Japanese College Student arrested over Wii Homebrew Software

[garyopa]

Violates the country's 'Unfair Competition Prevention Law'



A 19-Year old college student from Japan was arrested for posting Wii homebrew software online.

Just a few weeks ago, we informed you about an arrest of a man that sold flashcarts for the Nintendo DS in Japan, as part of the newly-amended "Unfair Competition Prevention Act" in that country.

Well, here goes another one, but this time is related to the "Wii Homebrew".

Japanese police arrested a 19 year-old college student from Kyoto Prefecture for allegedly posting Wii homebrew software online.

According to Japanese news reports, the "illegal program" allowed players to boot up pirated software on the Nintendo Wii. This past February, the college student supposedly put the software up on his website, where it was downloaded nearly 6,500 over the course of three months.

Apparently, the student earned roughly ¥200,000 (US$2,500) from his site in advertising revenue, since last year.

So, do you think that was well deserved?

In any case, looks like anti-piracy laws in Japan are really getting harsher this time.

NEWS SOURCE: Cops arrest college student over Wii homebrew software (via) Kotaku

Our thanks to 'Gauss' for this news item!

[tech3475]

It will be interesting to know what this "illegal software" is (i.e. the HBC or USB loader).

Still, I can see people not doing stuff like this student did if you live in Japan, just using the many other sources available. In many ways it just sounds like a scare tactic similar to the cases in the US and UK.

[billysastard]

i'd imagine that if it was just homebrew then any lawyer could get this thrown out, homebrew does not equal piracy.

[msanchez]

I'd be more in an uproar about this... but the guy was making money of it (even if indirectly). I don't particularly care for pirates, I don't think them to be the bane of the gaming industry... but I don't like people who profit from piracy; it just seems very wrong to do so. Still, maybe he didn't have any malice or thought of monetary gain when he posted the file.

I don't know if this is how it's always been, but this is the second time I hear of ad-revenue from a site used to nail somebody for piracy related charges.