Sure thing, here we go:
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So here’s this wild story about Francesco Salicini, this Italian dude with a YouTube channel called Once Were Nerd. Right now, he’s caught up in a bit of a mess with Italian law, all because he reviewed some gaming consoles by Anbernic. Now, these aren’t just any consoles. They’re retro handhelds, meant for playing old-school Nintendo and Sony games. And here’s the kicker: they come packed with microSD cards full of games. Yup, that’s hundreds of copyrighted ROMs right there. Not exactly legal stuff.
But Francesco? He’s all like, “Hey, I’m just talking about the hardware.” No big sponsors backing him, no sketchy affiliate links. Just a dude doing his thing. Except now he’s under the magnifying glass of Italy’s Guardia di Finanza. They’ve snagged over 30 consoles off him. That’s Anbernic, TrimUI, Powkiddy — the works. Oh, and his phone too — not great, huh? Conversations with these companies? Yeah, the fuzz got those transcripts too.
So, what now? They’re poking around for like six months to decide if they want to make a real case of it or let it slide. But here’s the scary part: Francesco could lose his YouTube gig without any rock-solid proof he messed up. Go figure.
Then there’s Nintendo. Man, they guard their stuff like a dragon with its treasure. They’ve slapped copyright strikes left and right, pulled down god-knows-how-many emulator repos on GitHub, and aimed their sights at Ryujinx. We don’t really know who’s gunning for Francesco, but if Nintendo or Sony is in on this, that’s some real heavyweight action.
It’s like this endless back-and-forth. Game studios want to lock down their creations forever, even the ancient ones. Yet, these old machines are kaput, and running those games on today’s tech isn’t filling up anyone’s wallet. So, what do we do? Emulators, that’s what. Otherwise, these classic games? Poof — gone forever.
Anyway — wait, where was I going with this? Oh right, if you want more geeky news, hit up Tom’s Hardware on Google News. Make sure to tap that Follow button. Because, why not?
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