> The big exceptions are video game consoles and alarm systems.
This part is the most interesting to me. Alarm systems I understand, though this looks like security by obscurity, but video game consoles? Are legislators willing to go that far to protect Sony's DRM?
Dunno what kind of extra power consoles have but laws don't seem to apply to them the same way.
People are screaming to let them install 3rd party software for Apple devices.
But why doesn't anyone want the same for the Xbox, Playstation and Switch? They are arguably even more "general computing devices" than an iPhone for example.
If Apple is forced to allow 3rd party app stores, why can't I get the same for my Playstation? Why is it different?
why should we arbitrarily proclaim a console to be a "gaming appliance" rather than a general-purpose computing device, but apple doing the same thing ("iphone is a phone appliance, not a PC") is bad?
the reason you think of a console as being an appliance is because their propaganda strategy has worked on you, there's no reason you couldn't build a Steam Deck (ahem, console) at $500-700 and provide similar performance to consoles while allowing an open environment. people are willing to make this cognitive leap for ios but a console is just a gaming box, you know? just buy a PC in addition to your gaming box! (oh, we don't care about e-waste/consumerism anymore now)
PS5 is sold at a profit since less than a year after launch, xbox series x isn't sold at much of a loss if it's a real loss at all (might be hollywood accounting to look good for the trial so they can claim they're losing money on hardware). So you can achieve very similar prices/performance on hardware.
> But with phones, you basically need a phone to function in the modern world
nobody is saying we need to outlaw phones, people are currently functioning with phone-appliances in the modern world just fine! just like they do with xbox.
in fact many of the modern real-world uses like banking would really prefer you to be using a locked-down appliance for security. that whole TrustNet concept and all.
again just like right-to-repair this always just turns into a mismash of different causes and goals that all get lumped into some broad "right to repair" (ok here's replacement boards at our OEM cost, and we'll ship you OEM repair tooling at a loss or let repair shops purchase it at cost) but actually are a bunch of disjointed but similar causes and goals (rossman really wants component-level repair because that's how he gets paid, so solutions that reduce e-waste but fall short of rossman-getting-paid are unacceptable to him). Other people are generally more into it for the anti-consumerism aspects and just want people to consume less in total even if it's repairable, and are fine for driving up costs/making repairs more attractive by taxing new devices etc. there's really like 3 or 4 different goals being wrapped up into one "right to repair" cause!
but "living a life in the modern world" does not require letting facebook sideload an app store so they can bypass app review/permissioning and datamine me. And actually doing so is detrimental to the real-world security of banking and the other important stuff that's run through my phone.
Again, reminder they've literally already been busted for doing exactly this, apple revoked their dev credentials because they were paying customers 10 bucks to install the datamine version of facebook with a dev build.
I think you need devs/producers to complaim about high margins in stores before anyone cares about 3rd party apps. Or about abusive practices (you get thrown out of a store for arbitrary reasons).
I haven't heard devs say anything of the sorts for gaming consoles. Certainly barriers to entry are higher and NDAs probably stricter... But, dunno, the complaints are basically non existent in media.
Microsoft gets Sony PlayStation devkits before the release of s new console. I can't see how you could say anything about Sony that would want them to refuse a devkit more than to their competitors. I very much doubt the truth of this.
Starting this with Apple is probably much easier PR wise than with Microsoft or Sony since their customers like Apple and Sony. Because most gamers don't care about Apple or don't like Apple (which is fair since Apple doesn't seem to care about them).
And the more important reason is that Epic probably already has deals in place with Microsoft and Sony. We have seen that they exist for Activision thanks, to the merger, so why shouldn't Epic have similar arrangements?
> This part is the most interesting to me. Alarm systems I understand, though this looks like security by obscurity,
My phone contains information or can access information that would harm me much more than someone robbing my home (while I am away). And if someone breaks into my home while I am there, the alarm system is not going to get the cops there quickly enough anyway.
So I do not see why an alarm system would be considered as something that needs an exception for security reasons, but a phone is not.
xbox still exists despite everything, and Nintendo is an even bigger player in the space than Sony. So I guess legislators ARE willing to go that far to protect Nintendo/Sony/Microsoft's DRM. The interesting bit here is that only Microsoft is an american company, so it is possible they got the biggest leverage here.
Those numbers don't seem right, looking at Wikipedia[0]. I'm sure console pricing can skew that a bit, but xbox is basically dead outside the US in terms of marketshare.
This part is the most interesting to me. Alarm systems I understand, though this looks like security by obscurity, but video game consoles? Are legislators willing to go that far to protect Sony's DRM?