http://www.vg247.com/2015/10/28/you-can-now-legally-circumvent-games-drm-in-the-us-after-servers-have-closed-down/
https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/10/victory-users-librarian-congress-renews-and-expands-protections-fair-uses

If the Always Online DRM games server get shut down, it is legal to crack it.

I think there is something wrong with GOG forum, the new thread I just created did not show up in the general discussion.

I try Favorited the thread and it shows reply to it is negative one.

http://static02.gog.com/upload/forum/2015/11/9994d56c6133103750c628e3e81846f7844fac60.jpg

Ok, after I post this it become zero and show up in the general discussion again.

The negative reply bug is back? I remember seeing that about a month ago in other posts.

I think so. Maybe when GoG fix the missing account thingy, they broke this......

That could be.

Yeah, that Account button bug was incredibly annoying! But at least it seems to be working ok now. But I still wish GOG could revert the chat system back to the old PM system. It just worked better!

Yeah. Much easier to find messages than it is now, where they're not chronologically placed... I mean, show me chats organized by person, but the last person to talk to me should be at the top of the freaking list. Online or not.

Ninja'd by nearly a month:

http://www.gog.com/forum/general/eff_librarian_of_congress_renews_and_expands_protections_for_fair_uses/post1

;-)

Like wishone said, we already have this thread.
And don't get too excited, this ruling only applies to SINGLE-PLAYER ONLY games that have always on, online DRM (like AC2 at launch, which has been removed), there are VERY FEW games that match this criteria. If a game has ANY online multiplayer component to it at all, it is not covered by this ruling.

If the game have both a single player and multi player component, it is not legal to crack it?

I don't think anyone is expecting the multiplayer part to magically start working by merely cracking the game, as the multiplayer part usually depends on multiplayer servers by the publisher. If those servers don't exist anymore, then no amount of cracking will make the multiplayer part work.

Your wording suggests that if a game has any multiplayer component, then cracking the single-player part so that you can at least continue playing that, would be still forbidden. I don't think so.

No, the wording is it's legal to crack if the game can't be played at all, even if it has a multiplayer component, take a good look at the wording in the article: "the Librarian limited the exemption to games that can’t be played at all after a server shut-down, excluding games where only the online multi-player features are lost."

So what matters is if the game can't be played at all, what is excluded is cracking a game to get multiplayer working again, if the game can still be played as single-player. As a crack can't resummon a server that went online, I conclude the exception is rare, rather than the rule.

P.S.: I took the info from the last paragraph of http://www.vg247.com/2015/10/28/you-can-now-legally-circumvent-games-drm-in-the-us-after-servers-have-closed-down/, I'm too tired to read the other, longer article right now.

Not a victory, but a small step in the right direction.
It'll be a victory when the scope of DMCA's Section 1201 will be limited to copyright infringements only and not fair uses of affected products and services.

You forget of course, that:
- Someone has to put the time in to crack it
- Half the cracks out there are full of spyware/viruses etc.
- No support for cracked games
- Half the time your not likely to get the full content (i.e. downloadable content, patches)

So whilst its a step forward it doesn't really solve the problem that they are selling a product which is designed to fail after a time period. It shouldn't be allowed in the first place, and people should stop supporting such anti consumerism by refrain from purchasing, which is the only way these type of things will stop, but they won't.

One day we all will see that drm is the scheme from el diablo and ban this outrageous practice for good! :p