mod chips legal down under

in an article on G4TV.com, Wade Steel writes that an Australian court has ruled that mod chips are legal. this particular case centered around the Sony PlayStation console. Sony argued that mod chips violated their copyright protection. however, the court ruled that this is not true.

if you read through the article, you'll see that the determining point in the case was the fact that "since no full copy of the 'unauthorized' game is actually created in the console's memory when the game is inserted into the console, then no actual copyright infringement happens."

this is great news for game modders. after innumerable accusations of supporting piracy, modders are starting to get support from the legal system. the fact is that a lot of people buy mod chips for legal uses. for example, using their Xbox console as a media center.

if the console makers are concerned about mod chips because the chips can be used to run pirate games, then they should target the piracy - not the chips. for example, they could require that an authorized DVD is in the console's drive before the game launches. I'm not saying that this is the answer, but it's an example of measures that the hardware manufacturers could try. it's just one example of a solution that wouldn't persecute the legit modding community.

Insolence - funny error message

this one can be filed under 'daily smile' or, better yet... 'what software should be like.'

I was playing around with the Insolence Halo modding app today. when I attempted to use an invalid path to a map file, I received this error:


<click image to see full-size version>

kudos to tjc2k4 for not taking his software too seriously.

interview with Xbox 360 Force

I recently chatted with Northy from the Xbox 360 Force Forum. we talked about some of the Halo books that I've worked on, the Xbox 360 and the video game console scene.