EA moans about used game sales

Electronic Arts isn't content with the fistfuls of money it earns on the video games it sells. Now the company says it's working on ways to grab money from second-hand sales of its titles, calling used copy sales a "very critical situation, because people are selling multiple times intellectual property."

Now never mind that U.S. law only gives EA the right to profit from its games the first time they are sold. (In law this is known as the "doctrine of first sale" and it's been part of copyright law since 1908.) EA is arguing that video games should be exempt from those laws because "digital goods is [sic] not actually becoming inferior in quality, so people passing that on is actually very challenging for us."

The situation is clearly dire: Electronic Arts had revenues of $3.7 billion this fiscal year, up from $3.1 billion in 2007. Tough times. Tough times.

Let's consider the issue rationally. Of course the reason so many people choose to purchase used copies of video games is the exorbitant amount of money they cost in the first place. If EA is serious about increasing new copy sales, the solutions are obvious: Either lower the price from the usual, absurd $60 per title, or make games so compelling that users will insist on having them new (and refuse to ever sell their old copies). For many gamers, the only reason they're willing to shell out $60 for a new game title is the knowledge that they'll get $20 or $30 of that back a few months down the road when they sell it to another player. Price gouging has been part of the game industry for years, and that's an issue that's actually getting worse. (Only a few years ago, $50 was the top price on a console game. When the Xbox 360 hit, $60 suddenly became the norm, though most Wii titles are considerably less.)

Fortunately, it looks like EA is not going to try to take a legal approach to halting second-hand sales but is planning to build a new business model that leverages "additional services and additional content that you get online." Does this mean the company will move toward no longer selling physical media sooner rather than later, so there's nothing that the gamer can actually resell? (That's an eventuality all digital industries will have to face someday, but it's one which scares them immensely due to the fears of piracy.) EA is mum for now. It's, as they say, "complex."

Until you figure it out, EA, I implore you: Quit your whining about used games and have a little empathy for your cash-strapped customers.