The point is that they are unnecessarily alienating people who:
1. believe it is against principle to be forced to activate a single player game online
2. live outside the US where internet connections are not as readily available.
3. just simply don't want it. (yes, very valid reason)
for what? so they can fight piracy? how? Historically speaking, draconian methods of fighting piracy, like steam have ALWAYS ENCOURAGED piracy, not prevented it. Even on the steam boards, talk is rampant of how it will be easier to just wait for someone to crack steam and play it offline, and you know what...they're right.
So they can cut out the middle man? how does that help ME, the consumer, say they do cut out vivendi, say 100% of all money spent goes completely to valve. That means we're going to see cheaper games right? WRONG, they're going to pocket that difference you know they will..if you believe something else, you're just niave. Its either going to go towards buying everyone on the staff ferraris or at BEST its going to go into development of the next game, but even in THAT case, all it does is justify the same inflated price tage of games.
So in the end, we have Valve with all the money, still charging high prices for games, Vivendi is out of business, putting more unemployed people to drain the economy.
Gee, can't wait!