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Upcoming furvor over the new console hardware has boiled over into the Internet's usual escape resovoirs of arguments and hipster contrarian counter-arguments. Specifically, the idea that console hardware will now attach digital-style, non-transferrable licensing to packaged products, ostensibly to counteract actions on behalf of certain retailers to cut game publishers and developers out of their revenue stream through selling used games. More specifically: screw GameStop, we're not letting you give your games to other people.

There are two incredibly effective marketing techniques both involving the creation of throw-away value propositions to get someone to accept another, related value proposition. The first one is the foot-in-the-door technique, where the throw-away proposition is relatively non-committal, and the related proposition is more involved. The idea is that getting someone to accept the throw-away proposition mentally prepares them to accept the later related one; since the person already has dealt with you, there's less transaction anxiety.

Today, the Kickstarter-funded project "Shadowrun Returns" announced... a modification of sorts to their original project. You see, they had originally promised DRM-free copies of their project as part of their Kickstarter rewards. The key phrase is "DRM-free": Many modern PC game stores - yes, including Steam, this is why people used to HATE Steam - have technologies that allow the owners of those game stores to remotely disable copies of games arbitrarily.