This week’s column on GameKrib focuses on the lawsuit between Datel and Microsoft. If you’re not familiar, Datel began making third-party Memory Units for the Xbox 360 that were much larger than the standard 512MB limitation of the first party models. However, Microsoft basically made them illegal for use on the system. In November of 2009 Datel sued them and Microsoft’s argument…well it doesn’t quite hold water.

An excerpt from the column:

Now I understand that business means making money. Part of business is also making sure the customer is happy with the service. A point comes when the actions of corporations to make money border on unethical, if not fully cross the line into it. In early February Microsoft made claim that we consumers gave them the right to disable unauthorized devices. This has all been a legal mess focusing on a line of 3rd party hardware allegedly designed to give certain players an unfair advantage in terms of multiplayer gaming.

What is at the core of this matter is that Microsoft cites their terms of service as stating owners of an Xbox 360 system agree to use only Microsoft authorized accessories. In other words, Microsoft has to give the okay before they allow the product to hit the market. Such a problem can be understood in the case of programmable controllers where complex actions can be tied to the press of a single button, or even the inclusion of a turbo setting as seen in the older days of the Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis. Unfortunately, what we’re talking about here is a memory card intended to handle greater amounts of data than what Microsoft offers.

You can read the column in its entirety here.