Sony's PlayStation 2 Not A Computer After All

Ask anyone what a PlayStation 2 is, and nine out of ten people will tell you it's a game console (although grandma and grandpa might actually think it's a toaster). And I bet Sony would have left it at that, had it not been for some nasty taxes when importing game consoles into Europe, between 2001 and 2004. The best way for Sony to avoid paying those taxes was to have the PlayStation 2 classified as a [tax-dodging] computer - which is exactly what they tried to do, about five years ago, going as far as to release a "Linux for the PS2" package, just to prove their point.

Since then, an ongoing legal battle has been fought by Sony... a battle which, eventually, they lost. The British Court of Appeal's final ruling came out just days ago, denying Sony an estimated 50 million Euro from rebatable import duties, as well as the right to take the case any further to the European Court of Justice.

Now, let's recap: on one hand, Sony lost a lot of money because of tax that - as it turns out - is no longer in place today (well, since 2005 actually). And on the other hand, Sony bosses Harrison and Kutaragi have also been promoting the upcoming PlayStation 3 as a computer lately, even though there's no more money to be gained from such a classification, anymore. Oh, the irony!

(N.B. Archive text, links removed)