4 ms·

This is one of the best reads in a long time. Awesome article and extremely interesting. I have friends a long time ago that used to buy CoD modded lobbies fro

by hastes 8y ago

This is one of the best reads in a long time. Awesome article and extremely interesting. I have friends a long time ago that used to buy CoD modded lobbies from these guys. Crazy to see how their lives unfolded.

StudentStuff 8y ago
It is quite a good read, but its sad to see how computing has continued to be locked away from the end user, affording them access to a walled garden of the manufacturers choosing, with no ability to change OSes or even install basic security updates without the hardware manufacturers consent and involvement.
- digi_owl 8y ago
  Yet at the other end you will find people that in full earnestness argues for further locking down, because "owners" can't trusted with proper maintenance. This is why the "home" PC varaiants of Windows 10 force reboots and removed the group policy tool that could have made disabling it easy.
- zeusk 8y ago
  I interned in the Graphics kernel team at Microsoft and we worked quite a lot with xbox. None of those people like DRM and copy protection bullshit but the studios (both gaming and media) demand it and not having them could mean losing market share to others that are willing. Cheat prevention is another big reason that often came up for the hardened environment.
  - throwaway2048 8y ago
    Its easy to abstract away personal responsibility to well crafted punching bags, but in the end its still a choice.
    - mikec3010 8y ago
      It's also your choice to not write your own gaming console that is DRM-free. What's stopping you? If you need money, go to venture capital and make your pitch about a gaming console that asks people to pay, but allows trivial copying and sharing of titles.
      - ShabbosGoy 8y ago
        So you think the current copyright system in the US is perfect, then? You’re part of the problem if you support overaggressive copyright enforcement. It’s my device, I paid for it, I should be allowed to do WHATEVER the hell I want with it.
        untog 8y ago
        I'm not sure what about the OPs post would make you think they consider the copyright system to be perfect. They merely suggested that there is nothing stopping you creating a DRM-free console.
        freeflight 8y ago
        "Nothing stopping you from creating your own" is quite a trivialization of how difficult it actually is to break into the, rather entrenched, video game console market. Having to compete with companies that haven't just been around and known for decades, but have massive resources and synergies due to their sheer size, is a pretty daunting task, and that's just the hardware side. Trying to convince major developers, and especially publishers, to get on board with such a project is also no small feat, you'd pretty have to convince publishers to do a 180° on how they've handled a lot of things so far because publishers are also known to be quite big fans of draconian copyright laws.
        InitialLastName 8y ago
        >"Nothing stopping you from creating your own" is quite a trivialization of how difficult it actually is to break into the, rather entrenched, video game console market. No, "nothing stopping you from selling your own" would be a trivialization (because there are things). It's easy enough (~20 hours of effort, including research) to build a computer, install Linux, and start playing DRM free games. If you want to distribute it, that's another story.
- Qwertie 8y ago
  At the same time there has never been another point in history where so much open source software is freely available to everyone.
AgentME 8y ago
I think I used Pokora's utility for adding water to Halo 2 levels. I remember when it came out and it seemed like all of the new custom Halo 2 levels people were making on halomods.com had customized water immediately.

by hastes 8y ago

StudentStuff 8y ago

It is quite a good read, but its sad to see how computing has continued to be locked away from the end user, affording them access to a walled garden of the manufacturers choosing, with no ability to change OSes or even install basic security updates without the hardware manufacturers consent and involvement.

digi_owl 8y ago
Yet at the other end you will find people that in full earnestness argues for further locking down, because "owners" can't trusted with proper maintenance. This is why the "home" PC varaiants of Windows 10 force reboots and removed the group policy tool that could have made disabling it easy.
zeusk 8y ago
I interned in the Graphics kernel team at Microsoft and we worked quite a lot with xbox. None of those people like DRM and copy protection bullshit but the studios (both gaming and media) demand it and not having them could mean losing market share to others that are willing. Cheat prevention is another big reason that often came up for the hardened environment.
- throwaway2048 8y ago
  Its easy to abstract away personal responsibility to well crafted punching bags, but in the end its still a choice.
  - mikec3010 8y ago
    It's also your choice to not write your own gaming console that is DRM-free. What's stopping you? If you need money, go to venture capital and make your pitch about a gaming console that asks people to pay, but allows trivial copying and sharing of titles.
    - ShabbosGoy 8y ago
      So you think the current copyright system in the US is perfect, then? You’re part of the problem if you support overaggressive copyright enforcement. It’s my device, I paid for it, I should be allowed to do WHATEVER the hell I want with it.
      - untog 8y ago
        I'm not sure what about the OPs post would make you think they consider the copyright system to be perfect. They merely suggested that there is nothing stopping you creating a DRM-free console.
        freeflight 8y ago
        "Nothing stopping you from creating your own" is quite a trivialization of how difficult it actually is to break into the, rather entrenched, video game console market. Having to compete with companies that haven't just been around and known for decades, but have massive resources and synergies due to their sheer size, is a pretty daunting task, and that's just the hardware side. Trying to convince major developers, and especially publishers, to get on board with such a project is also no small feat, you'd pretty have to convince publishers to do a 180° on how they've handled a lot of things so far because publishers are also known to be quite big fans of draconian copyright laws.
        InitialLastName 8y ago
        >"Nothing stopping you from creating your own" is quite a trivialization of how difficult it actually is to break into the, rather entrenched, video game console market. No, "nothing stopping you from selling your own" would be a trivialization (because there are things). It's easy enough (~20 hours of effort, including research) to build a computer, install Linux, and start playing DRM free games. If you want to distribute it, that's another story.
Qwertie 8y ago
At the same time there has never been another point in history where so much open source software is freely available to everyone.

AgentME 8y ago

I think I used Pokora's utility for adding water to Halo 2 levels. I remember when it came out and it seemed like all of the new custom Halo 2 levels people were making on halomods.com had customized water immediately.