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Comment by nywles | Hacker News Reader

May the logo have been included so that the security sector could not be distributed under copyright law?

That was a tactic Nintendo used with the gameboy. The courts eventually decided that the logo, when used as an access token like that, no longer qualified for the creative component required for copyright protection.

Interesting, I was not aware of this. It appears this was the case:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sega_v._Accolade

That case was 1992, which today would not hold up due to the political shift of corporate power. Same as how in the 90's Microsoft couldn't monopolize with internet explorer, yet mobile devices are doing it every day in even worse fashion.

    yet mobile devices are doing it every day in even worse fashion.

Which mobile browser has 90%+ market share ala "peak" Internet Explorer in 2004?

I hate being limited to Safari on iOS, but iOS has < 30% market share worldwide. Additionally, browsers are (highly unfortunately IMO) less relevant than in ~2004 when IE had a stranglehold on things.

Worldwide isn't relevant to a U.S. monopoly, and wasn't relevant in the anti monopoly case against MS. Tech got big, made up a significant amount of GDP, and bought politicians. That is why the rules are no longer applied.

Strictly speaking, the logo bit wasn't about copyright, but trademark. Specifically there was certain territories that Japan had trademark treaties with, but not copyright treaties. Taiwan if I remember correctly.

So you could legally make unlicensed copies of Super Mario Bros but they couldn't be called Super Mario Bros. This is why a lot of old bootleg games change the titlescreen to say, say, "7 GRAND DAD[0]" instead of "Super Mario Bros". This behavior actually seems to persist to the present day despite these copyright loopholes having long since been fixed.

Of course there were companies that got around the logo check with custom hardware[1]. And Nintendo themselves got lazy and didn't check the whole logo on the Color. So it's possible to change the boot logo on basically every Game Boy.

The court case you're thinking of has to do with SEGA's Trademark Security System (TMSS) for the Genesis. Sega v. Accolade to be specific. The broad strokes are similar, though - small bits of copying to sell an original unlicensed work are acceptable because console hardware is not copyrightable just because you worked on it real hard.

[0] Fleenstones? Aaaaugh...

[1] The Game Boy BIOS has a TOCTOU bug. AFAIK this is also how Argonaut Software managed to get an in with Nintendo to publish X in Japan.

Ah, a fellow Joel fan

But logos never get copyright protection. They get trademark protection.

https://www.uspto.gov/trademarks/basics/trademark-patent-cop...

That was my thought upon reading that as well. I think Nintendo pioneered this strategy with the Gameboy - if the cartridge didn't start by showing the Nintendo logo, the Gameboy would not boot. And if you used the Nintendo logo without licensing it, it was trademark infringement.

Clever way to prevent un-licensed third-party cartridges.

Funny enough, it only checked about half the logo, meaning you could change the bottom half to something else.

That was (of course?) eventually defeated: https://dhole.github.io/post/gameboy_custom_logo/

According to legend at least this was defeated pretty early with Argonaut Software submitting a GB proof of concept that bypassed the boot screen (and was also 3D!). This ended up becoming the game "X".

This didn't work though, as courts don't like it when you (ab)use copyright/trademark like that.

Sega tried the same thing by having a check for the word SEGA at a certain ROM location on the cartridge for Genesis/Mega Drive games. They were smacked down in federal court in Sega v. Accolade.

The modders could have just as easily decided to go the "you must find the logo on your own" route and written a "select the logo" file prompt into the tools. I find the "they intended to let others sell HDDs" then changed their minds later route more plausible, especially since they never went after the "hacked" drives with bans or anything.

However, it would have been effective at preventing people from selling modified HDDs commercially.

It really wouldn't. Courts don't like it when you misuse copyright like that.

It would seem so. But, it doesn't cost anything to try.

Sega tried and lost in court, so in that sense it did cost them to try as they had to pay for counsel which ultimately wasn't even successful.

Right, but it doesn't cost Microsoft anything to add their logo as an additional check. If laws or court precedent change, it's already there. (For example, the DMCA came long after the Sega decision)

Seems plausible, since otherwise it would be fairly simple for a third-party accessory vendor to create compatible drives that could legally sell in all the usual places you can buy console accessories.

Trademark isn't going to stop modders, but it would have been effective against legitimate accessory vendors and retailers.

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