Nintendo "Pleased" By EU Court of Justice DRM Ruling

[Andy Chalk]

Nintendo "Pleased" By EU Court of Justice DRM Ruling

Nintendo says it's confident that a European Union Court of Justice ruling on DRM means that the sale of circumvention devices will ultimately be declared illegal.

The European Union Court of Justice recently ruled that the circumvention of DRM technology may be legal under some circumstances [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/131597-DRM-Circumvention-May-Be-Legal-European-Union-Court-Rules]. For a lot of people, the takeaway is that it's okay to bypass DRM as long as you're doing so for lawful purposes, but in Nintendo's eyes it's another step closer to final victory over the pirates.

Nintendo said in a statement that it is "pleased" with the ruling, which "appears to be in line with the international obligations of the European Union and its Member States under the WIPO Copyright Treaty" and supports previous rulings in other nations including France, Germany and the U.K. That upbeat attitude presumably arises out of the part of the ruling that states, "It is necessary to examine the purpose of the devices provided for the circumvention of protection measures, taking account, according to the circumstances at issue, of the use which third parties actually make of them."

That's where Nintendo sees its opening: It's not relevant that these technologies can be used for lawful purposes if everyone is using them to infringe on copyright. "Since Nintendo only ever utilizes technological protection measures which are both necessary and proportionate to prevent widespread piracy of its intellectual property, and since the preponderant purpose of the circumvention devices marketed by PC Box is to enable piracy of legitimate video games, Nintendo is confident that the application of the guidance set out by the CJEU relating to proportionality will enable the Milan Tribunal to determine that the sale of circumvention devices is unlawful."

The long and the short of it, at least to my non-lawyer interpretation, is that while the EU Court of Justice ruling opened the door to circumvention being declared, if not legal, then at least not inherently illegal, it also provided Nintendo the opportunity to demonstrate that the circumvention technology is being used primarily for infringing purposes. If it can successfully do so (and I can't imagine it will be very difficult) then it may yet be able to mark this one in the "win" column.


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[Tanis]

Yeah, because making consoles region specific is SO 'helpful' to consumers.

 

[Skeleon]

But how will they prove that such products are primarily used for illegal measures? How many legal or grey area uses and users must there be for these products to be protected? Isn't this sort of like saying that bolt cutters should be illegal because they can and are used to steal bicycles? Obviously, Nintendo being happy is worrying, but even so I kind of doubt they'd be able to prove their point sufficiently to a European court.

 

[Yopaz]

Yeah, because making consoles region specific is SO 'helpful' to consumers.

The irony here is that if the 3DS and Wii U weren't region blocked that would mean the major legal use for this would disappear. While it has been clear for a long time that a region blocked console is bad for the consumer this court ruling has proven that it's bad for Nintendo too. Also lost sales due to games being unavailable in certain regions, but we all knew that one from the start I assume.

 

[TheEvilCheese]

God... has the lack of sales on the Wii-U's part left Nintendo delusional?



Oh, wait... silly question on my part. Any company that gets whiny and mad at people for wanting to get around such an archaic design concept such as Region Locking is delusional to begin with. It has no place at all in the modern world, and does nothing but unfairly segregate and punish the systems own fanbase for not living in the right part of the world, even if the software in question is already fully translated for regions outside of it. Such as the EU version of Xenoblade being essentially the same as the US version except for, of course, it's region-locked code.

Yes region locking is anti consumer and never justified, Nintendo have fucked up big time on that one.

However, I seriously don't think that's their real concern with this case, the levels of piracy on the DS were astronomical and that didn't have region locking, the primary use for flash carts was piracy no matter how you cut it. Weather this can be proved beyond reasonable doubt is another thing entirely. They have no real reason to care about bypassed region locking, they still get the money weather you buy an EU copy of the game or a Japanese one. It's unreasonable to assume this case is based on such a pointless exercise when there's a clear and real issue with piracy on the DS (and wii to a lesser extent) which is fundamentally illegal.

Nintendo are terrified that someone will properly crack the 3DS security and we'll have another wave of R4s. While piracy doesn't equate to lost sales in the way these companies seem to project I can certainly understand where they're coming from.

All that said, I hope they lose the case. Dictating what software you can use with hardware you own should not be up to the company and there are fairly well known legal reasons for bypassing DRM (Region free, running homebrew etc).

 

[JarinArenos]

I'll say it again, I still want to see a company put out a region-unlock hack that doesn't actually allow piracy. Unfortunately, I don't know enough of the mechanics involved to know if this is actually possible.

 

[klaynexas3]

It's funny how their major DRM is the region locking, and piracy was happening on these systems far earlier than region free hacks came into play. So really the only use for their own DRM is to play the wanker, as it is provably about as effective at preventing piracy as putting a condom on your toe for protective sex prevents pregnancy.

 

[CaptainMarvelous]

Did I... miss a bit? Why is everyone on the region locking, this is about the R4 cards and the absolutely ludicrous level of piracy isn't? I swear to based God, when I worked in a game store you get asked about the 'carts where you download all these games for free' at least once a week by people in their 50's. Obviously I'd rather we didn't have region locking but I can see why given how thoroughly dicked they were getting.

 

[Owyn_Merrilin]

God... has the lack of sales on the Wii-U's part left Nintendo delusional?



Oh, wait... silly question on my part. Any company that gets whiny and mad at people for wanting to get around such an archaic design concept such as Region Locking is delusional to begin with. It has no place at all in the modern world, and does nothing but unfairly segregate and punish the systems own fanbase for not living in the right part of the world, even if the software in question is already fully translated for regions outside of it. Such as the EU version of Xenoblade being essentially the same as the US version except for, of course, it's region-locked code.

Nintendo has always been hell on pirates. There's a story about how they sued a company in the 90's that was making flash carts for one of their old systems (I want to say the Gameboy, but it could have been the NES or SNES, too). They won the case and forced that company to destroy their inventory, legitimate use or no legitimate use. Atari won a similar case back in the 70's or 80's, for something similar for the 2600 (can you call it a flash cart if it doesn't use flash memory?). It's only in the last 15 years or so that they've been reminded what fair use is. Alternatively, maybe it's been that recent that consumers had access to the equipment necessary to give this stuff a legitimate use aside from piracy. Either way, this is Nintendo being the rabid IP defending dicks they've always been, the courts just aren't as friendly to it as they'd like.

 

[Morti]

In stark contrast to Blackstone's Formulation, referenced by Franklin:

"it is better 100 guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackstone%27s_formulation

 

[Roxas1359]

Did I... miss a bit? Why is everyone on the region locking, this is about the R4 cards and the absolutely ludicrous level of piracy isn't? I swear to based God, when I worked in a game store you get asked about the 'carts where you download all these games for free' at least once a week by people in their 50's. Obviously I'd rather we didn't have region locking but I can see why given how thoroughly dicked they were getting.

R4 carts have been used to break the region coding on the 3DS, albeit it was later screwed up due to Gateway, but the only main reason Nintendo still holds onto region locking is because it "deters pirates." That in itself is completely stupid because it's quite obvious that region locking doesn't stop piracy, if anything it probably increases it.

 

[Strazdas]

But how will they prove that such products are primarily used for illegal measures?

the problem with current circumvention device for 3DS is that it can ONLY be used for illegal measures. that is, it can ONLY play pirated games and nothing else. now if a device came out that simply removed the need for software to be nintendo signed, that would be much much better.

I'll say it again, I still want to see a company put out a region-unlock hack that doesn't actually allow piracy. Unfortunately, I don't know enough of the mechanics involved to know if this is actually possible.

everything is possible as long as you got acess to the hardware. the question is, is it economical. if such hack would cost 1000 dollars to manufacture noone would buy it.

Did I... miss a bit? Why is everyone on the region locking, this is about the R4 cards and the absolutely ludicrous level of piracy isn't? I swear to based God, when I worked in a game store you get asked about the 'carts where you download all these games for free' at least once a week by people in their 50's. Obviously I'd rather we didn't have region locking but I can see why given how thoroughly dicked they were getting.

no, this was a ruling that said it is legal to break DRM of a product you legally own, therefore hardware modifiying allowing that is legal. and people are angry about region locking because nintendo is using its region locking like a retard and most people pirate just to get around that idiocity.

 

[keniakittykat]

Seems to me that Nintendo is grasping at straws here...

Disappointing sales numbers? Surely it must be those damned pirates! The numbers don't exactly add up, but still! They're the reason we're losing all that money!

 

[loa]

What a sad, sad fossil being scared witless that their archaic business practices no longer apply to a changing world.

So your nintendo DS was the most pirated on handheld in handheld history.
And? What of it?
Did you go bankrupt because of it?
No, it printed you money like crazy because even if someone bought a DS only to use flashcards on it to play their pirated games, that's still one more person in the installbase, someone who would probably have never bought a DS if not for flashcards, who will likely end up buying a game or 2 if only because the rom of that game they liked is buggy and doesn't let them save or whatnot.
That's the worst case scenario.
Flashcards add value to your toy but all you could ever see was the theorized money you feel entitled to.
You wittless fossil. Go back into your corner of waning relevancy.

Speaking of installbases, how's that Wii-U thing of yours going?

 

[FalloutJack]

Once again demonstrating how NOT to fight piracy. (i.e. You have to remove the REASON for it, the convenience it grants people, or you solve absolutely nothing.)

 

[ZippyDSMlee]

So? At the end of the day you should be able to put your game collection on a hack device to use with the portable. Now the device its used on can be updated to not use it or have limited functionality,ect.

 

[CaptainMarvelous]

But how will they prove that such products are primarily used for illegal measures?

the problem with current circumvention device for 3DS is that it can ONLY be used for illegal measures. that is, it can ONLY play pirated games and nothing else. now if a device came out that simply removed the need for software to be nintendo signed, that would be much much better.

I'll say it again, I still want to see a company put out a region-unlock hack that doesn't actually allow piracy. Unfortunately, I don't know enough of the mechanics involved to know if this is actually possible.

everything is possible as long as you got acess to the hardware. the question is, is it economical. if such hack would cost 1000 dollars to manufacture noone would buy it.

Did I... miss a bit? Why is everyone on the region locking, this is about the R4 cards and the absolutely ludicrous level of piracy isn't? I swear to based God, when I worked in a game store you get asked about the 'carts where you download all these games for free' at least once a week by people in their 50's. Obviously I'd rather we didn't have region locking but I can see why given how thoroughly dicked they were getting.

no, this was a ruling that said it is legal to break DRM of a product you legally own, therefore hardware modifiying allowing that is legal. and people are angry about region locking because nintendo is using its region locking like a retard and most people pirate just to get around that idiocity.

Respectfully, I dont think most people are using it to avoid region locking. They're using it for free games. Unless you're telling me everyone bought a region locked cart of the game THEN downloaded a copy. Is that what you're saying happens?