Sony getting worse the Microsoft.

[Schultz]

Man i am about ready to start disliking Sony more the microsoft with there stupid lawsuits over stupid shit.
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?...5&from=rss

They won a court in UK over imported PSP's. citing that its for consumer safety because of voltage differences. How stupid can they get.. Good luck for UK and doing Ps3 imports now.

[gubi-gubi]

That's a pretty lame excuse IMO. Why not just say they don't want imports at all? Would anyone want an import one in the UK anymore though? I got mine from Lik Sang before the UK release date I think and one with 1.5 firmware but now I doubt there are any of those left so surely you may as well just get a UK one? Oh well.

[Zagatto]

I just read that over at Lik-Sang about how they got screwed over in the UK courts. They didn't even bother to show up to defend themselves because they felt that as a small company they just wouldn't stand a chance against Sony's lawyers.

The Sony Entertainment division has been making some incredibly stupid moves over the past few years trying to make decisions that will ensure their income but ending up costing them both money and reputation.

Can anyone say DRM sucks?

[wrxh8r]

Its mainly only the harcore base that wants to import anyway. Not the right people to piss off. Does that stop people importing personally or mearly stores importing heaps to sell. Or is it related to anyone that tries to sell oversea. How are they going to follow ebay.
At this stage im importing from the US because its cheaper and has better support. My brother lives in nashville so as soon as he can get one he'll send it over. Works out around 900 instead of $1250 nz. So even if i got stung 30% in duty id have it for the same price but early. Hes going to either bring it back himself or label it as core price which is $50 under nz limit so no charges at all.


Yeah im lazy. My computer is a tablet pc and i get bad habbits.

[Schultz]

Well thats the issue they are taking out one of the big name sites. Items will be harder to find for import. You can still find them but they will be harder. THe issue is *how* they won the stupid court and the ridiculus idea of protecting consumers. Why they are mainly doing it in UK is because they gain more of a profit then they do in the US or japan. You just made that point. Even if you get hit by a 30% tax when attempting to import it is when it will about equal out when you bought it there.

Also no offense by can you try to put spaces after your periods. Its hard as hell to read your posts.

[Schultz]

Well it looks like Lik-sang closed its doors. They are canceling all current customers orders and refunding all of them. Damn cause lik-sang was good about getting other then import stuff. I normally always ordered there addons for things that are harder to find.
http://games.slashdot.org/games/06/10/24/1453233.shtml

So lets see what this causes in the future. and if sony will go after other sites that do import of there gaming devices.

[Andromeda18_]

Considering there'll only be 500 thousand PS3's available on launch day and that only 100 thousand of those will be available in Japan, it's no wonder Sony is desperatly trying to prevent Europe from importing the Japanese version of the PS3. I'm not saying I agree with what they're doing, I actually don't, but I see why they're doing it. When the PSP was launched in Japan a massive number of them was brought over to Europe. There were news about planes full of them arriving in Spain and neighbouring countries. Sony doesn't want that to happen with the PS3 because the amount available at launch will be extremely limited. Of course, they'd still make money out of them, but it would diminish the already small number of PS3's available in Japan and that would harm Sony's image in their home country. I don't believe this will happen to games though. There is a reason why the PS3 (and the PSP) is 'region' free as far as games go. Besides, it's actually good when games that aren't released anywhere else other than Japan manage to sell outside the Japanese market because that means more money. The situation with the PS3 and other consoles is different because they will be on sale everywhere, even if later than sooner.
I feel bad for Lik-Sang though and hope they manage to get back on their feet (probably with a different name).

[wrxh8r]

Wow i didnt think they would actually win. By winning this case arnt they creating another against them ie without the ability to import sony are directly controling the price of their product in each country. Surely some countries have monopolising laws to help being shafted. I wonder where the argument over content will come in. Pal consoles dont get all available games. And you can gurentee certain more wealthy euro countries are going to get charged a little extra now. And how does the multivoltage thing relate to psp. Surely psps can still be imported due to their multivoltage adapter.
They cant do much worse than last gen. My ps2s dvd drive crapped out years ago. Threw in a modchip for the hell of it and it runs copies fine. Go figure. Fixed all the problems with new games not running on my brothers one as well.

[geo85]

The path sony is taking is evidence of what happens to a massive and popular corporation when they forget the only reason they are what they are and haven't been swallowed by the black hole of time is that the money they make has a source titled "consumer." They care about the cash and have forgotten the consumer.

[Blight]

The path sony is taking is evidence of what happens to a massive and popular corporation when they forget the only reason they are what they are and haven't been swallowed by the black hole of time is that the money they make has a source titled "consumer." They care about the cash and have forgotten the consumer.

Nintendo did the same thing and it cost them immensely in market share. They got pompous and screwed over other companies, and in many ways, sacrificed content for image. Sony is walking a parallel here, which is shocking since they got into gaming after Nintendo screwed them over. They may right their ship, but it is seriously taking on water right now, and their company is too busy showing bravado too actually do something about it.

[gubi-gubi]

Do you think this could just be a one off that is ment to scare other companies into thinking they can't export Sony stuff? I don't know about other countries but I think in the UK it's illegal to actually import DVDs. It's a law to prevent people buying movies before the UK release date so the market is weakend. You can still do it and I do it all the time with no trouble even though you aren't meant to. Think this is the way it will go with this? Like maybe a couple big companies will be too scared to do it but lots of little ones will anyway?

[Schultz]

To prevent the dvd's is what Region Coding was done for. But most people didn't like that so some players were made that didn't support it or duel region since consumers demanded it.

Also i hate to say it but Sony backstabbed Nintendo first back then. Nintendo found out that sony was planning on making there own system based off what they learned with working with Nintendo on the CD-Addon and so Nintendo dropped them. So really Sony started that first not nintendo.

[Blight]

Also i hate to say it but Sony backstabbed Nintendo first back then. Nintendo found out that sony was planning on making there own system based off what they learned with working with Nintendo on the CD-Addon and so Nintendo dropped them. So really Sony started that first not nintendo.

If you have some sort of article or something that has details about that, I'd like to see it, because if that was the case, then Nintendo should have sued the shit out of them for not only holding out on them while developing. I'm sure that could have turned into a preemptive strike on them since if they could have made a strong argument that they were breaching their contract and performing corporate espionage. If you have anything to read on the subject please to it out to me because I have only seen the stuff saying that Nintendo dropped them.

[Schultz]

If you have some sort of article or something that has details about that, I'd like to see it, because if that was the case, then Nintendo should have sued the shit out of them for not only holding out on them while developing. I'm sure that could have turned into a preemptive strike on them since if they could have made a strong argument that they were breaching their contract and performing corporate espionage. If you have anything to read on the subject please to it out to me because I have only seen the stuff saying that Nintendo dropped them.

well i posted this once.. But the link doesn't work anymore. here is an old thread were we talked about it. (Once again someone tried to go the other way on that issue)
http://www.import-anime.com/forums/showp...stcount=37

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PlayStation
http://www.n-sider.com/articleview.php?articleid=279

If you read those articles you find out. When Nintendo and Sony signed they didn't realize that sony kept control and that sony was planning on making a console that could play nintendos cartridges and such. Thus that made nintendo made and they dropped the deal with Sony. Sony played Nintendo the whole time.

And reading it why i think there is this lots of misleading feeling about it is because at the time like the Wikipedia mentions that alot of japanese people felt nintendo did a bad thing because they dropped another japanese company for a european one. even though sony was the one that was backstabbing nintendo the whole time.

[Elcoholic]

Thank you for your e-mail regarding www.Lik-Sang.com's recent closure, which has been received today.

I understand from your correspondence that you feel aggrieved regarding the closure of the website http://www.lik-sang.com. I can advise that Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE UK) have successfully sued Pacific Game Technology (Holding) Limited (one of whose company trading names is LikSang.com) for infringing our Intellectual property rights. The case was not contested by 'Lik Sang' who therefore incurred no legal costs. As a result of winning this case we were awarded substantial costs against Lik Sang which have not been paid. Therefore as there has been no extra financial burden on Lik Sang, we would deny that our actions have had anything to do with this website closing and can confirm that the legal entity is still trading.

I can also advise that the importing of any PlayStation product into the UK from an NTSC territory is against the law. These units do not carry a CE mark which means that they are not compliant with UK consumer law. In addition, any imported PlayStation product will not be covered under warranty within the UK. We enforce this not least to protect our consumers from some parallel importers who include components in their package that do not conform to EU safety standards and also from buying a unit that, for example, will not then play movies or games that are purchased in the UK.

Whilst we appreciate you taking the time to write to us to express your views regarding the importing of PlayStation product, we are not able to respond to any individual comments on this matter.


Yours sincerely,


Dan Kendall
PlayStation Consumer Care Team
Sony Computer Entertainment UK
Careline: 08705 99 88 77 (National Rate)
E.Mail: [email protected]
Web: http://www.playstation.co.uk/

Guy on another forum wrote a mail about it to sony. Above is their reponse.

They do have a point. If they really haven't gotten any money from them then why did lik-sang stop? They could have gone on (or atleast tried) without sony products. And in the end, if they won in court there's really no debating it.

I remember with the psp delay in europe they said something about certain patents and trademarks that weren't in place over here yet and that caused part of the delay and that was one reason they didn't like importing. But I just don't see a clear reason. People who buy a psp or even ps3 from the other side of the world through the internet generally know what they're buying.

Anyway, i've pretty much had it with sony and their lies and delays. I'm getting a ps3 but all my multiplats will be bought for the 360 (unless the ps3 is insanely more powerfull).