EA hat doch recht eindeutig bereits gesagt, dass sie den Gebrauchthandel von Software unterbinden wollen. Das geht nunmal nicht ohne Kollateralschäden.
Most specialist retailers offer used games to customers now - do you see that as a reaction to digital distribution, in order to protect their revenue streams? Even if EA is continuing to work with retailers, a lot people talk more and more about digital distribution exclusively, which surely is a huge threat? Dr Jens Uwe Intat: If I look at what actually started when, I'd say that retailers - much earlier in North America than in Europe - had actually started to do second-hand sales, so I wouldn't see it as an action-reaction pattern. At the same time I'd actually make the point that for us second-hand sales is a very critical situation, because people are selling multiple times intellectual property. In our understanding of the business model we are actually giving away the rights to play, and if you just pass it on, pass it on, pass it on, that is not comparable to second-hand sales in the normal physical goods area where you have physical wear-out - second-hand cars, second-hand clothes, second-hand books... they're all physically wearing out, so you have an inferior quality product. But digital goods is not actually becoming inferior in quality, so people passing that on is actually very challenging for us. What we're trying to do is build business models that are more and more online-supported with additional services and additional content that you get online. So people will see the value in not just getting that physical disc to play at home alone, but actually playing those games online and paying for them. Q: It's going to be hard to persuade retailers to stop those sales though. Have you had conversations with retailers about that? They'll want to protect their revenues... Dr Jens Uwe Intat: Yes, and it's in their interests, and there's obviously nothing we can do right now. We can't stop them from doing that, but again we're trying to solve it with the product offering rather than with the legal battle or other confrontational activities. Q: Conflict probably isn't in anyone's best interests... Dr Jens Uwe Intat: Absolutely, and it's actually also a very interesting discussion to ask how much cannibalisation do you really have on second-hand sales? That's such a complex subject, we're not going to be overly confrontational, we're going to solve it with better, more interesting and online offering going forward - and that should actually solve the whole current dilemma.
