As thousands of XBoxes, iPods, talking Monsters Inc. dolls and other tech gifts make their way under Christmas trees this season, a few dedicated hobbyists are tearing these products apart in hopes of making improvements that manufacturers either didn't think of or didn't deem cost-effective.
To help others who'd like to make the gift of technology a little more personal, these hackers are publishing their findings online alongside step-by-step instructions for duplicating their modifications.
At Marsette Vona's Boogie Bass Hack site, for example, you will find detailed instructions, source code and even photographs for duplicating his hack of the obnoxious singing fish. Vona, then an MIT graduate student, hacked the fish last year as a holiday gift for a friend, Ben.
"Ben and I had a running joke, basically interspersing the word 'Pork!' at random points in conversation," he said. "It was beginning to get a bit mundane, so I decided to kick it up a notch by hacking one of the talking fish to say 'Pork!'"
Vona, who now works for NASA in Pasadena, California, hopes his instructions will not only enable others to hack their fish, but similar products, such as Jonathan the Singing Deer.
Keith "Mortin" Whitsitt of Tallahassee, Florida, bought an XBox and began taking it apart as soon as the ballyhooed game console hit store shelves. He's already posted instructions (part one, part two) on how to add a USB port that can be used to add a mouse or a keyboard and how to speed up the hard drive by switching out a cable.
He's attempting to make similar progress with the Nintendo Game Cube, though he admits that the XBox's similarity to the PC makes it far easier manipulate.
Web developer Blake Patterson, who created iPodHacks.com, says he receives three or four "relevant" e-mails a day on topics such as using Apple's music player into an address book and circumventing a copy limitation that prevents an iPod owner from transferring music from an iPod onto multiple Macs.
Of course, all this hacking is nothing new. As long as tech toys and gadgets have been around, people have found great pleasure in taking them apart.
What has changed is the sheer number of technical toys on the market. You can't swing a battery-operated cat in an FAO Schwartz without hitting some singing, talking, shaking, interactive plaything of one kind or another.
Video game consoles and LeapFrog's LeapPad were among best sellers the weekend after Thanksgiving, according to the Associated Press. In other words, for the hacker with time and cash to spare, the possibilities are limitless.
For a few, the thrill is political, as was the case in 1989 when the Barbie Liberation Front switched the voice boxes of talking Barbies and G.I. Joe dolls to illustrate gender stereotyping in toys. For most, the pleasure lies in improving and customizing what's there.
"The XBox is basically a computer. This is what I do for fun: take computers apart and make them better," Whitsitt said.
Upgrade kits exist for people without the technical skills to follow detailed hacking instructions. A company called MediaFour is currently developing a software package called xPod that will let Windows users hook the iPod up to their PCs.
For $74, you can purchase Furby Upgrade Kit at Appspec.net. Instructions on the site detail everything from the right way to "skin" a Furby to having a beer when you're done.
Jeff Gibbons, an engineering consultant who lives in Alberta, Canada, says he and his friend Andrew Staats created the upgrade for fun, but then caught wind of a Furby Upgrade Challenge issued by Silicon Valley engineer and author Peter Van Linden in January 1999. According to the challenge website, Linden felt that "If Furby could be reprogrammed by its users, it would become a much more interesting and educational device."
Gibbons and Staats won the challenge and its $250 prize. One of the first recipients of their upgrade kit was an autistic child whose language skills had improved since receiving a Furby.
Gibbons says their next project is a Super Sully & Monster Upgrade Kit, for the new Monsters Inc. products.
And what do manufacturers think of all this tinkering? It depends on the manufacturer.
On the one hand, it's only natural for companies to want to prevent people from messing with their intellectual property and proprietary code. At the same time, alienating hackers, often huge fans of the products they reverse engineer, isn't exactly good PR. As Gibbons puts it, "In order to buy an upgrade kit, you have to buy a Furby."
In September, Lego issued a statement saying they had no intention of suing anyone for writing and distributing free code for their Mindstorms Robotics Invention System.
After a nasty public scuffle, Sony reached an agreement on Nov. 26 with a man who wishes to be known only as AiboPet, allowing him to continue posting free code and other instructions on modifying Sony's Aibo to his website.
"In the future, with a continuing relationship with Sony/ERA, I think (my website) will be significantly better than it was, or would have been if the 'crisis' had not happened, knock on wood," AiboPet said of the arrangement.
Tiger Electronics, makers of Furby, doesn't publicly condone modifying the toy, but doesn't go after people for doing so, either.
"Once someone purchases a toy, it's really out of our control what they do with it. Like any cool, cutting-edge toy, people always want to see how things work," says Lara Simon, Tiger's public relations director. At the same time, she adds, "We don't like to see people taking away the magic of how the toy is supposed to operate from the kid."
The hackers interviewed for this story were clearly cautious about offending corporations with their deep pockets and teams of lawyers.
In addition to posting disclaimers explaining that his upgrade kit has nothing to do with Tiger Electronics all over his site, Gibbons' instructions on installing Furby upgrade kits include removing the Tiger Electronics tag.
"I wouldn't post how to circumvent the XBox's copy protection. I'm not even going to attempt something like that because it's illegal and I don't have any urge to do something like that," says Whitsitt.
Calls and e-mails to Microsoft, Apple and Gemmy Industries, which makes the singing fish, were not returned.
