Reuters notes that Nintendo has sued 5 Japanese companies who are importing Flash Card Adapters for the Nintendo DS. These are devices that fit into the Nintendo DS cartridge slot and typically have a slot for a mini-SD card. The user then loads software onto the mini-SD card and the DS executes it from there.
Of course, one of the obvious uses for such devices is for game piracy. Frankly, though, most DS games aren’t worth bothering to pirate. A much more interesting use is to run homebrew software — games and applications that hobbyists and DS fanboys have written that is usually much more interesting and fun than the actual crap pumped out by Nintendo and third party developers.
In fact I bought Nintendo DS a few months ago largely to run homebrew. The same day I bought the DS, I also got an Acekard 2 Slot 1 Adapter and a 4gb mini-SD card. I did buy a couple games as well, butI haven’t played with them nearly as much as I’ve played around with all of the homebrew stuff.
Who wants to spend over $100 on a game console only to have the idiot manufacturer try to dictate what you can and cannot run on it? Freedom to tinker, and all that.