UK R4 importer sentenced to 12 months in prison

by Alexander Sliwinski on Jan 19th 2010 12:15AM

Not only are publishers trying to prevent the sale and distribution of R4 game copying devices for the Nintendo DS, but illegal importers are going to jail. GamePolitics reports that UK resident Yun Can Meng was sentenced to a year in prison after he plead guilty to importing over 26,500 R4 cards for distribution.

ELSPA's Director General Michael Ralinson said the organization was "pleased" with the outcome and the court's robust enforcement. If you're a UK resident in the R4 business, consider this a big flashing warning sign to find another business with lower risk -- like insurance fraud.

Source

Tags: britain, DS, Nintendo, piracy, r4, theft, uk

Reader Comments (48)

You tell em, Kotick! They should pirate Activision products instead, right?

Good.

It's the least he deserves.

Do rapists (and etc.) get that much prison time?

yea for real thats way too much time, i think ive seen less for dangerous crimes

You think a year in prison is the "least he deserves"? In your opinion, what is the most he deserves? I'm not saying that I'm on his side, but a 12-month sentence seems steep for this sort of crime.

Sometimes you need to set an example.

As the saying goes, "You can't make an omelette without breaking eggs, and sometimes you have to burn down the barn to get rid of the rats."

"Sometimes you need to set an example."

People shouldn't be used as scapegoats, ESPECIALLY by the law...

I'm glad the guy got punished but I think the real punishment needs to go to his buyers. Just like in the drug war, the supply is not the important side of the equation. The DEMAND is.

@ Victor
You are aware every single person who goes to jail is a scapegoat used by the law.
And fucking them over it does help lower crime. It's what's called the real world, as unfair as it may be.

Someone is going to pirate his butt in prison

Right, the lesson here is not to import several thousand R4 cards, provided you live in the UK.

.....yeah, I think I'll be okay.

....no you're not....
*glares*

Yowzers.

I use my R4 legitimately (it's the only thing that keeps me using my DS, or I'd never carry it around if I had to carry 30 games around) and I don't necessarily support closing things like this down. Just bothers me for some reason.

Granted, I've never downloaded a torrent (legal or otherwise, unless you count P2P distributed games, like wow patches) in my life and I don't think pirate bay should be closed either, so maybe I just have too much of an electronics freedom attitude towards these things.

Dymphna, that's still not legitimate.

Dumping my OWN roms that i paid for onto my R4 is not legitimate? Yes, I have my own rom dump.

If that's actually the law (which I am skeptical of) then it's a dumb law. I own the game and am backing up my own copies of the game. It's like when the RIAA claims I can't rip a CD I paid for onto my computer (and instead should have to put the CD in everytime I want to listen to it). Unless you actually agree that should be illegal to.

I noticed - at least with Grand Theft auto there is a disclaimer saying you can't even make copies or backups and such.

The law is the law.

And common sense is common sense.

As long as only one person at a time is playing the game, does it make a difference whether you're using the original or a backup? Common sense says no, it doesn't make a difference.

@mjallemand

Really? It's not?

It's illegitimate for him to backup his legally-purchased games for his own personal use?

He bought the games, that means he bought cartridges as well as the data they contain.

As long as he doesn't make copies of the games and distribute them illegally, he can do whatever the hell he wants with his own property..

When cd music ripping software first came out it used to ask if you got permission from the artist to copy the cd because it came across a 'copyright bit' so doesn't that mean since all (or most at least) cd ripping ripping software bypasses this mean it's 'TECHNICALLY' bypassing copy protection? So according to the DMCA it's ALL illegal?

just to raise the point of how much protection is considered protection? a single bit? a simple cd check? how much really?

"As long as he doesn't make copies of the games and distribute them illegally, he can do whatever the hell he wants with his own property.."

It's hard to enforce that, though.
Though he may use it legitimately, how many others are using it illegitimately?

If they can't protect its legitimate use, they aim for destroying the whole darn thing and making it illegal. ...of course, if that were the case in every situation, all forms of data should be banned - as it's hard to enforce the use and misuse.

...I'm still against the use of these things (as those who use it legitimately protect the product, which secure its illegitimate use), but I still think 12 months is a bit harsh.
Geez, 4 months would've been the maximum I would've given him.

It's actually not legal to copy your own ROMs for personal use, at least in the US.

There are so many companies making their livelihood off of flash based solutions for the DS these days. It is sorta sad really, especially since not many people would really use them for homebrew or amateur development (Which I think is probably against TOS and such anyway)

Hey Kotick, what do you plan to do with all the cash MW2 has been raking in? Are you going to donate some of it to the help and aid efforts in Haiti?

For a moment there I thought he was going to a year of jail for only 1 R4 card... but geeze 26,500?? 12 months is a lot for 1 R4 however I think for that many its too little... the guy should be in there for 5-10 years!! with lots of fines!! The guys lucky he didn't live in america.... he'd have been soooooo screwed lol.

I love my little R4, don't use it to pirate games, but it turns my DS Lite into a nice little media device

There is a big market for the r4 cards , I think .I know import these cards can be permmited.I know a good website that can troduce to you if you interest.

http://www.zstar.hk/

But he'll only use it for DS homebrew development.

I don't think any man deserves a year in butt-raping prison time for a mod that lets you play free Mario. What happened to just suing people into oblivion?

Nintendo's Evil...

That's what happens when you get in the way of a corporation and its money. The system isn't set up to give fair sentences, it's used to push the corporacratic agenda. That's why most people in jail, in the US at least, are there for non-violent drug crimes (85%).. Which is a product of the War on Drugs.. Which was Nixon's solution for suppressing "minority" political opponents, but that's another story altogether..

26,000 is a pretty substantial number and the profit he could make would be quite large.

However 12 months is a very long time for something like this since its banking on only the POSSIBILITY of something being used improperly.

Although the first reaction is that the sentence is extreme, exaggerated, etc., I see the point: to deter further piracy through such an extreme example. It just sucks for Mr. Meng that he's the one being made an example of.

1 year in jail is kinda harsh. but sometimes we have to set an example to others.

There must be something missing from the article. Selling or importing hardware cannot be illegal. It has never been illegal to sell mod chips for example, as they are not inherently illegal. In the same vein a bong can be legally bought anywhere as they are simply a piece of plastic or glass and that cannot be illegal.

In every case where someone has been sentenced for selling stuff like this it's ALWAYS because they've been selling it with pirated games on it. In the few cases where people went to jail for selling chipped xboxes it was always because they were including pirated games on them with the purchase, not because they were simply selling chipped/modified consoles.

Don't try to confuse me with the truth

Actually it is.

"British High Court has ruled that selling, advertising, possession for commercial use and even use of PS2 mod chips is illegal in the UK. The ruling was based on UK's implementation of the notorious EUCD legislation that UK implemented to its national legislation, virtually without consumer friendly amendments, back in October 2003. The European Union Copyright Directive legislation makes it illegal to sell or distribute tools that allow circumventing technical copy protection mechanisms. "

I should add that the law was updated to include all devices.

Silly?
Maybe

But unfortunately its the law :(

I love how everyone is an expert on this subject, just cause you bought it DOESN'T mean you "own" it.

You don't have to believe me, you can read Nintendo's stand right here...

http://www.nintendo.com/corp/legal.jsp#download_rom

"I love how everyone is an expert on this subject, just cause you bought it DOESN'T mean you "own" it."

In 90% of the world, if you "bought" it then you "own" it.

That's what consumer protection laws are for.

Insisting on "licensing" instead of "owning" would only quicken the copyright dinosaurs extinction, since that turns a sale into a service and services in many countries are regulated even more than sales. E.g. one can always demand a pay-back if service turned out to be not what was paid for...

You don't own it. In the US, since 1983, it's been illegal to dump cart ROMs for the sake of anything but strictly developmental purposes.

You are right (as well as jynxy, to an extent) about not owning the game.

What you buy at retail is the packaging and all printed material including the cartridge, CD, DVD, UMD or whatever format the item is distributed in. You are also buying a transferable license that allows you to limited use of the data on said medium. You own the media, not the code.

I have one thing to say to this article.

LAAAAAAAAAAAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!!!!!

At least Nintendo is suing for legitimate reasons (piracy).

Sony has been known to sue importers simply for carrying their legitimate products (eg. sued Lik-Sang into bankruptcy simply for selling the Japanese PS3 to importers before the US and Euro versions were out).

should've distributed iplayers!

lol, you mean the CyclosDS.

Yeah but, Sony will sue until you go out of business or stop selling their product. Not until you get a criminal offense.

Remember, remember the Fifth of November,
The Gunpowder Treason and Plot,
I see no reason
Why the Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot.

Corporate law. The perfect way to make the punishment for infringement harsher than for real crimes. These days you'll get less jail time for punching someone in the teeth than you will for downloading.

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UK R4 importer sentenced to 12 months in prison

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