14 DAY TRIAL // Sony has definitely had a rough time with its consoles over the years because of the piracy phenomenon. The PlayStation 2 could be easily modified in order to play pirated discs and with its handheld console, the PlayStation Portable, piracy really took off, thanks to the memory stick the small device used in order to save data.
Due to a small modification to the firmware of the console, the PSP could then easily play the games found on the memory stick just like any other title on a legal UMD disk. When the PSP-3000 was launched, Sony said it couldn't be hacked, but we've recently seen that the modding community had surpassed expectations and had indeed released a custom firmware for the Japanese company's new handheld device.
But Sony isn't worried about that these days, as John Koller, the president of Sony Computer Entertainment of America, announced the piracy phenomenon on the PSP had seen a significant decrease during this time frame. One of the ways the company wants to continue its fight against piracy is by releasing downloadable games through its online store, which will make players stop using modded firmwares.
"We’ve made really no secret that there certainly has been some piracy on the PSP," said Koller. "We’ve seen that as a significant issue — it’s trending down right now, we’ve seen the piracy not be as such prevalent in the last month to two months. But it has been a problem for us. We’ve noticed there’s kind of a ‘good vs. evil’ battle that we track on many of the forums and many of the pirated web sites. There’s certainly people that are standing up and fighting for what we consider the good side, the rights of developers and publishers to make money on their IP."
Well, it's really nice to see that there are still users who do not want to download their games from pirated web sites and still go the legal way and buy the titles they wish to play. This is certainly good news for Sony, as more profit is being made, more games and improvements for the PSP will appear.