Hello.I would encourage everyone doing business with European citizens, or citizens located in Europe, to lodge a formal complaint with the European Community Competition Authority under Articles 81 and 82 of the EC Treaty if they are upset about Sony's move with firmware version 3.21.
The competition authority can be found at the link address below. I have already complained as a private individual. The more people who complain the more likely that they will investigate. Fixstars as a company affected by this move can also launch a formal complaint. It is not too hard to do, and these guys have a good track record against the real big boys (Nintendo, Microsoft, Intel).
http://ec.europa.eu/competition/contact ... _mail.htmlBoth Article 82 and the Chapter II prohibition provide, in similar terms, that conduct may constitute an abuse if it consists of:
(a) directly or indirectly imposing unfair purchase or selling prices or other unfair trading conditions
(b) limiting production, markets or technical development to the prejudice of consumers
(c) applying dissimilar conditions to equivalent transactions with other trading parties, thereby placing them at a competitive disadvantage
(d) making the conclusion of contracts subject to acceptance by the other parties of supplementary obligations which, by their nature or according to commercial usage, have no connection with the subject of the contracts.4
Consumers can also complain to their local consumer protection authorities e.g. The Office of Fair Trading quoting Directive 1999/44/EC.
“The goods must:
• comply with the description given by the seller and posses the same qualities and characteristics as other similar goods
• be fit for the purpose which the consumer requires them and which was made known to the seller at the time of purchase.”
The key here being that "at the time of purchase" Linux was available to the consumer, and now it is only available by a consumer choosing to disable other features that were also available at the time of purchase.
In short, it could do A & B when it was sold, whilst now it can only do A or B.
Here's my complaint that I sent to
comp-market-information@ec.europa.eu------
Sony Computer Entertainment (Sony) produce an entertainment system that is trade marked as “Playstation 3” or “PS3.”
When PS3 was launched, Sony stated that users could use their PS3 to
1) play offline PS3 games
2) be backwards compatible for playing PS/2 games
3) be granted free access to the Playstation Network to play games online
4) play media such as Blue-Ray discs
5) install a second operating system (“OtherOS”), such as Linux, to allow the user to customize the product further
In the meantime Sony released the so called “slim” version of PS3 hardware which did not support backwards compatibility and the second operating system. At this point the original version of hardware became known as the “fat” version. The “thin” version was much cheaper at introduction, but sales of the “fat” version continued in parallel for some time. Many people paid a premium for the “fat” version because of the additional features i.e. second operating system and backwards compatibility with PS2 games.
Sony have now release new firmware for all PS3 versions under the guise of a regular firmware update (version 3.21) as of April 1st (a rather unfortunate choice of date.) This update forces users of the original “fat” PS3 to choose between removing the ability to install a second operating system, or to continue to enjoy free Playstation Network access.
see
http://www.playstation.com/ps3-openplatform/manual.html (which by the way added the comment about 3.21 only after it was released)
http://blog.us.playstation.com/2010/03/ ... 21-update/
Sony has stated that it will not support two different release streams in the future (one for online access to the Playstation Network, and one for installation of a second operating system). So users who choose -to continue to be able to install the second operating system will not only lose access to the Playstation Network immediately; but will, over time, almost certainly lose the ability to play Blue-Ray discs and offline games, as these often include encryption and other software features that require future firmware updates. These firmware updates will not be available for users who choose the option of being able to continue installing a second operating system.
I consider this to be unacceptable behaviour as the product is clearly worth less after this firmware update.
You may therefore ask why I am complaining to the anti competition authority?
You may say that this is a matter for consumer protection due to product misrepresentation?
Well maybe it is that too.
EC Directive 1999/44/EC states
“The goods must:
• comply with the description given by the seller and posses the same qualities and characteristics as other similar goods
• be fit for the purpose which the consumer requires them and which was made known to the seller at the time of purchase.”.
The key here being that "at the time of purchase" Linux was available to the consumer, and now it is only available by a consumer choosing to disable other features that were also available at the time of purchase.
In short, it could do A & B when it was sold, whilst now it can only do A or B.
You may also say “so what, you can run Linux on any PC.”
But the PS3 was used by many companies and students as cheap access to massively parallel computing based on the cell processor technology installed in the Playstation. No other system offered such cost effective access to this sort of computing. Sony sold the Playstation hardware cell processors much cheaper than anything else on the market, and the hardware was being sold at a loss for an extended period (see
http://www.vg247.com/2010/02/06/loss-pe ... -says-wsj/ ). The hardware was being cross subsidised by game sales and licence fees.
There are many manufacturers other than Sony, and many individuals, who have specifically invested development effort in installing and running Linux on this specialized hardware that Sony have sold. An example of two Linux releases and commercial ventures that may be harmed by this are PSUbuntu (Canonical), and Yellow Dog Linux (Fixstars) who also offered commercial versions. Playstation hardware was even bought in bulk by the US government for serious research e.g. cracking passwords of paedophiles. There are also competing companies who produce hardware for cell based systems that support Linux (but sell at their hardware much higher price level and have much lower volumes, meaning Sony have a dominant position in this niche)
See
http://www.fixstars.com/en/products/ydel/http://psubuntu.com/installation-instructions/http://www.ubuntu.com/support/serviceshttp://www.gamepro.com/article/news/212 ... passwords/
It isn't just that Sony sold this hardware and people broke into it like on the Xbox. No, Sony sold this hardware specifically with a documented feature in their operating system to allow users and competing companies to install their own choice of 2nd operating system. The existence of this feature was also used as a unique selling point during their advertising campaign. They have now effectively remotely removed that ability with very little or no notice on existing hardware installed in peoples private premises. Typically an end of sales end of support announcement would be made years in advance to give companies and individuals plenty of time to adapt to a new system. Sony announced this firmware change on 28th March 2010 and rolled out the update on 1st April 2010. Even though in August 2009 a senior executive of Sony assured owners of “fat” PS3 versions that they would not remove this feature via future firmware updates.
See
http://manuals.playstation.net/document ... stall.html
http://www.taranfx.com/why-no-linux-ins ... a-solution
When the 3.21 firmware update is installed it does not remove the reserved Linux partition, it simply denies users access to it. Users permanently lose access to at least 10Gb of hard disk and the only way to recover that is to reformat the whole disk and start again. Users also lose all of their data stored in this partition unless they have made a back up, but that Linux back up may itself be useless....
Removal of the feature is permanent on many Playstation systems. The firmware is not stored on the hard disk of the original 60Gb PS3 (the version I own): it is stored in flash memory. The back up feature does not cover the firmware at all: you can only back up and restore the contents of the disk. So once flashed, there is no obvious way back to the version (3.1.15) that did support this OtherOS feature. Sony no longer distributes 3.15, so any copies that may still be floating around on the net are of dubious quality. I fear that many consumers will install this update without realising the consequences of their actions, whether they chose to maintain access to the feature or not. That also probably also means that the “fat” systems that have been flashed to 3.21. can no longer be resold to companies or individuals who would make a different choice from the original owner i.e. to install a second operating system.
Article 82 and the Chapter II prohibition provide, in similar terms, that conduct may constitute an abuse if it consists of:
(a) directly or indirectly imposing unfair purchase or selling prices or other unfair trading conditions
(b) limiting production, markets or technical development to the prejudice of consumers
(c) applying dissimilar conditions to equivalent transactions with other trading parties, thereby placing them at a competitive disadvantage
(d) making the conclusion of contracts subject to acceptance by the other parties of supplementary obligations which, by their nature or according to commercial usage, have no connection with the subject of the contracts.4
Sony are denying companies and individuals access to hardware that they have rightly paid for and could expect to enjoy for many years, and instead effectively forced them to run the Sony operating system exclusively on hardware that was sold below manufacturing cost.
I think the behaviour that I have observed breaks both a) (selling below manufacturing costs) and b) (limiting markets to the prejudice of consumers) and that this therefore constitutes anti competitive behaviour and abuse of a dominant position.
Sony have sold 33 million Playstations, many of them to European consumers and companies.
I personally find this disgraceful behaviour from a major manufacturer and have written to Sony. They have noted my views but have not commented.
