Pre-owned market is "defrauding the industry"

[Reasonable]

As I see it the main difference/gripe is that the very same store that will sell you a game will also function as a re-sell outlet for used games.

For all other media (that I can think of) this is not the case. So HMV only sells new DVDs, Borders only sells new books, etc. There is of course a second hand trade but it takes place away from new media.

However the difference I see is that (for the most part) people buy a film because they like it and intend to keep it to re-watch, therefore re-sell rate I'm pretty sure is less than games. Ditto for books (to an extent although selling on books, trawling through used books in second hand bookstores, etc has been acceptable and part of industry for ages now). CD's re-sell too but again not as much as games.

Games however I think a majority of players don't return to once they've played through it (with exception of online games of course). And as games are far and away more expensive to buy there is a much more driving desire to re-sell a game once completed. Hence why re-selling games is both more common and has more value. People can be returning games within weeks of purchase for re-sell on, which is very unlikely with a DVD or book. Books tend to hit re-sell market during clearouts of piles of books, ditto for DVDs and CDs.

So while Braben is unrealistic to expect used games to vanish he does have a valid point which is that games are the only medium where within a very short period of time (a week or less even) you could buy a game second hand that has just released and is still on the shelves full price. This is what he's complaining about as it is likely (at least for some titles) that the second hand re-sell cannibalizes the full price sales. This doesn't really happen anywhere else. You're not going to walk into HMV a week after The Dark Knight launches and have the choice of buying it full price or cheaper for a used copy. But with a game you very likely could have that possibility

Summary:

1) I think re-selling of games is fine

2) I do think used / new should be very clearly separated

3) Perhaps (big perhaps) if a game is re-sold very quickly (i.e. returned within first three months of release) then the developer, etc. should get part of sale value from retail.

4) After a period of time though (assuming 3 above is viable) the developer is going to have accept the game has made its sales and they are out of the loop for re-sale or even just passing on of games to friends, etc.