And that changes.... what exactly?

Valve and Blizzard already do it. The only difference is that they are some of the bigger players in the PC gaming market.

You're missing the problem. We're talking about further fragmenting the PC market. Valve did it first, yes, and it was bad... at the time, but now Steam is the largest PC DD service by twice all others combined, and it does make sense for there to be a 3rd party PC marketplace. It's not good that Blizzard keeps their games separate either. The big difference between Valve and all other marketplaces is that Valve heavily augments their digital powerhouse with value of constant sales, promotions, and discounts, and it's way too late to try to kill Steam. So many 3rd party games only play on Steam now, across many publishers like SEGA, Frictional Games, and Paradox. Again, I'm not saying this is a good thing, but it's a fact of the marketplace now: You can't get people to stop using Steam. 

I'm not saying Origin shouldn't exist. It should, and every publisher should sell their games on their own websites. What it shouldn't do is be exclusive to their own websites. It's like if Nintendo told you you would only be able to buy their products forevermore at licensed Nintendo stores, pulling them from all other retailers. A 3rd party marketplace is a great thing to have, and it's good to have competition in those marketplaces. EA isn't trying to make a 3rd party marketplace. They're trying to make their games exclusive to their own marketplace. I'd say this is the beginning of the end for EA in PC gaming, but we all know that began with Dragon Age II. Seriously, we're talking about hundreds of thousands of lost sales for Battlefield 3 and Mass Effect 3 by snubbing Steam. 

I don't think I'm missing the problem. I just think that Valve shouldn't have a different set of rules for exclusivity just because they were the first one to do it successfully and because they seemingly care for gamers.

The whole thing? You know, no limits? Unlimited downloads forever?

You're missing the problem. We're talking about further fragmenting the PC market. Valve did it first, yes, and it was bad... at the time, but now Steam is the largest PC DD service by twice all others combined, and it does make sense for there to be a 3rd party PC marketplace. It's not good that Blizzard keeps their games separate either. The big difference between Valve and all other marketplaces is that Valve heavily augments their digital powerhouse with value of constant sales, promotions, and discounts, and it's way too late to try to kill Steam. So many 3rd party games only play on Steam now, across many publishers like SEGA, Frictional Games, and Paradox. Again, I'm not saying this is a good thing, but it's a fact of the marketplace now: You can't get people to stop using Steam. 

I'm not saying Origin shouldn't exist. It should, and every publisher should sell their games on their own websites. What it shouldn't do is be exclusive to their own websites. It's like if Nintendo told you you would only be able to buy their products forevermore at licensed Nintendo stores, pulling them from all other retailers. A 3rd party marketplace is a great thing to have, and it's good to have competition in those marketplaces. EA isn't trying to make a 3rd party marketplace. They're trying to make their games exclusive to their own marketplace. I'd say this is the beginning of the end for EA in PC gaming, but we all know that began with Dragon Age II. Seriously, we're talking about hundreds of thousands of lost sales for Battlefield 3 and Mass Effect 3 by snubbing Steam. 

Competition is one thing, fragmentation is another.

So you are sayin you want more publishers to remove their content from 3rd party DD platforms and set up there own service so you don't have price competition as content is only available on one service and you need to have a seperate profile and freinds list for each publisher? 

That sounds like a nighmare to me.

There is already a tone of competition in the PC DD space, Apple are soon to launch their own app store for example which will sell games, MS is ramping up games for windows and are planing to intergrate it into Win 8 and then ther are Direct 2 Drive, Impulse, Desura, GoG, Little indie, Amazon, DL Gamer, GamesPlanet, GameTap, GetGames, GamersGate, Game Downloads, BeamDog, YuPlay, BigGameDownloads, GameAgent, Strategy First, GameArena, GameStreamer, GameTree and probably more I don't know about. We really don't need publisher sepecific DD serivces especially if they are going to start making games and content exclusive to their own services. And EA, Activision (actually 2 as Blizzard have their own), Ubisoft already do have online DD services.

Successful people don't have different rules? What world do you live in? As I said, Steam was just as bad an idea, and still is, but it's also a service that provides value and unification to a market that is traditionally divided, so the problems are outweighed by the benefits. EA cannot and has no intention of doing that. They just want more money for their individual published titles.

SO that means we should jsut forget how much EA tries to fuck with people? I also don't see my $4 or so refund on that +2 years thing I spent. Just because they realized they were idiots doesn't mean they arent' any less idiotic and won'tt ry to fuck with you again.

To me a nightmare is putting all your eggs in one basket. If the basket says that you have violated their TOS for whatever reason, you will lose all your precious eggs.