It may seem counterintuitive compared to the strategies of their rival companies, but Microsoft appears to be trying to win over gamers with more lenient policies regarding hardware hackers. Last year they decided to back down from legal threats against Kinect hackers, and now we’ve got awesome mods like the new one shown off in the Super Street Fighter 4 video above (via Kotaku).
Now they’re even giving George “Geohot” Hotz – the talented hacker who’s currently embroiled in legal battles with Sony over his recent cracking of the PS3 system – a free pass to have a go at the Windows 7 phone. When Hotz revealed on Twitter he was going to purchase one of the new phones, Microsoft consultant Brandon Watson tweeted right back: “#geohot if you want to build cool stuff on #wp7, send me email and the team will give you a phone – let dev creativity flourish #wp7dev”.
Sony’s embarrassing themselves with a legal battle attempting to prevent what’s already happened – trying to put the genie back in the bottle, as the saying goes. And there’s a good chance they’ll lose that struggle.
On the other hand, if Microsoft’s new strategy with Geohot turns out to be the first sign of a larger shift in policy, they may win more than a few points with proponents of open hardware laws and consumer rights. Maybe they’ll even go a step further, like everyone’s favorite developer, Valve, and give Hotz a job – Valve is infamous for turning their most talented community modders into their most talented in-house developers, and Hotz may be able to teach the company a thing or two.
Plus, it wouldn’t hurt to have Microsoft’s cadre of lawyers on his side in the forthcoming battle with Sony.
