Apparently 'Hacked Sony PS3 & Got Sued For It' Looks Good On The Resume

from the lulsec-is-updating-their-resumes-as-we-speak dept

Last we heard from George Hotz, aka GeoHot, he was settling with Sony, in the lawsuit it brought against him for jailbreaking the PS3 to restore a feature that Sony used to advertise but retroactively deleted. Apparently, those sorts of skills are in demand at Facebook, who has now made it official that it has hired GeoHot, though it's not clear what he'll be working on. As if people needed any more reasons to hack Sony, apparently now it can help you get a job...

Filed Under: geohot, george hotz
Companies: facebook

Geohot Gives Remaining Legal Funds To EFF

from the not-gone-to-waste dept

When George Hotz (Geohot) settled the lawsuit Sony had filed against him for jailbreaking the PS3 in order to restore a feature that Sony had taken away (despite advertising it), many were upset. Part of the reason people were upset was that he had asked for donations, and insisted that he would fight Sony until the end. Those people wanted to know what would happen to the money they donated. Geohot has now said he's donating the remaining cash to the EFF, which hopefully will satisfy those who were upset over that aspect. As I said earlier, unless you've been subject to a lawsuit from a giant company, it's tough to sit there and criticize a guy for settling, rather than fighting to the end. The legal system is set up such that it's a stacked deck against the little guy, so as disappointing as it may be not to get a full ruling out of this, it's hard to fault Geohot.

Filed Under: geohot, george hotz, hacking, money, ps3
Companies: eff, sony

Geohot Supporters Angry He Settled With Sony

from the don't-complain-until-you're-in-his-shoes... dept

Via Slashdot, comes the news that a bunch of George Hotz' (geohot) supporters are angry he decided to settle with Sony, as we recently discussed. Part of this is due to some of Geohot's own bluster during the lawsuit, including this statement:

"What if SCEA tries to settle? Let's just say, I want the settlement terms to include OtherOS on all PS3s and an apology on the PlayStation blog for ever removing it. It'd be good PR for Sony too, lord knows they could use it. I'm also willing to accept a trade, a legit path to homebrew for knowledge of how to stop new firmwares from being decrypted."

So, you can see why some may be upset that he didn't back that up. Others were more upset about the fact that they contributed money to his defense fund in the belief that he would fight the lawsuit. I can understand why some are angry, but I think it's tough for people who haven't faced a lawsuit to recognize the stress that being sued puts on a person. Even if I hope someone will often "fight the good fight" on a particular legal issue, it's usually difficult to fault an individual for settling if a reasonable opportunity presents itself. Yes, this will often prolong certain problems, but it's unfair to expect a single individual to take on a larger issue sometimes.

Filed Under: geohot, george hotz, hacking, ps3
Companies: sony

Sony Settles PS3 Jailbreaking Lawsuit Against Geohot

from the perhaps-it-was-getting-too-hot dept

Sony has been getting widely slammed across the gaming and tech press for its bizarre and self-destructive lawsuit against George Hotz (Geohot), for jailbreaking the PS3 in order to re-enable a feature that Sony had long-advertised, but then deleted off of people's existing PS3s. The entire lawsuit made little sense, and Sony's quixotic attempt to continue to pursue it just got more and more bizarre, with the company even seeking and gaining access to the IP addresses of people visiting his website or watching the YouTube video he put up. However, it appears that the two sides have now settled their lawsuit, with Geohot agreeing to an injunction of some sort that apparently bars him from helping make PS3s more valuable in the future. Congrats, Sony, you've made your gaming devices less valuable. Quite a legal "victory" there...

Filed Under: geohot, george hotz, hacking, ps3
Companies: sony

Geohot Goes On Vacation; Sony Accuses Him Of Fleeing Legal Action

from the no-rest-for-the-weary dept

Sony continues its crazy, pointless and damaging attack on George Hotz (Geohot), the guy who jailbroke the PS3 to add back in functionality that Sony itself used to offer, but disabled. The latest move is to accuse him of skipping the country to South America, implying he took money raised in donations to flee. Geohot has responded by noting that it's Spring break and he's on a vacation that he planned months ago. Sony also freaked out about the computer equipment that Hotz recently was forced to hand over, saying that it had been sabotaged by Hotz. The company claimed that Hotz had "removed integral components." However, Geohot's lawyer pointed out that Sony was completely overreacting, noting that the hard drives just didn't have the controller cards attached, which is hardly sabotaging the drives.

Filed Under: geohot, george hotz, hacking, ps3, south america
Companies: sony

Top Hacker Rejects Job Offer From Sony Over PS3 Jailbreak Legal Strategy

from the when-you-treat-hackers-badly... dept

It looks like Sony's quixotic strategy of suing George Hotz (Geohot) for jailbreaking the PS3 is starting to cost the company in additional ways as well. Todd McDermid points us to the news of how another hacker, Koushik Dutta, who has quite a strong reputation in various circles, has rejected overtures from Sony PlayStation division for a job specifically because of Sony's attack on Geohot: It seems likely that the lawyers and execs at Sony who thought this whole legal strategy was a good idea didn't think through some of the consequences of their actions in terms of attracting new talent.

Filed Under: geohot, hacking, jobs, koushik dutta, ps3
Companies: sony

Sony's PS3 Lawsuit Is About Control, Not Piracy

from the can't-let-go dept

As GeoHot/George Hotz continues to fight his legal battle against Sony for daring to restore functionality to Sony PS3s that Sony had deleted, he's apparently been able to raise a bunch of money for his legal fund through donations. That's nice to see. He's also put up this amusing (and seriously NSFW) rap about the lawsuit: Seems like he didn't need copyright as an incentive to create that one, huh? Anyway, what struck me as the most prescient statement in the linked article above, however, was this line:

"Sony tried to sue a guy for getting his AIBO to do non-Sony approved tricks, making it apparent that they don’t really care about piracy, they care about control."

We actually wrote about Sony's response to AIBO hacks a decade ago, and it's absolutely true. Copyright is supposed to be about incentives to create. But it's generally been twisted into a tool for control against "stuff we don't like."

Filed Under: control, copyright, geohot, ps3
Companies: sony