In his case against Sony, Geohot Starts Blog, Asks for Financial Help and Support

In his fight against Sony, Geohot has decided to open a blog. In the blog he explains himself as well as asks for help in his case against Sony

Media, I need your help. This is the first time I have ever asked. Please, if you support this cause, help me out and spread the word.
I want, by the time this goes to trial, to have Sony facing some of the hardest hitting lawyers in the business.
Together, we can help fix the system
Donations here are for legal defense ONLY
I checked with my lawyers before setting this up
If you have another substantial way to donate aside from money, let me know
tl;dr
Sony is lame, and is suing me for hacking MY OWN PS3. Help me own them in court
Sony are bullies
Sony doesn’t care if what you did was legal, if they don’t like it, they sue. Sony tried to sue a guy for getting his AIBO to do non Sony approved tricks, making it apparent that they don’t really care about piracy, they care about control. In (Sony v Bleem), Bleem was the winner on all counts, but the high cost of a legal defense shut them down. Fortunately, that suit helped set precedent on the legality of emulators. I would hate to lose this case due to resource starvation, and with the support of the masses, I won’t. Lets turn the bully back on itself. This case has the ability to set a huge precedent for consoles and all closed systems to come. The other two should be begging Sony to back off.
Sony sued the wrong guy
I am an advocate against mass piracy, do not distribute anyone’s copyrighted work but my own, do not take crap lying down, and am even pro DRM in a sense. For example, I believe Apple has every right to lock down their iPhone in the factory as much as they want, but once it’s paid for and mine, I have the right to unlock it, smash it, jailbreak it, look at it, and hack on it. Fortunately, the courts agree with me on this point.
My PS3 goal has been to provide users a legitimate path to homebrew, which by the standards of all previous cases (or, in reverse), is 100% legal. Sony does not even try to allege piracy or copyright infringement in this case, they allege I did things like play "super mario world, an unauthorized game" on MY PS3. And access MY PS3 in an unauthorized way. Who are they to authorize what I do with my taxed and paid for property?
fail0verflow’s goal was even nobler than mine. They wanted to give you back a feature Sony illegally stole, Linux on your PS3. It’s shameful on Sony’s part that they are being sued at all. If you have a problem with pirates, sue them, don’t sue people who point out your shortcomings.
Why should I care about your personal legal troubles?
You shouldn’t. For example, if I was taken to court for sex crimes in Sweden, I would never ask for donations. But this case isn’t about me. Clearly I am not being sued because of something I have that Sony wants, I am being sued in order to send a message that Sony is not to be messed with. But if I(and all codefendants likewise) actually win this, we have the power to send a much stronger message back. That consumers have rights, and we aren’t afraid to stand up for them.
Why should I trust you? I just saw you trying to rap battle Sony
My attempts at humor aside, I do take this whole matter very seriously. Again, it’s not about me, I was on the verge of quitting this stuff last June, and I would hate to be the one who sets a reputation for hackers that all a company has to do is sue us and we back down. In fact, I want the opposite reputation set, that the more a company tries to abuse the legal system, the harder we rally back. I will be the first person in line on the launch date of the Xperia Play, and itching to get my hands on the Next GEOHOT Project.
Why did you wait until now to set this up?
I didn’t want to be trigger happy, and thought the suit might go away quickly. Also, I had to consult with my lawyers about how to do this. It’s been over a month, and it looks like this is going to be a drawn out case. I am in this for the long haul. I am very serious ethically when I take donations, for all iPhone work I only accepted after the fact, here after the fact is too late. Now I am pot committed so to say.
How much should I donate?
Put it this way, Sony has 5 lawyers, I have 2. I’d like to level the playing field, and really get some hard hitters in there. I have already racked up over 10k in legal bills; donate whatever you feel like. Leftover donations at the end of all this will be donated to the EFF.
What if I want to donate more than I feel comfortable sending through PayPal?
I’m excited! Email me, we’ll figure it out.
Why doesn’t the EFF fund this?
Ask them. They have offered to provide some legal help though, which is much appreciated.
Donate to help you, you’re the reason I can’t play Modern Warfare now…
No, I’m not. Kakaroto explains this really well here. I have never played PS3 online ever. Frankly I’m amazed by the apparent ease with which these cheats were created, security 101, why is the security in the client anyway? I had no idea this would happen, and am in full support of the cheaters being permabanned from PSN.
I’m a poor college student, what can I do to help?
I feel you, don’t worry. Spread the word. Let people know how you feel about what Sony is doing. Let Sony know how you feel about what Sony is doing.
What if SCEA tries to settle?
Lets just say, I want the settlement terms to include OtherOS on all PS3s and an apology on the PlayStation blog for ever removing it. It’d be good PR for Sony too, lord knows they could use it. I’m also willing to accept a trade, a legit path to homebrew for knowledge of how to stop new firmwares from being decrypted.
Why isn’t SCEA trying to settle?
RAGE RAGE RAGE RAGE RAGE…THEY POINTED OUT OUR SECURITY FLAWS…IM SO MADDDDDDDD…WAHHHHHH

Geohot’s new blog can be found here. Please note that this is his ONLY official blog. Geohot is also NOT on Twitter. If you have been following someone on Twitter with word “geohot” in its alias, then it's a fake profile.
If you enjoyed this post please re-tweet it!


Stay tuned for more!

Geohot's rap warns Sony that they are F*** with the dude who got the keys to your safe

Geohot's rap warns Sony that they are F*** with the dude who got the keys to your safe. Only God knows the implications of this rap in Sony's case against Geohot.



Lyrics:
Yo it’s geohot
And for those that don’t know
I’m getting sued by Sony
Let’s take this out of the courtroom and into the streets
I’m a beast, at the least, you’ll face me in the northeast
Get my ire up, light my fire
I’ll go harder than Eminem went at Mariah
Call me a liar
Pound me in the ass with no lube, chafing
You’re fucking with the dude who got the keys to your safe and
Those that can’t do bring suits
Cry to your Uncle Sam to settle disputes
Thought you’d tackle this with a little more tact
But then again fudgepackers, I don’t know Jack
I shed a tear everytime I think of Lik Sang
But shit man, they’re a corporation
And I’m a personification of freedom for all
You fill dockets, like thats a concept foreign to y’all
While lawyers muddy water and TROs stall
Out of business is jail for me
And you’re suing me civilly
Exhibit this in the courtroom
Go on, do it, I dare you.
You may download the MP3.

If you enjoyed this post please re-tweet it!


Stay tuned for more!

Geohot Ordered To Hand His Computer’s Hard Drive Over To Sony!!!

According to Wired, Geohot has been ordered by U.S. District Judge Susan Illston to provide Sony with his computer’s hard drive so that Sony  may comb through his computer’s hard drive and retrieve information “that relates to the hacking of the PlayStation,”. As you may know, Sony sued the 21 year old hacker after he successfully hacked PlayStation 3 and published the hacking tools online. 
Even though Geohot’s attorney, Stewart Kellar did try to block Sony from gaining access to GeoHot's hard drive, the judge ruled that:

“Here, I find probable cause that your client has got these things on his computer,” she said. “It’s a problem when more than one thing is kept on the computer. I’ll make sure the order is and will be that Sony is only entitled to isolate … the information on the computer that relates to the hacking of the PlayStation.”

Of course nobody knows what information, code or otherwise Sony will be looking for or indeed what they will find when they are let loose with the drive in question, but I think it’s probably fair to say they aren’t looking for cooking recipes. Either way, this could end up being a pivotal moment for the PS3 hacking scene.
If you enjoyed this post please re-tweet it!


Stay tuned for more!

Sony Granted Temporary Restraining Order Against Geohot, the King Of All Things Jailbreak

Engadget reports that a US District Court has granted Sony a temporary restraining order against George Hotz, aka Geohot. Sony had previously sued everyone’s favorite hacker for jailbreaking the Japanese company’s PlayStation 3.

…the US District Court for the Northern District of California granted Sony’s request for a temporary restraining order forbidding Mr. Hotz and his merry men from distributing or linking to the jailbreak, helping or encouraging others to jailbreak, hacking into the PS3 or PSN, or distributing any information they’ve found while hacking.

Hotz has also been ordered to hand over any computers and/or media that may be used in the jailbreaking processes.
Whether this will have any effect on the jailbreak scene remains to be seen. However, one can reasonably assume that even if Geohot is prevented from working on the jailbreak there will always be another hacker willing to take over Geohot's job. The question is " can Sony sue all of them"?


Stay tuned for more!

GeoHotz and The Jailbreaking Network: THE OFFICIAL MOVIE TRAILER

George Francis Hotz is well known in the Jailbreaking community. He was among the group of people who first unlocked the iPhone to work on all carriers Afterwards, he went on to release jailbreaking tools like purplera1n, blackra1n, blacksn0w, a hack the PS3 and most recently Limera1n which jailbreaks iOS 4.1.
Before the release of Limera1n, he officially announced that he was leaving the JB community. However, he has since returned to the jailbreaking scene. His rebirth