The story and work of Gary Bowser is pretty badass and would make for an interesting ama and event on lemmy. Here’s a recent article on Gary Bowser https://torrentfreak.com/gary-bowser-how-a-1980s-hacker-became-nintendos-nemesis-decades-later-230702/
Fuck Gary Bowser and Team Xecuter in general, he doesn’t deserve the punishment he got but I feel no sympathy for him.
Read up on how they stole GPL’d code from other Switch hackers for their closed source SX OS, and then had the fucking nerve to charge for it.
Piracy is one thing, but what they did hurt the Switch hacking scene, for their own profit.
Agreed. SOG did a video on him a few months ago.
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I don’t know, if I put out GPL software, I wouldn’t give a fuck if it got used to fuck over Nintendo without following all the GPL nonsense. They took the legal risk of going up against Nintendo, I sure as hell didn’t take any risk writing code. Them profiting a bit isn’t the end of the world. No one was going to make any money staying within legal limits anyway, nothing was “stolen”.
Edit: Just to be clear, all I know about Bowser is based on the parent comment. Maybe he’s a bigger POS than the example given but, from that, doesn’t seem like a major villain.
If that’s the case you probably wouldn’t release GPL software, you’d find a more permissive license, perhaps apache?
SX OS has anti-piracy measures in place which literally brick your switch.
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Isn’t he basically screwed for the rest of his life though? Having to pay some of his wage to Nintendo
Most of his wage. 14.5 million docked from his paychecks for the rest of his life. There’s not much more info in how much will be docked from his pay, as in a percentage or flat cost
Edit: I read more into it. It’s 25-30% of his paycheck goes to Nintendo.
https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2023/04/bowser-free-from-prison-still-owes-nintendo-14-5m-for-switch-hacking/ See at the bottom
He will die owing Nintendo tens of millions of dollars. Fuck Nintendo
Honestly the fact the court allows that too…
So glad people got rid of slavery, right? US is disgusting with the corporation bootlicking.
that’s not technically true, the 13th amendment only outlawed slavery if you haven’t been convicted of a crime.
Edit: besides that technicality, I do agree.
Yeah, but my point was that this is just slavery for everyone, only with a different name.
I understood you correctly, but were you aware that American corporations including McDonald’s, Target, Whole Foods, and Microsoft have been profiting heavily from US prison labor without the the legal requirement to compensate the laborers fairly, provide sick days, or provide decent working conditions? https://sites.law.berkeley.edu/sustainability-compliance/corporations-use-of-prison-labor/
Shit’s fucked if/when you get convicted of a crime, whether your Gary or anyone else.
Edit: added context
Because Nintendo lawyers ran circles around the court
Some other guy said something about costing Nintendo 65 million. I don’t buy that claim. They were still profitable as a company during that time, so it’s just a show of force to scare other script kiddies from fucking with Nintendo. Fuck em, emulated breath of the wild is better than on console anyway
“Ran circles around the court” - a good court and legal system doesn’t let that happen, it needs to be fixed.
Very true. It should happen but it does unfortunately
Regardless of your opinion of the guy, feel like financially fucking him into the ground for life shouldn’t be a thing… Sure punishment is in order, but what he got is a financial life sentence - it doesn’t feel right.
We bringing serfdom back, baby!
Debtors prison is the logical next step.
No. It doesn’t. I don’t think he should have been charged regardless, but that’s just me lol
Wouldn’t filing private bankruptcy solve this within 3 or 5 years?
Pick your legal ass fucking: corporate or financial (bank)
I mean it sucks but whats the alternative? Life in jail? He did those things and did cost them 65 million, I’m never one to defend corporations but he is a criminal and deserves some kind of punishment.
Money is made up, I doubt his actions actually cost them 65 million. If they did - so what? Taking that out his wages will never get them that amount of money back, ever. That is a ludicrously large amount that will never be reached, they just want to ruin a person’s life.
I don’t agree with the punishment one bit.
But it was never about getting their money back. Instead they just wanted a life-ruining sentence and large number to give to the media to scare people into not fucking with Nintendo.
Nintendo knows they’ll never see even one million of that 65. Hell, they’ll probably never even make enough to cover the lawyer fees. They don’t care as they’re playing the long game. They’re trying to prevent the next Bowser before it happens. Which won’t work, but they’ll never understand why.
Sir, this is a piracy instance. Know your place
Maybe not ensure he’s fucked for the rest of his life?…
He didn’t cost them 65 million. That’s a pretend number made up by soulless lawyers. If people could actually do that much “damage” to corporations, we wouldn’t be so beholden to their whims.
You’re never one to defend corporations, except apparently when you do.
Ignoring the fact that not getting to make money Nintendo had wanted to make isn’t the same as losing money, how is this person ever supposed to pay that money back? They can’t reasonably expect to see that money ever. All they are doing here is literally financially ruin a man for the rest of his life, it is completely ridiculous such a sentence is even legally possible.
So they essentially won the right in court to keep a person poor for as long as they live. Because they lost out on projected income. Why can’t I sue the fuck out of someone because my projected income of a gorillion dollars isn’t actually coming in?
Ok what should be done then?
Throw him in jail for a few months, give him a painful but reasonable fine (something mid 5 to low 6 figures) that he can possibly afford to pay off, and then leave it be ffs.
The rich and powerful steal literal billions of public money, cheat their way out of paying their fair share in taxes as a hobby, and they don’t get close to such a sentence ever. Why is this low to mid tier huckster deserving of indentured servitude for the rest of his life when people who cause economic damage and steal public money get off with a resignation, a severance package and two months house arrest?
Sounds like the problem is lack of enforcement then right? Making the punishment a slap on the hands only makes it easier for rich to get away with their theft. If you have a problem its not woth his punishment but rather the lack of equality in the enforcement.
Even in a fair justice system the punishment would be extreme in proportion to the crime. He caused the made up number of a global corporate giant to be a bit smaller than they had imagined.
I find the whole premise ridiculous, society or in this case an individual doesn’t owe a company its profits. If a person can be sued over this, then why don’t they sue Sony over competition? Why can’t I sue someone because my projected income isn’t what I wanted?
For an example, I used an emulator to play try Pokémon Arseus (however that’s spelled). I had very little desire to play it in general, but I did want to see what they did with it. It was garbage. I never would have purchased it, especially since I would have had to purchase a Switch too. Did that “cost them money?” Absolutely not. They likely include that in the supposed cost though.
Yeah. I wonder will it show up as Nintendo Tax on his payslip?
Being his last name is Bowser i thought i had to be a joke. This is wild.
And when the president of NOA’s last name is Bowser, too, all sorts of fanciful scenarios are just coming to mind.
It’s nominative determinism. It’s a real thing.
They named their most iconic antagonist after him?
The CEO of Nintendo of America is curiously also named Bowser. Seems they are going out of their way to find them.
No, they named him after the current president of Nintendo of America – Doug Bowser.
This entire situation can be summed up as Bowser suing Bowser Jr. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)
So long Gary bowser
Interesting story, and pretty sad at the end, the dude lost practically everything because of the fuckers at Nintendo. Heres his gofundme page if someone is interested in helping the guy out. https://www.gofundme.com/f/garyopa-restarting-his-life
I don’t have too much sympathy for the guy. I mean if you’re stupid enough to try and profit off of piracy that brazenly, that’s what you get. If I know your real name you fucked up big time.
If 30% of his paycheck goes to Nintendo, does that also apply to donations?
So long, Gay Bowser!
curses hetero mario in gay bowser as it flies away
Was changing his name to Bowser a part of the release?
Interesting story, and pretty sad at the end, the dude lost practically everything because of the fuckers at Nintendo. Heres his gofundme page if someone is interested in helping the guy out. https://www.gofundme.com/f/garyopa-restarting-his-life
