EA's Business Model Finally Revealed

annettemarc wrote:
The established players leaving will turn out to be the least of EAs problems. I can imagine many new players will assume that this is an expensive game to "win". They will not know it used to be simply a creative social game of challenge, requiring lots of effort to be rewarded with what you EARN.

For players being introduced to the game during this event, they will see EAs screens filled with invitations to " win" prizes, they will discover that the vast majority of the desirable prizes are unattainable, decide the odds are strongly against them, see that it is a game that costs hundreds of dollars to enjoy, and go find one of the thousands of other games that fill their expectations.

BTW, someone help me ... About those baskets on the premium menu ... In the initial days of this event, many many people ac epted EAs OFFER to purchase those baskets. And NOBODY had been told they were temporary. I'm having trouble recalling ANY legal business practice in which a business sells a product for real money, and that product is preprogrammed to VANISH, and there is NO indicator giving the buyer prior notice that it would.

I realize that "event" objects often disappear at the END of an event WHEN THERE IS NO FURTHER BENEFIT POSSIBLE from them. But Is there ANY other item you have seen on the premium menu that vanished -- completely without warning -- while it still would have value to the buyer? (For that matter, any paid-for item you've seen ANYWHERE that vanished without warning?)

Reeks of fraud to me. And, no, I am not merely talking about the kind of fraud you sue over. Fraud can be either civil or criminal. What distinguishes criminal fraud is that is INTENTIONAL. EA offers "i" buttons next to the items for sale. They had the opportunity to (but chose not to) describe the baskets as "single use". They did not.

Sleazy business is one thing. Criminal actions are a whole 'nuther thing.

You made a couple very valuable points here, I see this event as a short term gain for EA, grab as much as possible before the rubes realize whats actually happening, but with long term losses, ie, all of us premium players catching on to whats going on and a lot of us deciding enough is enough with some going freemuim while others quite the game out right, while still others will praise EA, tell everyone their a business and need to make rent or somesuch and blindly shovel money at EA in hopes of getting that one last thing. Also as you point out the new players saying whoa how much? and find another game. I would be surprised if they don't see the hit in there numbers some where not to far down the road. Especially if they continue with the same formula for coming events. That will probably only accelerate it. And for those who don't use this forum or any type of blog and are unaware of the outrage. Either they will realize the futility of it and the added expense and move on or go freemium or as someone else once said, a fool is easily parted from there money.
Your theory on the basket deception sounds spot on. They could've put "One time use only" very easily but chose not to. I do wonder how many still would've bought them knowing that going in. I won't get into the differance between frauds, but I like your thinking.