Thank goodness for Australian copyright :)

Chips down for Sony Caitlin Fitzsimmons July 26, 2002 SONY is considering appealing a Federal Court decision that gives the green light to mod-chipping PlayStation consoles to play pirated games. Federal Court Judge Sackville found that Eddy Stevens of Kensington, Sydney, had sold pirated PlayStation games and console modification chips but did not breach the Copyright Amendment (Digital Agenda) Act 2000 in doing so. The mod chips allow PlayStation owners to play copied games and section 116A of the Copyright Act effectively makes it an offence to make, sell or promote a device to circumvent technical protection measures. Sony had argued that Mr Stevens infringed Sony trademarks by selling pirated games, breached the Fair Trading Act by implying the games were genuine and breached the Copyright Act by selling mod chips. Sony won the first point but failed with the other claims. On the second point, Judge Sackville said there was no evidence to suggest that Mr Stevens misled consumers and it "verges on the fanciful" to argue that any of his customers would have believed the pirated games were genuine. The third point was perhaps the most important to Sony because it was the first time the provisions of the Digital Agenda Act had been tested since they came into effect March last year. The chips allow consumers to play games without needing the unique access code found on genuine PlayStation games. Mr Stevens chose to represent himself but the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC ) presented arguments as a 'friend to the court'. The ACCC argued that mod chips should be legal because they also allowed consumers to make personal back-up copies of games and play games from the US and Japan with NTSC rather than PAL television coding. Judge Sackville rejected that argument and concluded that the main purpose of the chips was to allow piracy. But he ruled that Sony failed to establish that the access codes were a technical protection device designed to combat piracy. The reason was that the access codes did not prevent users from copying the games; they merely prevented the users from actually playing the pirate copies. "I do not think the definition is concerned with devices or products that ... merely have a general deterrent or discouraging effect on those who might be contemplating infringing copyright," he said in his judgment. Sony Computer Entertainment Australia managing director Michael Ephraim is not giving interviews but the company released a statement expressing "disappointment" with the decision. Sony cited a recent UK decision where Justice Jacob of the UK High Court found in favour of Sony Computer Entertainment Europe under the corresponding provisions of the UK Copyright Act. "This case calls into question the value of the new provisions of the Copyright Act which were passed by Federal Parliament after a long period of consultation to deal precisely with this issue," Sony said. The company is considering an appeal. Australian IT