Speaking of user friendlyness
We finally plugged the Wii back in the other night to play our new game – Wii Sports Resort. Pretty fun; I like the improved control given with the game controller add-on.
But one thing that amazed and amused me was the warning we received. The software and possibly hardware configurations and programming were updated when we booted up and started fiddling. The unit informed us an update was about to take place, and politely informed us that if we’d made any modifications to the system, such as making it play DVDs, or other end-user kiss-your-warranty-goodbye changes, those changes would be overwritten and your device might come to some harm.
I loved it. We were late to buy a Wii (weighing the consoles before it won out), so this was the first time we’d seen the warning.
If there’s one thing the game companies have learned, and to some extent, embraced, is that we’re going to hack their stuff. And min max it, and play it, and keep buying it. We might not pay for it if we don’t have to, but we will pay for it in some way, and sometimes the game companies will be the ones getting the money 
.
But to see that warning was heartening. Too often there are scary details buried in the minutia of End User License Agreements (EULAs) that are written quite badly and can be interpreted quite badly (Google owns all content in your gMail, beta software that can be deleted at any time, the OMG The Government OWNS YOUR COMPUTERS!!!111). This was a simply a friendly warning that hey – we know what you might do, and this might break it, because we don’t necessarily like you modding our stuff …. Or not – mod at your own risk. 
Not everyone has this approach, but I do see DirectTV’s point of view* as well. If I’m creating or selling something, I want to be compensated. But virtual (or actual) monopolization of media is steadily eroding as home technology and people who just want to hack continue to do so – the trick is finding something that mostly works for mostly everyone.
We’ll see where that middle muddle is … and in the mean time, happy hacking, do so at your own risks, and so on, and so on!
* While this “Game Over” report is dated Dec 08, it refers to events in 2001 and is not annotated as clearly as I’d like. This did lead me to a link to an interview with the creator of the countermeasure that is a great read.