Quote:
Originally Posted by Kali Yuga
Two key examples are XBox Live and Valve's Steam. Both systems "phone home" to ensure that the game is a legit copy. If the account is invalid or the game is tampered with (in a manner detectable by the system), the player is typically barred from services such as online play.
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And MS has implemented it in a way that frustrated more (PC) users with frustrating interface, ineffective cloud (not saving games properly, losing info etc), and flakey implementation (installs and subsequent running of software often messes up) because they force GFWLive on top of other DRM systems)...
Steam has done it better making it almost seamless in use, including auto-updates that work, a cloud that works, and the ability to 'go offline' and play your single player games without an internet connection (though I really never bother with this myself).
The downside, though - if Steam goes (or you do something that frustrates them), you can lose access to all your games. Though we've seen this is also the case with EA as of late as well.
That's the fatal flaw of DRM - essentially you're just leasing. The provider lock-in for 'managing your rights' or vendor lock-in for hardware can render what you lease unusable as it has done to purchasers of music, books, and movies with DRM in the past.
If software has DRM, it's well identified (usually) in the store page on steam, and the forum discussions make it very obvious quickly. There are a fair number of people (1%? 10?% Nobody knows) who refuse to purchase a game with selected DRM, Securom (sp?) being the most hated. EA and Sony have really done well upsetting people with faulty (ha...they're all faulty in the end) implementations of DRM that actually offend users enough to write petitions, form only activist groups, and launch lawsuits.