We here at Big Download dislike piracy as much as the next person, but what gets under our skin even more are anti-piracy programs that go too far and cause issues with our games. The issue -- to us, at least -- depends on whether or not these ten day activation cycles are going to cause problems when we try to play Mass Effect or Spore.

While complaining about an online enabled anti-piracy program may be a moot point with a game like Spore, where online enabled content is a major feature anyway. We would like to point out the games like Sins of a Solar Empire have done exceedingly well in sales without any sort of anti-piracy software. Our take is that if a game is worth playing and supported be the developer after it releases to market, then anti-piracy software is largely a moot point. People have been stealing things since the dawn of people owning things and unfortunately it's never going to stop.

Although with the advent of digital distribution platforms such as Steam, piracy could end up going the way of the Dodo along with brick and mortar stores. We can only hope.