're actually willing to break the law to protect their interests; no company should be prepared to do that.

I see. Makes sense. Thing is, Sony never seem to get away with it, because the law catches up quickly.

As for not buying Sony products, its a shame, because most of them are really good, but a principle is a principle I guess.

[Velotix von Skruviktorrius]

You'll notice I've never said "Sony's products are shit" because anyone who actually claims that is a bloody liar.

Edited February 20, 2011 by Velotix Lexovetikan

[Carbo]

Sony had the police raid the home of a prominent PS3 homebrew scener and confiscated all of his computers and gear.

Jesus fucking Christ.

[Badnik Mechanic]

Sony had the police raid the home of a prominent PS3 homebrew scener and confiscated all of his computers and gear.

Jesus fucking Christ.

I don't know why but... Part of me finds that really funny. The fact that he says both Sony and the police raided his home. (Although I doubt very much Sony was there, most likely it was just the police). Just because for a moment I had visions of if Sega still made consoles, it would mean that AAUK would have to go around raiding peoples homes.

Edited February 23, 2011 by Hogfather

[Velotix von Skruviktorrius]

Oh just hurry up and get into court already, this is getting silly. ._.

[Carbo]

Seeing as how Sony are thriving on loose threads, they just got clearance for targeting any IP that has visited Geohot's site or viewed Geohot material throughout the past two years.

A federal magistrate is granting Sony the right to acquire the internet IP addresses of anybody who has visited PlayStation 3 hacker George Hotz’ website from January of 2009 to the present.

Thursday’s decision (.pdf) by Magistrate Joseph Spero to allow Sony to subpoena Hotz’ web provider raises a host of web privacy concerns.

The subpoena to Bluehost, which maintains Hotz’ geohot.com site, is part of Sony’s lawsuit against the 21-year-old New Jersey hacker. Respected for his iPhone hacks and now the PlayStation 3 jailbreak, Hotz is accused of breaching the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and other laws after he published on his website an encryption key and software tools that allow Playstation owners to gain complete control of their consoles from the firmware on up.

...

A subpoena to YouTube, also approved, seeks information connected to the “geohot” account that displayed a video of the hack being used: “Jailbroken PS3 3.55 with Homebrew.” The subpoena demands data to identify who watched the video and “documents reproducing all records or usernames and IP addresses that have posted or published comments in response to the video.”

This is getting incredibly ridiculous.

[Tornado]

Some idiot judge actually allowed Sony to have access to all that information? What the fuck for?

[Badnik Mechanic]

What the fuck for?

According to the site. Two reasons, and when you think back to why the case was delayed... it's quite clever, from Sonys perspective at least.

1: To prove the “defendant’s distribution” of the hack.

2: This reason is due to a jurisdictional argument over whether Sony must sue Hotz in his home state of New Jersey rather than in San Francisco, which Sony would prefer. Sony said the server logs would demonstrate that many of those who downloaded Hotz’s hack reside in Northern California — thus making San Francisco a proper venue for the case.

[Tornado]

I know why Sony says that they need it. I want to know why the judge gave it to them.

If you could prove minimum contacts simply by grabbing IP logs and pointing out that people who lived in California visited the website (and I'm pretty sure you can't, but let's just assume you could), there is still absolutely no reason to approve the subpoena for the YouTube information. It does absolutely nothing for the first point, and it probably undermines the second one.

[Scar]

Whatever.

I've reached the point where I don't care anymore.

Most people who use Hotz's stuff aren't using it for the homeebrew, just for the piracy/hacking of games. Since the PS3 being hacked there are so many hacked lobbies in MW2 and even COD4. I really don't like that as it ruins the fun of the game.

The hackers, specifically the ones that cheat and steal, can all go fuck themselves for all I care. I do believe Sony are going a bit overboard with the confiscation of the PS3 and computing equipment. They're just losing sales of the PS4 with that kinda attitude.

Though, no doubt people will buy the PS4 to hack it, just to spite Sony.

[Patticus]

A federal magistrate is granting Sony the right to acquire the internet IP addresses of anybody who has visited PlayStation 3 hacker George Hotz’s website from January of 2009 to the present.

The Bluehost subpoena requires the company to turn over “documents reproducing all server logs, IP address logs, account information, account access records and application or registration forms” tied to Hotz’s hosting. The subpoena also demands “any other identifying information corresponding to persons or computers who have accessed or downloaded files hosted using your service and associated” with the http://www.geohot.com website, including but not limited to the “geohot.com/jailbreak.zip file.”

The judge also signed off on a Google subpoena seeking the logs for Hotz’s Blogger.com blog, geohotps.3.blogspot.com.

A YouTube subpoena, also approved, seeks information connected to the “geohot” account that displayed a video of the hack being used: “Jailbroken PS3 3.55 with Homebrew.” The subpoena demands data to identify who watched the video and “documents reproducing all records or usernames and IP addresses that have posted or published comments in response to the video.”

A fourth subpoena is directed at Twitter, demanding the disclosure of all of Hotz’s tweets, and “documents sufficient to identify all names, addresses, and telephone numbers associated with the Twitter account.”

Sony told Spero, a San Francisco magistrate, that it needed the information for at least two reasons.

One is to prove the “defendant’s distribution” of the hack. The other involves a jurisdictional argument over whether Sony must sue Hotz in his home state of New Jersey rather than in San Francisco, which Sony would prefer. Sony said the server logs would demonstrate that many of those who downloaded Hotz’s hack reside in Northern California — thus making San Francisco a proper venue for the case.

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/03/geohot-site-unmasking/

So then, it looks like if you watched the YouTube video of this thing, they'll have your IP address by now.

[Scar]

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2011/03/geohot-site-unmasking/

So then, it looks like if you watched the YouTube video of this thing, they'll have your IP address by now.

I haven't. And even then, they can't do anything to you. Aren't they just trying to get the court cast to get to San Fransico? Just because you watched the video doesn't mean you support or used any of Hotz's hacking....er....stuff...

[Velotix von Skruviktorrius]

*visibly strains trying not to scream "I TOLD YOU SONY ARE BASTARDS" all over the thread*

[Scar]

*visibly strains trying not to scream "I TOLD YOU SONY ARE BASTARDS" all over the thread*

Trust me, Sony is no worse than any other company in the world. Ethics and business don't go hand in hand, there is no ethical multinational corporation, because they are run by shareholders.

Its up to you not to support Sony, but if business ethics are an issue, you should read into some of the shit many many companies did to make money, or prevent loss.

Edited March 5, 2011 by Scar