It's Time to End Region Encoding

This morning's news that the Australian High Court--that nation's version of the U.S. Supreme Court--ruled in favor of a man who installed so-called mod chips in Sony PlayStation 2 game consoles should send a wake-up call to the game and movie industry that the concept of region coding is an abomination that does nothing to help consumers, and should be ended as soon as possible.

Region coding is a process by which the makers of certain kinds of media--specifically DVD movies and console videogames--and the hardware that play the media limit the geographical region of the world in which the media can be used. They segment the world into different regions, and then only sell a particular region's model of player (and, of course, region-encoded media) in that area.

As a result, makers and distributors of console videogames and DVD movies have, for years, been able to gouge consumers by charging more in some regions than they do in others. In many cases, they charge a lot more. This works because region coding means an inexpensive game in Asia cannot, in theory, be played on a game console sold in Europe, or the U.S., or Australia.

Then the mod-chippers stepped into the fray. These folks made or sold chips that preserve all the other functionality of the game device, but removed the region-limiting code, so players with a modified console could, for example, play on a console bought in the U.S. games that were encoded for use in some other part of the world. In some cases, this can save gamers a lot of money, because of the way game distributors price games in different regions around the world, and international currency exchange rates.

Sony had sued Eddy Stevens, who ran a business that installed these custom-made processors inside PS2s, arguing that mod chips circumvent copy protection, and are therefore illegal. But in a decision that will greatly benefit consumers, all six judges on the Australian court ruled that mod chips are legal, because playing a computer program on a PlayStation did not involve reproducing it.

Now, it's one of the world's worst-kept secrets that most inexpensive DVD players have a menu option to turn off region-coding restrictions. That means you can buy movies encoded for other parts of the world and play them right here--in some cases, movies that are, legally, unavailable in this country from anyone. I have one of these players, and I love it: My relatives in Britain can send me DVDs of English TV shows that I can't even buy here.

So why do we tolerate these kinds of restrictions on video games?

If you believe the market for video games and movies should be at least as fair and free as it is for other commodities, you have to acknowledge the overt unfairness and restricted market that region encoding creates.

We live in a global economy, where wars in West Africa directly affect the price of a Hershey's bar at your movie theater's concession stand. I think it's simply not acceptable to charge some of the world's consumers more, while at the same time limiting their access to games or movies that are legally sold for less money (or those that are only available) in other parts of the world.

It's time to end the tyranny of region encoding, and let the market decide how much the world's entertainment-buying public is willing to pay for its movies and games, instead of the heads of greedy, colluding corporations.