So, I don't use my 360 much, and I turned it on for the first time since the ban fell on those with modded consoles. Turns out I've been banned from Live (or at least my console has). As the 360 was given to me I had no clue it had been modded! In fact, I assumed it hadn't been modded as the reason I was given the 360 was because it wouldn't play PAL games (at least that's what I was told).

To be honest it's not a huge loss as I only had Silver membership anyway and my gamer score was pretty low. If anything, Microsoft has just informed me I can play all games, regardless of region! And the 360 was free so as long as I still have my Live account to use on PC for Fallout 3 I can't really complain.

However, I have to wonder, if I'm not that bothered with the loss of Live, are the pirates going to be that bothered either? I had genuine games, but if the pirates are still able to play pirated games and get these games for free, why would they care. Surely the loss of Live is just a minor setback for them. Is this ban going to do anything to combat piracy? Also, what about people like me who got their console second-hand and had no idea they had a modded console only to find out they have easy access to pirate games via torrent now the ban has affected there console? It crossed my mind, so why wouldn't others think the same but go that bit further and actually start pirating there games?

I've seen a lot of consoles being sold as banned consoles and people not bothered about Live are still picking them up as they can still play games including "copied" discs. I'm failing to see the point of this ban, surely they should have banned the console from playing any games period?

@ Scoobes )

it probably won't affect most "pirates", because they already knew they shouldn't log into live, only the stupid ones did it knowingly and second hand buyers that had no idea their console was modded (although everyone should know these days, that most 2nd hand 360s are RROD'd or banned from LIVE)

second hand buyers get the stick from the industry, because from their point of view they are half-pirates

and making the console unusable is very critical .. I think that's damaging of peoples property and would be very very expensive for MS (they'd get sued millionfolds)

Hit yourself up some torrents.

Here in Brazil, there was a reazonable number of people that bought a 2nd console because of ban. But it's already like 3° time that occurs this ban massing, so the people are not getting bothered anymore.

They will be bothered, believe me. Here in Poland where it's hard to find someone who buy original games on X360, internet forums just boil from insults directed at Microsoft from pirates

What do you mean?

Not logging into Live makes no difference. When you play, the 360 logs all your information and sends to Live when you go online. If it's the first time you enter in Live, then you should enter after the ban waves. But if you logged  sometime before the banning, with is 99% of the cases, M$ already knows that you are modding your console, and put it in their "black list". So they can ban your 360 in the Ban waves even if you don't log.

@ Onibaka )

to be more clear - non-stupid pirates don't have their modded 360 connected to the internet (an probably have a non-modded 360 to play online) .. that's what I meant by "not logging into live"

Then what's the point in getting rid of Live if the majority of pirates aren't going to care? I'll never understand these anti-piracy schemes these company's adopt. And I can't think of another industry where buying things second-hand is such a big crime. Devs and publishers seem to forget that it's well within our legal rights to sell our property and to buy equipment second-hand if we should choose.

You're probably right about the last point, but something effective needs to be done to stop piracy, and preferably something that doesn't screw over genuine customers (including those that buy second-hand).

Do you know of anyway to find out when or how the console was modded?