Sega Giving Stock To Stop ISO Pirates?

atheos acording to this story kalisto was given stop options to cease releasing ripped dreamcast ISOs. I'm not sure if this is true or not, but I don't think I've ever heard of this. I mean, its a lot nicer then sending in the legal attack sharks (and the page proclaims that they will move on to the PSX) but something feels odd about this. Emulators and ISOs are very different things in my eyes. Anyway, take this whole story with a big old salt lick since we don't really have much to go on here, but I just found this odd.

Please, it's not real.

Jesus. Why do people buy into this shit?

Kalisto wanted out, and didn't have a witty thing to say. So they made something up. If you read their previous NFO's they were rather pissed off at the 'scene' and one would easily say they did want out.

Now the issue of Sega giving stock options is ludicrist. Sega would rather hand them some handcuffs rather than money or options. You better believe that sega still wants them in jail.

And finally, if the 'warez site' in question was more up to date, you'd notice a new group has formed (named echelon), right after kalisto has 'exited'. Seems a little suspicious to you, doesn't it?

Finally, here are some links that are comparibly better than the one provided in the story.

Isonews [isonews.com]

152.org [152.org]

You can see the 'nfos' from the new group 'echelon' and give youself a better picture of the dreamcast pirate world.

Re:hire them!

F.Y.I PSX2 games have been hackable for the same amount of time or longer than dream cast.

They come on DVD's and they simply apply the same ripping or downsampling procedures to get it to fit on a CD.

The dreamcast is tougher due to the custom 'data' format (gdrom), and the group 'utopia' was the first to break the protection.

Kalisto uses the same anti-protection that utopia created to break the games.

We need a new RFC

For the SBP (Slashdot Bullshit Protocol). Basically, you send a story out to 5 people before you publish it on the front page. If 5 of them go "Bullshit!", then you don't publish the story.

I can see it now

Sega: Hey, if you don't steal our stuff, we'll sell you this stock for really cheap.

Pirate: j00 m$t B k1dd1ng m3, b1tch, ur $t0cK 1$ g01ng t0 b w0rthl3s s00n. P$x2 0wnz all.

Sega: How about if we give it too you?

Pirate: n0 th4nx

busted

Hi, we're Sega. We don't know who you really are, but if you stop pirating our games we'll give you stock options. Then when you go to collect on them we'll find out who you really are. Then, we'll duct tape your wrists to your ankles and our lawyers will take turns until you can no longer walk.

I am very skeptical about all this

I think this is all a stupid prank, or a Kalisto inside joke/coverup on why they're not releasing anymore.

Why am I skeptical?

1-I'm unsure about the legality of this in the first place. Basically, Sega is bribing these people with stock options, and I'll eat my own shorts if there isn't some law out there that prohibits this.

2-Let's say bribing people with stock is actually legal. Don't you think Sega would make them sign some agreement that they may not disclose this transaction publicly? If I was running a big corporation, I would sure want my bribes to criminals kept secret ... maybe Sega of America has a different philosophy about this?

3-Continuing with #2's assumption, what are Sega's stockholders going to think, when they find out that the people who may possibly cripple the Dreamcast console are getting free stocks? Would Sega really be so bold/stupid? How would they explain these actions at stockholder meetings?

4-Just before their announcement, Kalisto had briefly stopped releasing Dreamcast ISOs because they think the Dreamcast ISO "scene" is ungrateful. Shortly thereafter, they released about 4-5 games, then stated that they are no longer releasing anything because Sega is bribing them. This all stinks of trying to find reasons to stop releasing. They could have easily stopped releasing due to the first reason, rather than publicly announcing that they are being paid the "ransom".

5-Just after Kalisto stops releasing, a "new" group called Echelon emerges and immediately starts releasing games using fairly advanced ripping/booting techniques, as if they've been doing it for ages. Looks like Kalisto, smells like Kalisto. Hmmm, maybe this is all just a big name change for a piracy group?

Sounds like Homer and his free motor boat.

"Hi, I'm Calisto, I'm here for my stock options"

Bob.

Re:hire them!

GDRoms are just more "dense" that CDroms, and can be read by a standard cdrom with some modifications. And, they didn't make the boot disk OR figure out how to rip the GDroms, they took someone elses work, called it there own, and tried to play it off and claimed others stole it from them.

Wow, with those skills, maybe they SHOULD work for a corporation.

Hey.

Just a thought.. but..
Couldn't Sega be doing this?

1) Offer them all stock options.
2) This means they all have to sign contracts, and be *identified*. (You can't anonymously get options, I don't think).
3) Now, Sega is legally bound to give them these options; however....
4) Now Sega knows who each and every member is, so they can proceed to sue them for copyright infringement *anyway*!

Hypothetically.. the fact that sega would agree to pay them to stop is not the same as saying sega is not going to press charges for their past actions.

Re:hire them!

they took someone elses work, called it there own, and tried to play it off and claimed others stole it from them.

Huh, imagine that. Pirates trying to benefit from someone else's work.

Care about freedom?

hire them!

Have you guys seen the specs on how these games were ripped? Dreamcast GD-ROMs are supposed to be incompatible with CDRs a hundred different ways. For one, they hold more data. These hackers managed to rip the games, edit them down to CD-size and then create a boot disk for the dreamcast that disables all the country-code checking. These are some serious 3l33t HaX0rZ. Sega should hire them immediately. Hell, maybe even pay them to start whacking the PSX2 :)

Re:shouldn't

heh heh, this story is not actually true. The person who writes the .NFO files for Kalisto is leaving the group and played a prank. That's the story.