Check out this site and read that Federal Trade Commission is going to be looking at the DRM issue in games and people can contact them and to voice their views.
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Wonderful!
That being said, I doubt much good will come of it. The death of DRM will be informed customers voting with their wallets, not legislation, unless an actual ban on DRM is made, and I somehow don't see that happening.

At the very least, the type of DRM and it's restrictions should be clearly written on the box. And not in the small tiny print your average shopper does not look at anyway.
I'd much rather see it vanish completely though. I've been buying more games without DRM since various companies started doing that than I ever did when it had it, such that I'm one of those people who look up what protection the games uses before I consider purchase.

While I hope that some good comes from all this I have a sense of dread that it will end with something along the lines of a panel stacked with EA and Securom shills recommending that there need to be harsher legal penalties for people breaking DRM. I hope it's just my overbearing cynicism at work.

I have the same fear, Phoenix.

I've definitely made my last impulse by on PC games unless they're certified DRM free on GOG or a similar service.
I hope this comes to something, but the ordinary guy doesn't have a bunch of lobbyists and lawyers working for him, so he generally ends up just getting whatever the crooks have rubberstamped through.

I'm sure there will be quite a few folks from the likes of the EFF and the FSF there to pull for us little guys.

This is all we will end up getting out of this, another label on the box, right next to the age rating that everyone also ignores.

you know I'd be a big supporter of DRM as long as it didn't fuck over the honest consumer and if it actually WORKED to slow piracy...
As it stands, DRM is like putting a bag of money in a glass box in the middle of a busy footpath with a sign next to it saying "please do not take this money". The only people affected are the honest ones

you know what they say, if you outlaw guns, only outlaws will have them.

Some DRM schemes work though, and cause near no fuss.
This is really only in the multiplayer-only/MMO community, where the game/cd/dvd is tied to an online account. Sure cd's can still be cracked, and 3rd party servers setup, but the game is worthless (or nearabouts) without the main community and updates that forms under legit copies.
I have an issue when such online authentication (as we saw in 2008) is used on Single-Player games though. Personally, it's an instant ignore of the title.

That is a good point but how do you stop the value-added content from being pirated as well? Hopefully Relic have an idea since they've said that Dawn Of War 2 will have no DRM and loads of small free downloadable bonuses for people who buy the game. I'm thinking of buying that upon release even though I'd have to make it ugly as sin to even start on my poor old laptop,
As for the activations, I have no problem with a SINGLE activation of software per windows install (I reinstall a fair bit so that sort of thing is important to me) but regular verification or server based activation limits is the point where I start avoiding software or if it's something I REALLY want, I wait until there's an activation crack.

Whether or not the content being included in the game can be pirated should not even be a concern; remember that the focus needs to be on making an attractive product that will sell well, not on stopping piracy (as this will simply be a losing battle, and even if it is won it will not necessarily bring about more sales). The goal is simply to put together an overall product package that people will consider a highly worthwhile purchase. The simple fact is that if someone decides to pirate a game you're not going to be able to stop them, and more importantly even if you could stop them the pirate/don't pirate decision has no direct effect on your bottom line. It's the buy/don't buy decision that you need to be focused on, and game companies need to reallocate the resources they waste on fighting piracy to try to favorably influence that buy/don't buy decision.
The problem with any remote activation is that you're dependent on that company's servers in order to access the content you "bought". There have already been several cases with videos and music where people were cut off from their purchases when the companies they bought from decided to shut down their activation servers. And I'd expect the folks here to appreciate that many will want to go back to a good game 10+ years down the road; how many of the activation servers will still be around then?

well with any luck it means that the writing might be on the wall for securerom who want to be in the firing squad that shoots it?