• chiliedogg@lemmy.world
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    22 hours ago

    Sony sold the PS3 at a pretty significant loss and had an “OtherOS” feature that allowed people to install Linux on it.

    Between that and ots cell architecture, it turned out to be a super affordable way to build supercomputers. Sony eventually disabled the OtherOS feature to combat people buying them en masse and costing Sony their lunch, and they got a LOT of flack for it.

    Valve is doing the opposite. They’re keeping the openness, but charging enough money it’s not financially viable to buy a bunch of Steam Machines to build cheap AI clusters.

    • dual_sport_dork 🐧🗡️@lemmy.world
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      16 hours ago

      Sony eventually disabled the OtherOS feature to combat people buying them en masse and costing Sony their lunch, and they got a LOT of flack for it.

      And also tried to get Youtube to reveal the identities of everyone who watched George Hotz’s PS3 hacking video so they could attempt to individually sue them. Don’t forget that part.

    • Encrypt-Keeper@lemmy.world
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      13 hours ago

      Sony eventually disabled the OtherOS feature to combat people buying them en masse and costing Sony their lunch

      By people I assume you’re talking about the U.S. Navy lmao