Homebrew a true utopian society?

**shadowprophet** · August 8th, 2006, 04:55

Firstly forgive the rather startling picture, It seemed to fit the point of this article, Do read on.

Homebrew.. the very word for some brings about thoughts of your favorite game,program, or application, The scene has grown so much in the last few years. It truly is a wonderful time to own your favorite console, So many talented developers, So much to choose from, and all for the cost of absolutely nothing, These talented people, create there works of wonder for little more then recognition of there talent. Its true, the homebrew scene has become so vast, its now a very competitive field to develop for. So many talented developers with all that competition only breads more creative intellectual properties, only making the scene better for everyone.

How is all this possible? How can such a great thing happen. and cost nothing?! well the truth is. In many respects, It does cost something, Those talented developers work tirelessly pulling down long hours, toiling away to creating something wonderful, there labor pays this cost for everyone. And then they turn around and give us there creations, there (magnum opus) if you will, Its a shining example of how strong and how loved the homebrew scene really is. And we give them in return, praise and support, and well wishes. it fuels them, our hopes and ideas, help them gather the strength to continue there endeavors, and often they return with something even more amazing, down the road.

Yes its true even you and I play our part in this scene too. our thoughts and opinions, Our praise and support. believe me these well wishes are much appreciated from our hard working devs.

In fact the homebrew scene would be a shining example of a true utopian society, In many ways it already is.

But the truth is There is a dark side to the homebrew scene as well. This dark side of the scene prevents us from reaching our perfect goal. It plagues us with setbacks, and scares of legal issues, in fact forcing many talented developers to leave the scene out of fear of legal retribution.

That's right. Im talking about Software piracy, Warez, ISO'S, what many people don't understand, Is there is a fine line drawn between our homebrew scene, and software piracy.

while our homebrew scene is frowned upon by corporation console developers. We protect our scene by keeping it legal, Meaning that every piece of homebrew we serve is completely (Homemade) without a trace of commercial intellectual property contained within.

however that line between homebrew and commercial software is becoming finer every day, as homebrew developers become more talented, we are now seeing commercial quality, completely legal homebrew more and more.

But there is a dark side to our scene too. Call it lack of creativity, or just laziness. But some Developers have now saw fit to use bits and pieces of commercial property in there projects, make no mistake this is an illegal move, And damaging beyond words to our scene..

From fragments of commercial property found in our homebrew. to Iso loaders, Make no mistake our scene is under the microscope. Big corporations would love for our scene to just dry up and go away, it would force more people to buy commercial software as inflated prices.

The proof is out there, Sony discovered commercial software imbedded in a certain firmware emulation application and issued a cease and desist order to its respective developer.

Make no mistake. They would love to (end) our scene.

People must be aware if they could legally end our scene they would have, But by keeping the scene legal we keep homebrew safe for everyone!

Imagine a world without homebrew... Its hard to imagine isn't it? we have become so attached to the idea of just downloading our latest favorite apps and games and playing them for free, that its almost impossible to imagine going back to a time without this awesome scene.

realize that things like iso loaders that load commercial software do a lot more then encourage one to download illegal warez (stolen commercial property) They damage our scene buy putting us in the hot seat. all that needs to be done to shut any site down is some mistake to be caught under that micro scope and a cease and desist order from some corporation and poof, the scene is no more..

So keep in mind the next time you see or hear about a piece of warez. take these things into account. warez is commercial software that has been stolen, leaked or copied, realize that even though it may seem harmless. that by downloading and playing it you put you self at risk too. make no mistake (it is theft). and if your caught, they wont just fine you the price of the game itself. they will fine you according the the copyright laws under which it is protected. (believe me its a very stiff fine)

And that is just on individual accounts, Servers and networks get fined individually for each piece of copyrighted material that is found on there servers. Its no wonder warez servers are always going down...

In closing I would like to say, I wrote this article to wake people up. Not that everyone needs wakening up. We have many good honest people in this scene. But there are still those out there who would cheat our scene and harm us, by seeking or distributing stolen commercial property.
And in the long run they cheat more then the scene, they cheat there selves... By damaging a scene you love your only hurting yourself..

Thoughts opinions.

Leave Feedback Via Comments Below

**QueadlunnRau** · August 8th, 2006, 05:20

Are you feeling alright? Everyones mood is changing in this scene ...

What ever happened to the up beat DCEmu that I came to grow and love? Can this crew ever go back to the innocent days of looking forward to what new homebrew was coming out next?

Seems these past weeks have been devoted to worry of what might come of the homebrew scene, or worry of what Sony might do to it. C'Mon can we ever go back to just looking for new and innovative homebrew?

I personally don't touch any software/homebrew outside this site, don't have a need too.

**Gene** · August 8th, 2006, 05:23

not gonna quote because its long but, Well said my brother, well said.

**jOeBrO** · August 8th, 2006, 05:26

Originally Posted by Gene

not gonna quote because its long but, Well said my brother, well said.

yes VERY well said, i hope this wakes people up

it would be a shame if a site as great as this gets shut down because of part of their own community(ISO downloaders)

**kando** · August 8th, 2006, 05:28

very well written and insightful article

**NoQuarter** · August 8th, 2006, 05:29

Yeah, well said man!I'm sure we all want the scene to continue,just some people think their actions don't have any repercussions.I fully stand by Dcemu's position on warez.

**xiringu** · August 8th, 2006, 05:31

I think there's something wrong in what you say, and it is that homebrew/open source can't be stopped. that's it, exactly how it sounds.

it doesn't matter if it is legal or not. it's just too big for anyone to stop it.

of course, they can make it difficult. let's say...don't let homebrew run on their hardware. oh! they've already done it! and they failed...

of course, they can sue somebody (one person) for something illegal, but they can't stop a mass of people doing this. if somebody get's sued, the next project could be released with no names so nobody gets to be blamed.

and there's one big thing helping homebrew: technology is advancing fast and powerful handhelds or umpcs or even mobile phones will reach soon the 1Ghz (give it 1 or 2 years)

that's the reality. and that's a bright future for us. we will be able to run homebrew on anything, even something tiny like a mobile phone.

and all those gadgets will be powerful enough to run a full version of windows or linux, so the huuuuge amount of software that already exists will be usable on our portables.

there will be no more porting of software to DS, psp, or gp2x, because they will be able to run a full OS

piracy you say? there's piracy on desktops and I don't see the market tumbling or disappearing because of that

it's just a matter of time that open source and homebrew will be on top of anything else, and nobody can stop this.

I've been using computers for 17 years, owned lots of them and you know what? there were lots of people saying the same things you say about 10 years ago, and they were all wrong.

to put an example:
I even got to try a beta version of the very first Windows, well before it was made commercial, on my university days and I don't see Microsoft ruined by that.

the scene will just grow, and grow, and grow...