I argue that they don't need it. They need it the way a 5 year old will claim that chocolate deficiency is an actual medical problem.

I could use a Ferrari but the price is too high. They could use the ability to snoop into people's phones and PCs but the price is too high.

Like your DUI analogy, we tried the ignition interlock, but they hot wired it and got another DUI. Now they will have to walk (get it? LEGWORK!). Back in the before time, they brought down notorious mobsters and bank robbers by pounding the pavement. Ness didn't hack Capone's PC. Capone kept his books locked in a safe in his office The office was guarded by men with Tommy guns. Many crooks kept the real books in code.

They were allowed to borrow the family car on weekends. Then one night Dad saw them drag racing and trenching yards in the family car. Now they are not allowed to borrow the family car.

This is just them whining that they can't go to work now (if they had a job, that is) or the library to study (The 4 Ds on the report card suggest that wasn't likely to happen anyway).

Perhaps one day, when they are behaving responsibly and have built up trust again, they might occasionally be allowed to borrow the car again, but they will be checked up on and it won't be this year.

And as a direct result, Adams lost the next election and 2 of the 4 (the most egregious ones) were expired the very next year.

Of course, I'm betting that if something fakes a screen locker in Windows, the user will obediently enter their user/pass to unlock it anyway. They won't press ctrl-alt-del unless instructed to by the lock screen.

True, but the giant disk is just disk. A hit here or there won't degrade it much. The expensive precision part is much smaller.

Hang out at the club with Bill Gates do you? Is it true Barack tends to slice?

Retirement isn't quite the same as being born to it, though honestly, many people can't retire either.

Really, the law hasn't caught up to this sort of thing. It's not really illegal, nor is it particularly legal. Part of the problem is that it would cost a lot to hash it out and there's just not enough money involved unless it becomes a class action. But as a general principle, if someone pays you for something, you're not allowed to take it back unilaterally.

I have been speaking more of the moral/ethical position of it (which is all we have given the ambiguity of the law).

Meanwhile, I have never seen a EULA that actually had anything to say about this situation . I doubt it could be claimed that this was clearly pointed out to the people who bought the game at any time, before or after the sale.

Case in point, the paper that convinced everyone austerity was the answer was found to have a math error that flipped the results. Everyone knows it but austerity marches on because the top economists say what their masters want them to say.

That's why I say the sale price approaches the cost of production. It does not start right at it and stay there forever more.

As for copyright laws and mini-monopolies, those are factors that damage the health of the market.

In another message, I looked at Far Cry 3 and assuming recovery of development price over the 10 million sold and a development cost of 60 million, that would come out to $6 ea. Note that it was never $6 each or even close (even a used copy runs twice that now after they have already paid off all development costs). Because they don't know they will sell 10 million, I would expect a higher price at first and for the market to support that based on novelty. However, after that honeymoon period, a healthy market would exert considerable downward pressure on the price.

Simply, we don't have efficient healthy markets in the U.S.

Which is why I'm not offering you one :-)

They are so empowered in the same sense that I am empowered to take my neighbor's stereo. That is, I could do it if I had no ethics and the police probably wouldn't even send someone to look in to it.

I take it you have no counter argument so you have resorted to a childish ad-hominem?