Why not release old stuffs?

Hi to everybody.
Some members of this board have disk and documentations from old consoles's developement kit.
Why not release them? I'm sure many people would find it useful (snes emulation is still not perfect, for example), thus, I don't think it will hurt their companies.
For documentations, why not scan them and put them on the net too?

I'm sure many people will appreciate these gifts :smt023

 

Mostly because people have paid alot of money to have what they have... so alot of things dont get released.

 

...Okay m8, you go first and then we'll follow yer :smt023

 

Lets see the variables:

cost=dev items
time =copy items+ legal Threat

Equation:

cost+ time = Large Cost

Large Cost != free

Sorry does not equal.. Now the question.. why would someone who spent alot of money on an item want to invest time and a possible lawsuit by giving it away for free?

 

Copyright! The manufacturers who produced this documentation hold the copyright. Reproducing this material is illegal. Not to mention the fact that most of it is covered by NDAs. (Non Disclosure Agreements)

 

Sure, everybody will post their stuff. Then, I'll send you some free money.

 

Well if you are going to send free money out can you print them in 100's and instead of in god we trust can we change it to.."To assembler we go"

 

When you buy developement kit, what is the most important? Hardware part or software part?
Furthermore, what is interesting in keeping knowledge which would be useful to many people? The XDK (for xbox) is widely avaiable. Thanks to it, there are a lot of homebrew softwares on Xbox. But I've never heard about someone who has been sued for leaking this SDK (and the Xbox is not an old console!).
So, I really don't think Nintendo would sue you if you release some hardware documents or developement libs (which can be released anonymously anyway).
Moreover, the most difficult part on homebrew developement is finding informations about the consoles. So, why keep it secret when you can share them and help 'the community'.

oldengineer : unfortunately, I don't have many devkit, except the most spread, so, nothing rare. But there aren't a lot of people who can get their hand on such things...

 

He certainly spoke about OLD CONSOLE like snes. It's true that you don't need to have the hardware but just the software with an emulator. So it's true that everybody i's agree to get something rare. It's like all people who are happy to find an iso of DC, saturn games etc...
It's sure that pay a devkit isn't so easy but if we see release groups for games, movies etc... we're all so glad to find those items for free.

 

Oh dear, I was openly ridiculing you for asking people to openly 'spread' warez, I thought that would be the end of it, but it appears that you are 'serious', I'm amazed and saddened...

:no

 

I really don't understand.. Am I too naïve to think that people who own rarities can share them, in order to help others?

 

Help them to create homebrew softwares, help them to create accurate emulators (even if in this case, I'm not ok with emulators of recent consoles, like GC or DS...).
For example, there isn't any accurate PS1 emulator, and not even an accurate SNES emulator!
But the main point of releasing infos would definitly for homebrew softwares.

 

However why should people who are not interested in emulators or homebrew software want to pay for them?

Why dont you join us here for the next year and buy up all the documents u can and release them... see how much money you are goin to spend.

 

My main question is why do you pay so much for the developement kits? What is the most important part? Hardware or the software which comes with.
And, apart the money side, I'm sure some of you have old documents which take dust. Ok, maybe they were expensive, but it's not like releasing the GC's developers guide, or the PS2's libs.
What I've seen on the market section of this forum is recent or very rare devkits (GC's NR, M2, etc..), that's not what I'm talking about wih 'old stuff'.
And about getting into your community : it would be interesting, but I can't start a good collection because I don't have enough money (I can't afford to spend half of my pay in these devices), moreover as I don't live in US, shipping is very random.

 

There isn't an accurate PS1 emulator because Sony stamp down heavily on anyone who even goes anywhere near their intellectual property. The killed off Bleem! easily. Technically, you don't buy dev hardware off Sony, you only lease it and are supposed to return it to them rather than sell it on.

I don't have a lot of experience with Nintendo, but they also have a similar reputation.

Also, a lot of the older dev stuff becomes lost as it comes to the end of it's life. Docs get lost in cupboards and thrown away when it's no longer of any use. This makes it rare, and rare means expensive. People don't like sharing things that cost a lot of money. Next time you see someone driving a Ferarri, ask them to share it with you and see what reaction you get.

Unfortunately, life is not fair. Get over it.

 

Same here but im not going to start bugging on people who have paid for things to release them for the needs of other people. If they wanted and needed it so bad maybe they should stand up and have thier say on why they should have it and what they are going to use it for... Maybe then someone might want to share something. As it stands your just asking for us to give you something for nothing what so ever in return.

 

That's my point : if these things are never publicly avaiable, they're lost forever. I really doubt anyone would pay $$ to get his hand on a old Snes programming guide.

For what I've seen on this board (through pictures and ebay auctions), most of you are interested in the hardware. It's not like I was asking to lend your playstation dev, but to scan or release the docs which were coming with (and couldn't be avaiable elsewhere anyway).
Anyway, I'll try to find what I'm looking for on the Web.

 

The softwae 99% of the time is no good to people without the hardware, and most people don't own the hardware anyway. As interesting as the hardware is, without the software it isn't going to do much, so in answer to your question both are just as valuable. Oh and homebrew stuff made with official SDK isn't bonafide homebrew as it's not made with homebrew tools, but also doing it with official tools and no licence is also illegal -_-

 

Not strictly true.

The person or company who released it into the public domain is in breach of contract. The only thing I can think that the person receiving it could be charged with is receiving stolen property, but as the items have not actually been stolen that would be difficult to stick.

You would not be able to publish or distribute your work, but you could still create it.

Having said all that, I'm not a lawyer so don't take my word for it. It's just my interpretation.

Also, publishing any documentation, however you came by it is illegal under the copyright laws.