EA Games = Evil Advertising
A Parable
Salesman: “Welcome to Worst Buy, can I help you?”
Me: “Yeah, I’d like to buy the new video game, Battlefield 2142″
Salesman: “That is a great game, its on sale for fifty dollars… Thank you sir, here’s your change, enjoy the game! Now, if you will just stand over here with your legs apart and your hands at your sides…”
Me: “Huh? What’s all this?”
Salesman: “Um, well you see, every purchase of Battlefield 2142 comes with a kick in the balls from Lugash. So Lugash here is going to kick you in the balls to fulfill the purchase agreement.”
Me: “But I don’t want to be kicked in the balls.”
Salesman: “Totally understandable sir, but Lugash here has paid EA Games a LOT of money in order to get this kick in the balls included with the game.”
Me: “Look, it didn’t say anything about this on the box! I just want to play the game, I don’t want…”
Salesman: “Of course you don’t sir, but if you read the EULA you will see that by purchasing the game, you have already agreed…”
Me: “Hey, fuck the EULA, and fuck you too! What right does this guy have to kick me in the balls just because I’m buying a video game?”
Salesman: “Sorry sir, but it IS a Free Market, and EA Games is a business. A business that wants to make money. Therefore when Lugash offers them money to include a kick in the balls with their product, they have every right to make such arrangements.”
The moral of the story
Change ‘kick in the balls’ to ‘in-game advertising’:
…there is a printed disclaimer that comes with the game telling you that Battlefield 2142 will analyze certain “advertising data” on your machine to determine what ads to display to you. Ironically, EA says that if you don’t want your data shared with its advertising partner then “do not install or play the software on any platform that is used to connect to the Internet.
Read the full GameSpot review of Battlefield 2142 here.
The moral of the story is that EA in EA Games stands for Evil Advertising.
Blog on,
-CZ
