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Soulja Boy Is Selling Cheap Emulators as His Own Consoles
- swarnie_ 8y agoThese are just Alibaba emulators with ROMs preloaded right? How is he expecting not to get sued by every game dev and manufacturer from the last 30 years?
- iseeyoubydesign 8y agobecause the games are all from a few devs and they get a cut. This is too obvious to be this stupid. Take a look at this guy and ask yourself how hes been so successful. Hes crazy like a fox. But well see, maybe hes finally went crazy.
- balls187 8y agoPerhaps he just rubber stamped the idea. Or some suit somewhere told him it's okay. Or he just doesn't care because he'd get a C&D first, comply and keep the profits.
- zeroname 8y ago> How is he expecting not to get sued by every game dev and manufacturer from the last 30 years? Probably by being broke. Nintendo might still prosecute to make a point though.
- sodafountan 8y agoFor the same reason Prada or Gucci doesn't go after every illegal vendor selling fake merchandise on the street corner, even if you go after them and win what are you going to take? There's very little profit involved in these endeavors and most people are wise enough to be able to detect cheap junk and not buy it. Soulja Boy isn't getting rich off of this, but Nintendo might take notice if this blows up too much.
- bonestamp2 8y ago800 preloaded games? The disregard for copyright is embarrassingly naive... usually the idea with selling something is to come out financially ahead in the end.
- dleslie 8y agoBest Buy has been selling pirate retro consoles for months, with no action taken against them. https://m.bestbuy.ca/en-CA/product/300-in-1-portable-retro-mini-handheld-game-console-red/13011241 https://m.bestbuy.ca/en-CA/product/300-in-1-portable-retro-m... And, of course, Amazon and Ali Baba have been selling them for ages.
- dmix 8y agoYep, these types of Chinese preloaded consoles have been around for years now. I doubt the few thousand dollars Soulja Boy makes re-selling these will be of much interest to anyone.
- dec0dedab0de 8y agoMy local mall had something similar for sale at a kiosk. I was shocked that nobody checks to see if what they're selling is legal. The mall is owned by Macerich a company that owns a ton of malls all over the place.
- dleslie 8y agoCounterfeit items aren't a new thing; these are to video games as knock-off Prada bags are to fashion.
- sodafountan 8y agoRight, this whole thread reads like hacker news is just discovering knock-offs
- dec0dedab0de 8y ago
- sehugg 8y agoCould just link to the original IGN article: https://www.ign.com/articles/2018/12/05/souljaboy-is-selling-some-kind-of-game-consoles-but-people-are-suspicious https://www.ign.com/articles/2018/12/05/souljaboy-is-selling...
- CyberDildonics 8y agoThat's some solid irony
- sctb 8y agoThanks! Updated from https://www.highsnobiety.com/p/soulja-boy-video-game-console/ https://www.highsnobiety.com/p/soulja-boy-video-game-console....
- baldfat 8y agoThe only thing I can think is I bet you he doesn't have anything copyrighted by Disney. We really need to rethink our system where there will never be a time when games from Atari will become public domain.
- paulpauper 8y agoreminds me of a joke: the only things you cannot draw are Mohammad and Disney characters
- brootstrap 8y agoYouuuuuuuu - gotta be kidding me, this dude is a clown.
- fb03 8y agoI would sincerely love to know how he got this idea. I mean, he is a renowned musician. Why would he out of nowhere sell something that reeks of piracy and can get him into problems? I fail to understand.
- azinman2 8y agoGuessing someone offered to do all the work if he lent his name. Probably his previous money has run out...
- whywhywhywhy 8y agoRap music has a strong history of building your brand then licensing products with your name/brand on them or even to the extent of Kanye where he actually designs his own fashion line/shoes.
- jacquesm 8y ago> even to the extent of Kanye where he actually designs his own fashion line/shoes. There is no way he does that himself, just like all the other wannabe fashion/perfume/merchandising brands. They just use their fame to tack on another revenue stream.
- kakarot 8y agoActually Kanye is quite into fashion and apparel, instead of just making assumptions about someone's capabilities because they're famous, use that energy to learn about them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanye_West#Fashion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanye_West#Fashion
- butterfi 8y agoJust because someone is famous, doesn't mean they are especially good at a job. Michael Jordan is a much better basketball player then a baseball player.
- ug02nice 8y agoWhere do I invest?
- joshstrange 8y agoStep 1: Take money out of wallet Step 2: Set money on fire Step 3: You've just saved money but not investing in something that will be mired in copyright infringement cases.
- kozak 8y agoOff-brand game consoles with preloaded pirated games exist for a long long time. They actually make me somewhat nostalgic for early 90s, when they were ubiquitous in my country. Maybe in first-world countries (where original consoles are being officially distributed) they are exotic, but definitely not everywhere.
- azinman2 8y agoThe Soulja watch is interesting to me. I see very similar ones coming from China, but it’s pretty amazing that at any hardware spec a “smart” watch could be sold as little as $10, let alone with profit. They’re shameless rips of Apple, but at $10 damn that’s crazy.
- slashink 8y agoThe really interesting part is that the highlight marketing photos are using pictures of an Apple Watch and when you actually check the product, the "real" photos is nothing like it. This is basically adding a known brand onto cheap tech knockoff products.
- joshstrange 8y agoHere is a video [0] of him with it on, yeah, nothing like the Apple watch. Also on the topic of cheap Chinese watches I would read the section of this article on the smartwatch [1] and note this was published 2 years ago. That whole article is interesting but the smartwatch and their contact who said it only cost them $6 to make (note they bought the watches for just under $10 each): > If the factory sold the watches for $7.49, how much could they possibly cost to make? That’s a question that can be awfully hard to get answered. Not really expecting an answer, we asked our friend to ask his friend. She was happy to tell us: $6. > Six dollars for: a GSM chipset, a CPU, an LCD screen, a battery, a PCB, a metal housing, a molded silicone watch band, a MicroUSB cable, and a box. And the labor to assemble and test all of that. [0] http://www.xxlmag.com/video/2018/12/soulja-boy-watch-brand-souljawatch/ http://www.xxlmag.com/video/2018/12/soulja-boy-watch-brand-s... [1] https://medium.com/newco/what-50-buys-you-at-huaqiangbei-the-worlds-most-fascinating-electronics-market-f0384d9fca32#2216 https://medium.com/newco/what-50-buys-you-at-huaqiangbei-the...
- pjc50 8y agoThe article handily links to the Alibaba store: https://www.aliexpress.com/store/3850034 https://www.aliexpress.com/store/3850034 I suspect what happened is that someone approached him with the idea of putting his brand on it, and he was flattered; otherwise it's basically the Amazon drop shipping business.
- pkulak 8y agoYeah, to me he seems like the gullible victim here. In addition to anyone who buys it, I suppose.
- chmod775 8y agoExcept he's probably getting paid...
- frozenport 8y agoMight have taken on substantial legal liabilities.
- erikpukinskis 8y agoWhat makes you think he isn’t just interested in video games, discovered emulators and liked the product and saw that it wasn’t being marketed to his audience? Are you familiar with the ways musicians, particularly in hip hop, diversify their business portfolios by selling product lines? Are you familiar with Fenty, Beats by Dre, etc?
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- pjc50 8y agoYes, but those ranges have a high level of personal involvement and brand coherency, and are generally better quality. This is a lot more of a cheap opportunistic item.
- wprapido 8y agoConsoles with a bunch of preloaded pirated games were quite common in Eastern Europe back in the 90's.
- yakshaving_jgt 8y ago(You!) Soulja Boy, I tell 'em Hey, I got a new cheap emulator for you all called the SouljaGame You! You gotta steal intellectual property rights then crank back three times from left to right
- Jaruzel 8y agoI'm semi-famous. Does anyone want to buy a raspberry pi running RetroArch with my name written on it? /s
- ad-hominem 8y agoNo, you're not
- Loughla 8y agoHonestly though, I'm surprised we haven't seen this from well known 'celebrity' accounts on Reddit.
- erikpukinskis 8y agoCelebrities on Reddit don’t have great push marketing channels. And in general overt marketing doesn’t work well on Reddit. That audience likes to be tricked into buying things via clever organic “news”. Other sites like Instagram are much more amenable to brand marketing like this.
- erikpukinskis 8y agoIt’s just marketing, I don’t see what’s so strange about it. He runs a public brand, and he looks for products that he thinks can be effectively marketed through that brand. It’s no different than Urban Outfitters.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- danmg 8y agook.
- rasz 8y agoYou can charge $400 if you are famous enough https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rxCD_bMhZA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rxCD_bMhZA https://www.retromodding.com/collections/preconfigured-build-to-order/products/metal-jesus-rocks-ultimate-gba-gameboy-advance-v2 https://www.retromodding.com/collections/preconfigured-build...
- kakarot 8y agoWhat is Linux 3.0 OS?
- ocdtrekkie 8y agoI've found it interesting that knockoff SNES and NES classics are pervasive not just online these days, but and brick and mortar malls. For the unknowing parent buying for their kids, they seem like the better offer, they usually list having hundreds of games rather than the couple dozen with the legitimate consoles. At a glance, they look official, having similar styling to both the hardware and the classic Nintendo box look.
- ghostly_s 8y agoThey are the better offer. Why should a parent care if some company's getting royalties for a game they released 30 years ago?
- sergiotapia 8y agoLMAO this is funny as hell
- _pmf_ 8y agoHe's also selling cheap imitation of Hip-Hop as music.
- tmh88j 8y agoGot 'em. He sold enough of that "imitation hip hop" to never have to work another day in his life . Wish I had that luxury.
- atombender 8y agoSo has anyone tried the Chinese pirate console that he's apparently rebranding? It looks like it's this one [1], $89 on Amazon. Emulates PS1, GBC, SNES and more, with 843 games, including classics like Super Mario Bros. I'd absolutely love to have something like this in my living room, but I think I'd prefer a somewhat less suspect, more hacker-friendly system where one could easily add new games. But I also don't know anything about this one. [1] https://www.amazon.com/Console-Entertainment-System-Classic-Joystick/dp/B07BT9R1K3 https://www.amazon.com/Console-Entertainment-System-Classic-...
- fabricexpert 8y agoThere's lots of reviews on youtube of this kind of thing.
- thg 8y agoHave a look at RetroPie: https://retropie.org.uk/ https://retropie.org.uk/ Doesn't come with any game ROMs, but there are enough places you can download them. Once you have them, it's just a simple file transfer to install them.
- atombender 8y agoThanks. Looks like something I need a Raspberry Pi to run? I'd like something that just works out of the box, zero building or fiddling with hardware.
- thg 8y agoIt doesn't involve much effort. Transfer image to SD card, put SD card into the Pi and that's pretty much about it on the hardware side. After that you just have to transfer some game ROMs, set up your controller(s) and you should be good to go. Takes at most 20 minutes to get it all up and running the first time. https://retropie.org.uk/docs/First-Installation/ https://retropie.org.uk/docs/First-Installation/
- zimpenfish 8y ago
- orblivion 8y agoSince scarcity of IP has less meaning these days, branding and identity seem to be what's scarce and interesting. Somehow, I love this whole idea.
- olliej 8y agoWell I mean this seems entirely reasonable to me - I’m not sure but I suspect he isn’t an engineer, and even if he is, why waste time and money on designing something that has already been designed and built? I’m also surprised that so many people in the comments are against this, especially given how often I’ve seen people on HN arguing we should be getting rid of IP law.
- throwaway2016a 8y ago> especially given how often I’ve seen people on HN arguing we should be getting rid of IP law. Anecdotally, after years of being on HN I can't recall anyone arguing to get rid of copyright. Tons of arguments for getting rid of software patents, strengthening fair use, and putting abandonware in the public domain but flat out against copyright as a concept is a bit extreme for NH. Again, just an anecdote based on my experience.
- olliej 8y agoThere was a post a few weeks about getting rid of IP laws, with many comments from many people arguing that we should definitely get rid of all IP laws, including copyright.
- throwaway2016a 8y agoI must have missed that one. Again, just an anecdote, not saying that people who want to get rid of all copyright don't exist just that I haven't seen them.
- olliej 8y agoWe’re on the internet, anecdotes should always be treated as facts :)
- beckler 8y agoI can't remember who made them, but older System76 machines were not made by System76.
- Impossible 8y agoDoes it play Braid tho? (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSXofLK5hFQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSXofLK5hFQ)
- fhbdukfrh 8y agoHa! I have one of these that i built into a portable arcade machine. Some of the hardware has Xbox references on the pcbs, though i suspect the just didn't bother to remove from the source, though it could be surplus from earlier versions. The games are hilarious and completely ripped off, some the Japanese only market versions, others weird mash-ups (like 8-bit Mario but with looney tunes characters). Mine most certainly does not output 4k (what would a 4k gb-color emulator exactly look like? Gigantic, crisp pixels?)
- akeck 8y agoThis feels like what happens to professional sports players. Very often they go from $0 to millions with no training or professional support on how to deal with 7+ zeros of wealth. They quickly attract bottom-feeders promising "crazy returns" on anything and everything. Witness the endless stream of sports star "owned" restaurants and bars that wink in and out of existence, and the recent sanctions by the SEC on ICO promotion.