What is Kotaku thinking? Guide on how to "backup" DS games?!

So has anyone else seen this? I was looking at my RSS reader and the Kotaku RSS stream linked me to an article on their sister site Lifehacker (Lifehacker is to Kotaku as Tested is to Giant Bomb) on exactly how to copy games into roms, put them onto flash cards and play them on your DS. They even provided links to where you can buy the flash cards! This is a link to the Lifehacker article which I think is okay to link to but its so outrageous that im not even sure!
  http://lifehacker.com/5588151
   What is Kotaku (or Kotaku's blog network) thinking? Shouldn't they know better?  I hate when people pirate games so much. Personally I have reported the article to every Nintendo of America squealer's link i could find. If you want to report it to you can email  noalegal@noa.nintendo.com .

This is just asking for trouble.....I wonder if that'll work for out-of-region games with translation patches :P?

Wow this is terrible.....  *secretly bookmarks page

Kotaku...

THIS IS TEWWIBLE!!!

Gawker (the owner of both those blogs) really only cares about traffic generated by an article. It doesn't actually care about the content (unless it's exploitable like the iPhone 4 fiasco) or any actual "journalism" in any of its posts on their blog network. This is why Lifehacker is one of the more popular blogs on its network since they dabble in gray area matters such as this.
 
I'm no fan of it but the only thing you can do is not visit their sites. Either that or not take any of their so called journalists seriously.

They are offering a way to legitimately backup cartridges.  How the end user decides to use the guide is a different story.

" They are offering a way to legitimately backup cartridges.  How the end user decides to use the guide is a different story. "

The content of what they post doesn't bother me. They can post whatever they want. I'm not going to throw my hands in the air because they posted an article on how to backup your games, probably with the intention of helping the honest end user. I really don't see why you're so personally offended by it, and it's not like you're going to get a medal from Nintendo of America for reporting an article many people will see (Kotaku gets an average of two million views every day).
 
@FluxWaveZ said:

Any publication that actually cared about their reputation would never post something like this.

" Wow this is terrible.....  *secretly bookmarks page "

They've done similar artciles before with the Wii, such as installing the homebrew channel, jailbreaking your iPhone, and more recently, how to play back-up Wii games. They're always very careful in their wording in that they never insinuate that following the guide could lead to piracy, but hell, I'm not that bothered. I mean, they should know that posting that guide is going to advertise easy methods of piracy but they're just doing it for the hits.
 
Having said all that, it's not stuff you can't immediatly find elsewhere from a quick search on google, so I'm not sure it matters all that much.

Yeah, their Lifehacker site does things like this all the time. They always put some disclaimer up for using their info for ill, but they know the deal. It gives them hits, and makes us cyberpunk wannabes happy.

Also, Tested has had several articles on how to rip DVDs. You could (theoretically) follow their article, rent a bunch of discs from wherever, and just steal some films. Except Tested's article is for those who want to watch their films on portable devices or across networks, or have all their films on one massive hard drive. This Kotaku/Lifehacker article is precisely the same thing, under different circumstances.

Gawker Media is click-hungry, but Kotaku is among the worst of their websites.  Inflammatory articles that are nothing but flamebait, articles endorsing actions of highly questionable legality, and a sea of posts that are in no way dedicated to the subject of video games save for the editors' painful attempts to stretch the topic into that realm.

" Gawker Media is click-hungry, but Kotaku is among the worst of their websites.  Inflammatory articles that are nothing but flamebait, articles endorsing actions of highly questionable legality, and a sea of posts that are in no way dedicated to the subject of video games save for the editors' painful attempts to stretch the topic into that realm. "

Kotaku editorial are scumbags. Ill-informed and subjective dimwits. Arrogant and more lucky than they deserve to be. Can't stand any of them.
 
Barely getting any clicks from me. Less than 5 a month. And I hate myself for each and every one of those clicks.

I get that it's for backing up your shit, but damn it seems excessively ill-advised to put that out there. Kotaku on the whole is another subject, I've only ever delved a handful of times past reading the headlines and every single one of those times I've regretted the seconds I wasted reading their editorials.

By making this thread, you've probably gotten them dozens of more hits.

Phew, it's a good thing you called the internet police!
 
Honestly, it's cool that you feel indignant about it and all, but creating a thread on a different video game forum and posting a link to the article is only going to do two things:
 
1) Help promote it instead of actually combat it.
 
2) Create yet another "Eww Kotaku (and their other sites) suck" thread.

Whatever guys. It's information... on the internet! It's not illegal so there's no problem. 
 
It's not like anyone who wants that information can't get it anywhere else.

What ever will Nintendo do! D:

Nothing is wrong with that, i'm sure you can back up your own games, it's just you can't distribute it.  
 
 "don't copy that floppy." 

" Phew, it's a good thing you called the internet police!  Honestly, it's cool that you feel indignant about it and all, but creating a thread on a different video game forum and posting a link to the article is only going to do two things:  1) Help promote it instead of actually combat it. 2) Create yet another "Eww Kotaku (and their other sites) suck" thread. "

" This is just asking for trouble.....I wonder if that'll work for out-of-region games with translation patches :P? "

" @TooWalrus:   I'll wait on the 3DS; I can read quite a bit of Japanese, but I still wouldn't know what any of it would mean. "

" If Ocarina of Time is a launch game, I'm going to do it. I know I can get through that game without reading anything... And the US games will work on the Japanese 3DS, so really, why not? Japanese colors are always cooler anyway. "

" @TooWalrus said:

" If Ocarina of Time is a launch game, I'm going to do it. I know I can get through that game without reading anything... And the US games will work on the Japanese 3DS, so really, why not? Japanese colors are always cooler anyway. "

That's where you're wrong.  The 3DS will be Nintendo's first handheld to be region locked (presumably for battle against piracy).  So if you intend on importing a Japanese 3DS, have fun importing all your 3DS games from Japan as well because any other region 3DS game won't work on it. "

" @Symphony said:

" Phew, it's a good thing you called the internet police!  Honestly, it's cool that you feel indignant about it and all, but creating a thread on a different video game forum and posting a link to the article is only going to do two things:  1) Help promote it instead of actually combat it. 2) Create yet another "Eww Kotaku (and their other sites) suck" thread. "

No. Kotaku is bigger than here by quite a bit, and alot of the audience overlaps. I'm not making it bigger in any real way. GB used to have some pretty diehard nintendo posters who I thought would want to know about this if they didnt already and i think its interesting (although i think alot of the nintendo people may have freaked out and left/been banned). Don't worry, I'm not assuming that you are a good person (or anyone else specifically). I don't expect much to come of this, but it seems noteworthy enough to post. That's all. You can't impress me with your worldly internet savvy or masterful use of sarcasm. "

Who cares? I don't see why you are getting butt hurt over it... 
 
I bet if GiantBomb had posted this guide you wouldn't have really cared. 
 
Edit: I have never understood why people get so angry over people pirating stuff, there's nothing you can really do about it so step back and go do something else. I download a lot of stuff here and there, I don't have a modded 360 and won't be modding my 360 S even if it becomes moddable. Do I get angry over people downloading games for their modded 360s? Nope, who gives a flying fiddlestick.

I don't believe it has actually been confirmed, but the DSi is region locked in terms of both download software and DSi only carts, the few that do exists.

I haven't a problem with it.
 
Given people have their mobile devices and such stolen often, would you rather have someone lose all of their games if they were robbed or have only the cartridge with their backed up games stolen? Its a case of losing over £100's worth of software or £30 on a 4GB Micro SD based flashcard.

" They are offering a way to legitimately backup cartridges.  How the end user decides to use the guide is a different story. "

" Who cares? I don't see why you are getting butt hurt over it...  I bet if GiantBomb had posted this guide you wouldn't have really cared.  Edit: I have never understood why people get so angry over people pirating stuff, there's nothing you can really do about it so step back and go do something else. I download a lot of stuff here and there, I don't have a modded 360 and won't be modding my 360 S even if it becomes moddable. Do I get angry over people downloading games for their modded 360s? Nope, who gives a flying fiddlestick. "

" @Ygg said:

" Who cares? I don't see why you are getting butt hurt over it...  I bet if GiantBomb had posted this guide you wouldn't have really cared.  Edit: I have never understood why people get so angry over people pirating stuff, there's nothing you can really do about it so step back and go do something else. I download a lot of stuff here and there, I don't have a modded 360 and won't be modding my 360 S even if it becomes moddable. Do I get angry over people downloading games for their modded 360s? Nope, who gives a flying fiddlestick. "

Piracy as a whole hurts the industry.  All of the incompetent slackwits that think that they aren't hurting anything by downloading games to hard drives and flash cards are too goddamn stupid to realize the damage that they're doing. "

" @jakob187 said:

" They are offering a way to legitimately backup cartridges.  How the end user decides to use the guide is a different story. "

So if someone posted an article on 'how to effectively kill an adult man' claiming it was for use only in self defense, would that be ok? I mean it's only for self defense and it's the end user that decides how to use that information...right? "

@ZanzibarBreeze:  The point is that they are not somehow morally unobligated just because they give it the guise of doing something legal. They are teaching people a skill that they very well know will likely be used to do something illegal. The analogy is not false, it's 2 skills that cane very well be used to do something very illegal and teaching them under the guise of protecting oneself. It's bullshit.

Really, you reported it to as many squealer links as you could find? Slow day?

" @ZanzibarBreeze:  Is it likely someone is going to do something illegal when they teach them how to rip Nintendo game or how to kill someone in self defense? Yes.

" Whatever guys. It's information... on the internet! It's not illegal so there's no problem.  It's not like anyone who wants that information can't get it anywhere else. "