For anyone living in the United States, buying a RCM Loader just got much more difficult.

As you may have heard, Nintendo filed a lawsuit in November 2020 against Vietnamese resident Le Hoang Minh, who manufactured RCM Loaders and sold them on Amazon under the name "Winmart". This came after a DMCA takedown request from Nintendo, resulting in Amazon taking down his listings. Le disputed the request, allowing him to resume selling the devices. Nintendo called this an abuse of the DMCA's counternotification system, since Le lives in Vietnam, where any consequences for wrongly disputing DMCA takedowns are unenforceable. Due to this, Nintendo sought an injunction by a U.S. court. After the lawsuit was filed, Le did not respond to it, nor did Le enter discussions with Nintendo. This led Nintendo to seek a default judgment.

According to Nintendo, here is why the product is illegal:

Once this circumvention has occurred, the unauthorized CFW modifies the authorized Nintendo Switch operating system, thereby allowing users to obtain and play virtually any pirated game made for the Nintendo Switch. All of this happens without authorization or compensation to Nintendo or to any authorized game publishers

On April 15, 2021, the U.S. court to which Nintendo brought the case has ruled in favor of Nintendo's request for a default judgment. Any online store selling RCM Loaders is now prohibited from shipping them to the U.S.

Nintendo is seeking a total of $2,500 in damages (down from their original request for $2,500 per violation) in an effort to not drag the litigation out much longer:

This request for a $2,500 award is intended to be very conservative and does not reflect anything close to the full amount of damages Nintendo could reasonably seek from Defendant,” the company writes.

Nintendo could…credibly seek a separate award for every device Defendant sold — almost certainly many devices, given that Defendant’s RCM Loader device was available online for many months. However, rather than attempt to quantify Defendant’s total sales, Nintendo seeks to facilitate an efficient resolution of this case through entry of judgment awarding damages for a single § 1201 violation.

The injunction also applies to "any and all products, services, devices, components or parts thereof” that circumvent Nintendo's security measures. Does this mean that Le Hoang Minh (and anyone working with him) can't even sell paperclips?

Source (courtesy of TorrentFreak)

 

[Julie_Pilgrim]

The same way you're banned?

LMAOOOO

 

[Kubas_inko]

So happy to live anywhere else but the US, where modifying your own property is legal.

 

[Gep_Etto]

Nintendo is trying to drink the ocean one teaspoon at a time. Go ahead, ban RCM loaders from one supplier, then another, then another... meanwhile, I'll be here waiting for you to have my hard drive banned because it has TegraRCM on it. Oh wait, I can just boot from a USB stick and use this web-based payload injector instead! Good luck going after everyone who rehosts it, since it's an open source project...

 

[chrisrlink]

Nintendo is trying to drink the ocean one teaspoon at a time. Go ahead, ban RCM loaders from one supplier, then another, then another... meanwhile, I'll be here waiting for you to have my hard drive banned because it has TegraRCM on it. Oh wait, I can just boot from a USB stick and use this web-based payload injector instead! Good luck going after everyone who rehosts it, since it's an open source project...

saddly from what I read the injunction apply's to all US based marketplaces too (ebay and fbm) are also complying afaik

 

[Bladexdsl]

these guys are next

 

[Gep_Etto]

saddly from what I read the injunction apply's to all US based marketplaces too (ebay and fbm) are also complying afaik

Then people will buy them from China. The Chinese government doesn't care, each American dollar that goes into their market is a win for them. And you can do this from your phone, from your computer (like I said: even without a hard drive!), etc. You can install a modchip. There are just so many options and it isn't realistic to think you can stomp them all out. Nintendo is just flexing their muscles because they have to. They won't stop piracy. I know it, you know it and they know it.

 

[duwen]

Someone call the Wah-mbulance for the baby posted that poll.

...there's a difference between an object designed for one purpose that can be repurposed for a very different nefarious reason, and something designed solely to circumvent copyrights.

 

[Julie_Pilgrim]

Someone call the Wah-mbulance for the baby posted that poll.

...there's a difference between an object designed for one purpose that can be repurposed for a very different nefarious reason, and something designed solely to circumvent copyrights.

Paperclips would be taken down if the person seling them advertised them like "with this you can get free switch games" or "here's something you can use to hack your swithc"

 

[chrisrlink]

these guys are next

if they take that down i'd fear for atmosphere's future

 

[SuzieJoeBob]

Oh no, what'll we ever do!!!!
*Proceeds to visit eBay and Alibaba*

 

[smf]

What's next? Will Nintendo get the courts to ban the entirety of China because "teh piracies?" Will Nintendo get PCs banned because "teh piracies?"

No. Don't worry, that doesn't even make any sense let alone have any legal merit.

--------------------- MERGED ---------------------------

Paperclips would be taken down if the person seling them advertised them like "with this you can get free switch games" or "here's something you can use to hack your swithc"

I believe it would be possible for nintendo to get the advert taken down, however I don't think you could actually stop someone selling paperclips. The jigs are a different matter, although getting into RCM doesn't infringe anything. It would make an interesting case. At that point they'd go after the people who make the software.

 

[Gep_Etto]

At that point they'd go after the people who make the software.

...which is mostly open source, so it's pretty much impossible to stamp out since anyone can rehost it.

And not just that. Look at what happened recently when GitHub got a DMCA takedown notice for youtube-dl based on 'circumvention', i.e. it being code that "bypasses technical measures that control access or copying of copyrighted works, even if that technology can be used in a way that would not be copyright infringement". To nobody's surprise, though it did get removed for a short while, youtube-dl came back. This is the exact scenario we'd be looking at if Nintendo were to come after the people who make Atmosphère, hekate, etc., though NSP/XCI installers like Tinfoil might be in a bit more danger.

 

[daemonspudguy]

No. Don't worry, that doesn't even make any sense let alone have any legal merit.

That was the point. It was supposed to be complete nonsense, like Nintendo's suppression of our right to do as we please with our devices.

 

[smf]

That was the point. It was supposed to be complete nonsense, like Nintendo's suppression of our right to do as we please with our devices.

You're allowed to do whatever you want with your own device, you're not allowed to tell anyone how to break drm or sell anything that does it.

Nintendo are just asking for the law to be applied.

To nobody's surprise, though it did get removed for a short while, youtube-dl came back. This is the exact scenario we'd be looking at if Nintendo were to come after the people who make Atmosphère, hekate, etc., though NSP/XCI installers like Tinfoil might be in a bit more danger.

youtube-dl is different as it doesn't circumvent anything covered by the DMCA.

So you can't know what would happen if Nintendo did the same thing, sept in atmosphere is very much like the kind of thing that the DMCA covers. But I agree tinfoil and the sigpatch thread on gbatemp are far more likely to receive takedowns first.

 

[daemonspudguy]

You're allowed to do whatever you want with your own device, you're not allowed to tell anyone how to break drm or sell anything that does it.

Nintendo are just asking for the law to be applied.

The Library of Congress made an exception to anti-circumvention laws specifically for "jailbreaking" devices. It's legal.

Sent from my Pixel 4a using Tapatalk

 

[smf]

The Library of Congress made an exception to anti-circumvention laws specifically for "jailbreaking" devices. It's legal.

They made an exception for "jailbreaking" phones & specifically (despite being asked multiple times) excluded games consoles (and also tablets).

It's not legal.

 

[daemonspudguy]

They made an exception for "jailbreaking" phones & specifically (despite being asked multiple times) excluded games consoles (and also tablets).

It's not legal.

If it isn't legal, how is this website still online? How are the tools still hosted on GitHub? If it truly is illegal, then all the tools used to run homebrew software would be taken down.

Sent from my Pixel 4a using Tapatalk

 

[smf]

If it isn't legal, how is this website still online? How are the tools still hosted on GitHub? If it truly is illegal, then all the tools used to run homebrew software would be taken down.

If murder is illegal then why aren't all murderers caught.

Nintendo seem to only issue take down notices against illegal download sites when they charge money. The free ones aren't legal either, they just seem to ignore them.

github is owned by microsoft, I'm sure they don't care if you're costing nintendo money.

 

[daemonspudguy]

The free ones aren't legal either, they just seem to ignore them.

Tell that to LoveROMS.

github is owned by microsoft, I'm sure they don't care if you're costing nintendo money

That's not how that works. If a site gets a DMCA takedown notice, they are required to comply with it.

 

[smf]

Tell that to LoveROMS.

From the court papers.

38. As a direct result of Defendants’ infringement of Plaintiffs’ copyrights and trademarks, Defendants’ websites have become enormously popular. The LoveROMs website alone receives 17 million visitors each month. Such visitors are drawn to the website by the widespread availability of free, unauthorized copies of Nintendo’s video games and other highly valuable intellectual property. The resulting popularity of Defendants’ LoveROMs and LoveRETRO websites has allowed Defendants to reap substantial ill-gotten gains, including through donations and the sale of advertising on the LoveROMs and LoveRETRO websites.


Nintendo went after them because of the money. It plays better in court, there is money available for the court to award some to Nintendo and it probably annoys them more that someone is making money while depriving them of it.

Nintendo have not removed all illegal copies of their games from the internet. So the "if it was illegal it would be taken down" is still a poor argument