awesome, that is the only word that can explain it. Bout time sony had something go wrong.

LOL, when was the last thing Sony did right. Release the Trinitron series of TVs

Sony is so freaking insecure..they feel like everybody pirates all thir products! no it backfired!! may this be a lesson to sony

Maybe it's just me, but isn't 1.5 million dollars a little light for a MULTI-BILLION DOLLAR International company? That's like giving someone a $2 speeding ticket-----really gonna teach them a lesson, eh? DRM and any copy or backup limiting features should be illegal. THIS SOFTWARE ASSUMES WE ARE ALL CRIMINALS, and isn't the basis of both the American and Canadian legal systems 'INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY'? May SONY and their employees, artists, and representatives burn in hell. Proprietary f**kwads anyway, I've never owned Sony anything, and now I never will.

I personally think they got off easy. I can't find exactly how much they are worth but as Kronyk420 stated they are a huge company and $1.5 million pocket change to them.

On the customers getting between $25-$175, that is way to little. Just as an example if you have GeekSquad do a DVD worth of backup for you, its $230. If you want more stuff done (backed up or otherwise) it costs even more.

As stated in the article, I wonder who did the repair estimates for $ony.

Peace

That penalty is a slap on the wrist for Sony or any of the other big labels. Frankly, the whole thing infringes on privacy in a major way. The concept--which is basically a hack--is just wrong, dirty and intentionaly misleading. These big record companies think they can do whatever they please. I'm glad DigitalFreedom.org is standing up to them. Its about time some one did.

So what do the consumers get out of this deal? Probably something like $5 off their next CD purchase....yeah right. I for one canceled my Sony BMG subscription right after this rootkit fiasco and plan on NEVER buying another Sony product. Take that Sony you bastards!

$25-$175 a cpu? what are they smoking at sony bmg that would make them calculate this amount? what sony bmg should do is replace all the cpus that were damaged beyond repair and give these hard working PAYING customers 100 pk cd+r to download the music from p2ps and burn them.

It's funny how Sony and other companies always whine about losing billions of dollars to piracy, when infact they are quoting arbitrary numbers as if every unit that was alleged to be pirated would have been purchased. In this case they did lose money...and that's something their accounting dept can verify.

HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Seriously? $25-$175 thats not gunna be enough to replace anything, what parts exactly was their "copy-protection" able to break? I know it could brake CD/DVD drives but was it bad enough to ruin CPU's and other components as well?

Quote:

---

It's funny how Sony and other companies always whine about losing billions of dollars to piracy, when infact they are quoting arbitrary numbers as if every unit that was alleged to be pirated would have been purchased.

---

That is exactly right, all the files ive pirated the last few years(yes i admit it i have pirated from time to time) I would never EVER buy any of the programs or songs. They claim that they lose however many billion $$$ every year but the simple fact is very few of the people who pirate things would actually bother getting them at all had they not been free. So all there numbers are completely incorrect.

Quick question about XCP: couldn't you just format your computer and get rid of the problems that way?

^
From what I've read, these softwares (and the methoeds used to quickly remove them) can actually damage devices. I assume that this means that they messed with the firmware, in which case the device could be fixed by reinstalling the firmware. I don't think they actually "ruined" hardware components, just the firmware on them. It's pretty difficult to ruin hardware with software.

$1.5 million is pocket change to Sony.

And yet someone who obviously has some tech skills (the guy that got jailed for 5 months for setting up a P2P network in the other article) gets imprisioned for 5 months of his life plus house arrest.

Whoever the idiot at Sony who thought of this so-called "copy protection" should get some jail time too, and pay back every single customer from his own pocket in full whose pc's were damaged by this.

Why didn't Sony just offer to pay shipping both ways & any necessary repair to any computer sent to their own computer repair department that has EITHER of those hacks on it? I'm sure they could do it for ~$25 per system. :D

Andrew691 is completely correct. Downloading is done by people who will not purchase or think about purchasing the merchandise. A majority of the stuff I have done has yet to be listened to or even looked at. Its just there if a desire to look at the download ever comes up. There figures are very much inflated.

Doesn't Sony gross $1.5 million every 5 seconds? People need to go to jail for this bull!

Slap on the wrist. Courts are quick to put pirates away, but corporations, they let off scot-free.

So wait.... do you have to live in California or Texas to take advantage of this? Anyone know where to find more info on this?? Because the settlement seems totally different from the information on:

http://www.sonybmgcdtechsettlement.com/

I guess that must be a nationwide settlement. Geesh, I wish my state would get off its ass and get me some cash for this! We got screwed with the software on the Charlotte Martin CD.

Somehow, it doesn't seem fair, that if you live in California or Texas, that your damages would somehow be more costly!

^@anne

Did you have any permanent hardware problems? I'd like to know what exactly this malware "damaged", as no one seems to know.

---

This also gives validation for wanting to download music and video without DRM. Who would buy a CD or DVD or downloadable music that installs ANYTHING on your computer??? Yet I think almost every CD and DVD you buy tries to install something if you put it in your computer. Downloadable music you need iTunes or some software that ALSO installs DRM software.

You got a new notebook/laptop for school, you aren't gonna want to slow it down with this stuff on it.

@max777

Until this kind of DRM malware, audio CDs never installed anything on your PC, unless they had some kind of exclusive content or the like, which you could OPT to download. I wouldn't worry about getting a bunch of sticky malware from CDs, at least not anymore.

---

^@anne

Did you have any permanent hardware problems? I'd like to know what exactly this malware "damaged", as no one seems to know.

"Damages" is a legal term. All the hours that were wasted fixing this spyware and the fact that people were not informed it was happening to their systems. Any damage resulting from this piece of crud opening systems wide open for destruction by other viruses. That sort of thing. Those are damages enough, for which Sony and any other mega-corporations of similar intent, should be punished.

I still say this is a win for big corporations who want to create and spread viruses. Now it looks like all they need to do is call it a DRM and say "Click Yes to Install."

Computer virus
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A computer virus is a computer program written to alter the way a computer operates, without the permission or knowledge of the user, it hides in other program files.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Computer_virus

sounds like a virus to me. i guess if you are a multi billion dollar company you don't go to jail for the distribution of a computer virus. corporate america sux.

I would never buy another CD or DVD from Sony ever again. The only way is to punish them in their pockets.Their only language is money.