[H] Playstation 2’s Success Fueled African War - Page 2 - Overclock.net

SpuddGunn · 07-14-08

Quote:

Originally Posted by stargate125645

I think this is a case of "which came first, the chicken or the egg?", because if someone were to take over a country, of course they would take over the economy of said country. To suggest that mining operations helped fuel a war is just ludicrous in this case because it has nothing to do with the war. Genocide, religion, and power are the reasons for their wars.

Besides, if we are looking for the ultimate party to blame, look no further than the former European empires (UK, France, Holland/The Netherlands...). If anyone is to blame for Africa being in shambles it is them for the way they ended their empires earlier in the century.

So by giving the people what they wanted - there own country - and leaving them to it, its all of the European nations fault??! Thats priceless that is.

How about realising that Africa like many other nations, has tribal traditions that once the 'empires' have left, the people reverted back to. Hence why war and such escalated

stargate125645 · 07-14-08

Quote:

Originally Posted by SpuddGunn

So by giving the people what they wanted - there own country - and leaving them to it, its all of the European nations fault??! Thats priceless that is.

How about realising that Africa like many other nations, has tribal traditions that once the 'empires' have left, the people reverted back to. Hence why war and such escalated

Yeah, believe what you want if it makes you feel better, but it doesn't change the truth. I'm sorry you feel you need to defend people's actions for which you have no responsibility, but what I said is the truth. And for the record, tribal wars and genocide are two completely different things, so don't pretend things are the same as they were before the European powers decided colonization was a good idea.

OmegaNemesis28 · 07-14-08

ROFL

I cant even read this thread without laughing hystericaly. Did someone actually write an article BLAMING Sony for an actual war/political conflict? ROFLMAO

Peroxide · 07-14-08

Whoa, if this is how they're going to play, then the Iraqi War is now called the "Bush War" due to oil.

Difference being, the majority already agree with my statement.

Stupid article, just name dropping to make Sony look bad.

DarkFury · 07-14-08

Quote:

Originally Posted by OmegaNemesis28

ROFL

I cant even read this thread without laughing hystericaly. Did someone actually write an article BLAMING Sony for an actual war/political conflict? ROFLMAO

Actually, I don't think they are single handedly blaming SONY for the war, it's just that Sony is one of the major players in world electronics and just happened to get labled on this issue due to its poplularity.

Here is some more info from the source story that HardOCP drew from from the original quote in this thread:

http://towardfreedom.com/home/content/view/1352/1

Quote:

When the war began in 1998, the race for every adult in the West to have a cell phone was well past the starting line. A computer in every household was also becoming a reality. And by the end of 2000, millions of Americans were still waiting for a PlayStation 2, a second-generation video game console, which SONY says was having manufacturing issues.

To fulfill the personal-tech desires of hundreds of millions of consumers, SONY and other manufacturers needed electric capacitors. These capacitors were made with tantalum, which is able to withstand extreme heat. So as multiple technological revolutions occurred in unison at the end of the 1990s, the worldwide demand for tantalum began to boil.

Like today’s demand for oil, this fever puts tremendous stress on tantalum’s supply chain. From the beginning of 1999 to the beginning of 2001, the world price of tantalum went from US $49.00 a pound to $275.00 a pound. At the same time, the demand and price of coltan also began skyrocketing; coltan is needed to make tantalum.

By 1999, the Rwandan army and several closely linked militias had swarmed over the hills of eastern DRC and took many coltan mines by force, said the UN. The Rwandan army that year would eventually make at least $250 million by selling DRC coltan with the help of mining companies and metal brokers. The estimates of the war’s dead range from hundreds of thousands to several million. A couple million Congolese are believed to have been displaced.

American-based Kemet, the world’s largest maker of tantalum capacitors would eventually swear off coltan from the Congo because of human rights violations, making suppliers certify origins.

"But it may be a case of too little, too late," stated the UN Panel of Experts. "Much of the coltan illegally stolen from Congo is already in laptops, cell phones and electronics all over the world."

David Barouski, a researcher and journalist from Wisconsin, says it is certain that the coltan from this conflict is also in SONY video game consoles across the world. "SONY’s PlayStation 2 launch (spring of 2000) was a big part of the huge increase in demand for coltan that began in early 1999," said Barouski, who has witnessed the chaos of eastern DRC firsthand.

"SONY and other companies like it, have the benefit of plausible deniability," he said, "because the coltan ore trades hands so many times from when it is mined to when SONY gets a processed product, that a company often has no idea where the original coltan ore came from, and frankly don’t care to know." He adds, "But statistical analysis shows it to be nearly inconceivable that SONY made all its PlayStations without using Congolese coltan."

SONY still uses tantalum in some of its parts, Satoshi Fukuoka, a spokesperson SONY from Japan, said in an e-mail. He said they are satisfied with responses from suppliers the tantalum they use is not "illegally mined Congo coltan".

This also goes for past purchases of tantalum parts as well, he said, but he did not specify how far back they began demanding parts without Congo coltan. Fukuoka said the PlayStation 2, PSP and PlayStation 3, "are manufactured mostly from independent parts and components that manufacturers procured externally."

"The material suppliers source their original material from multiple mines in various countries. It is therefore hard for us to know what the supply chain mix is," he said. "I am happy to state to you that to the best of our knowledge, (SONY) is not using the material about which you have expressed concern."

Like the war in the Congo itself, the price of coltan has since cooled and is being priced at levels pre-1999, as the demand for the "black gold" declines. Nevertheless, experts such as Barouski say another Congo resource will take its place as the next "hot commodity", and the emergence of another African resource war will not be far behind.

In a way, this is kinda like the "Blood Diamonds" of South Africa... however determining the source of Coltan (legal or illegal) probably will be more difficult than that of the diamonds.

SpuddGunn · 07-14-08

Quote:

Originally Posted by stargate125645

Yeah, believe what you want if it makes you feel better, but it doesn't change the truth. I'm sorry you feel you need to defend people's actions for which you have no responsibility, but what I said is the truth. And for the record, tribal wars and genocide are two completely different things, so don't pretend things are the same as they were before the European powers decided colonization was a good idea.

Think you need to think again. look at Zimbabwe. When it was Rhodesia, it had a booming economy, farms were producing more than enough food to feed the population and generally was a leading light in Africa.

Mugabe came into power, now look at it. No farming worth talking about, inflation running around 160,000%. Is that the fault of the British empire???!!! No it isn't.

America was a colony once, are your problems the fault of the British empire??? No

stargate125645 · 07-14-08

Quote:

Originally Posted by SpuddGunn

Think you need to think again. look at Zimbabwe. When it was Rhodesia, it had a booming economy, farms were producing more than enough food to feed the population and generally was a leading light in Africa.

Mugabe came into power, now look at it. No farming worth talking about, inflation running around 160,000%. Is that the fault of the British empire???!!! No it isn't.

America was a colony once, are your problems the fault of the British empire??? No

And I think you need to stop being blinded by your ilfounded need to defend your country. You didn't do it, and you didn't vote in the people who did, so it's not your fault and you therefore have no reason to needlessly attempt to defend anything.

Besides, you have yet to bring up a valid point and are just reaching for anything now to try to defend something that you have no need to defend. Case and point: you bringing up The American Revolution. Kicking out a foreign power and forming your own country is a completely different prospect than having the foreign power leave the country without properly setting up any form of self-sustaining government - the type under which there would be no chance for power-hungry individuals to spread their fanatical religious views, etc. Regardless, this is off topic, so if you wish to continue this discussion you ought to do it via PM.

Bottom line here is that blaming Sony is a stretch. If we want to blame Sony, then every person that uses oil is just as guilty for allowing sadistic, terrorism-supporting regimes to thrive in the Middle East, for example. Or everyone who shops at stores that sell products Made in China is guilty of supporting human rights violations and overbearing communist regimes. Saying Sony is guilty here is like saying you know Kevin Bacon because you have a friend of a friend of a friend of a friend who knows someone who knows Kevin Bacon. Not only is it stupid to conjur up such a connection, but the conclusion that comes out of it is equally stupid.

Mjolnir · 07-16-08

EDIT: eh, that looks like crap. One day I'll learn to use something better than MSpaint for my mockups.

startekee · 07-16-08

This is stupid. Im an African American and I believe that Africa needs to stop blaming people for their problems.

nitd_kim · 07-16-08

Uhhh. Sure, lets just blame others right?

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[H] Playstation 2’s Success Fueled African War

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