EA Backs Down on Spore DRM, Again

I’m rather puzzled about how companies like Electronic Arts (EA) stay in business. Apparently, they’ve received a deluge of complaints over the three install limit used in Spore’s SecuROM DRM. In response, EA said the following…

“We’ve received complaints from a lot of customers who we recognize and respect. And while it’s easy to discount the noise from those who only want to post or transfer thousands of copies of the game on the Internet, I believe we need to adapt our policy to accommodate our legitimate consumers.”

EA plans to do two things. First, they are going to increase the number of installs. However, they did not say by how much. Secondly, the game now allows users to de-authorize a system should they buy a new computer. Therefore, they will not use up one of their installs transferring the game over. However, EA then went on to say…

“We’re willing to evolve our policy to accommodate our consumers. But we’re hoping that everyone understands that DRM policy is essential to the economic structure we use to fund our games and as well as to the rights of people who create them. “

So basically, they’re response is only to relax the already unprecedented restrictions just a bit. As one commentary site put it, it equates moving you from a smaller cage to a bigger one. You’re still locked in a cage no matter what. Their last line shows that EA still does not get it and they they still do not think they did anything wrong. So basically, it’s ok to deceive and abuse legitimate customers as long as it protects their rights. As I’ve said before, this is the fundamental problem with DRM. It provides few to no rights to legitimate consumers. The government really needs to step in and amend laws like the DMCA to put a stop to this garbage.

Source: CNET

Update: The install count was increased to five (5).