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Originally Posted by Andrew H.
2. This ruling doesn't apply to all manufactured goods; it only applies to copyrighted items. (However, many manufactured goods may also have a
copyright attached to them in some manner.)
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Sony has already asserted that folks modifying their PS3 software are breaking the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act by hacking into Sony's PS3 software. Because the software on the PS3 is Sony's.
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2011/0...gerous-message
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Originally Posted by EFF.org
Not content with the DMCA hammer, Sony is also bringing a slew of outrageous Computer Fraud and Abuse Act claims. The basic gist of Sony's argument is that the researchers accessed their own PlayStation 3 consoles in a way that violated the agreement that Sony imposes on users of its network (and supposedly enabled others to do the same). But the researchers don't seem to have used Sony's network in their research — they just used the consoles they bought with their own money. Simply put, Sony claims that it's illegal for users to access their own computers in a way that Sony doesn't like. Moreover, because the CFAA has criminal as well as civil penalties, Sony is actually saying that it's a crime for users to access their own computers in a way that Sony doesn't like.
That means Sony is sending another dangerous message: that it has rights in the computer it sells you even after you buy it, and therefore can decide whether your tinkering with that computer is legal or not. We disagree. Once you buy a computer, it's yours. It shouldn't be a crime for you to access your own computer, regardless of whether Sony or any other company likes what you're doing.
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Sony's core arguments — that it can silence speech that reveals security flaws using the DMCA and that the mere fact of a terms of use somewhere gives a company permanent and total control over what you do with a device under pain of criminal punishment — are both sweeping and frightening, and not just for gamers and computer researchers. Frankly, it's not what we expect from any company that cares about its customers, and we bet it's not what those customers expect, either.
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It's a fuzzy line these days. Copyright & DMCA restrictions seems to be trumping everything lately in the courts - right to resell, Fair Use, reverse engineering.