I know that many of you game consoles owners are bending the rules a little bit, and have installed a modchip. If you didn't know, these hacks were illegal, at least until this December.

In some parts of the globe, people are more understanding of games, and will make game consoles modchips legal. This happened in the land Down Under, where amendments to the Australian copyright laws are expected to pass this week. These amendments will make legal to mod your console and play games without any region restriction.

Back in October of 2005, Sony Computer Entertainment lost a High Court case against mod-chip supplier Eddy Stevens, which lasted for almost three years, according to australianit.news.com. Sony wanted to outlaw the modchips by interpreting parts of the Copyright Act with technological prevention measures to include access control measures in its consoles.

The Australian federal government was expected to amend provisions of the Copyright Act dealing with TPMs to make modchips illegal as part of its Free Trade Agreement with the United States.

Whatever they decide, game console modders will still have a job. There will always be kids who prefer modding their console so that they can play games outside their region. I guess European and Australian gamers are more likely to mod their consoles than Japanese or US gamers, because game titles always come later in their regions.

There also is a special category of gamers who mod their consoles, the ones that play pirated games. Yeah, it's much cheaper to download a PS game via torrent websites than to buy one. I don't advise you to do this, as I must inform you that doing so is considered stealing, therefore illegal.