Darkspore DRM Shuts Out New Players?

We're receiving reports that new Darkspore players are unable to play the game, and haven't been able to play for over nine days, due to an error with the online authentication system. There's an ongoing thread about the issue here, dated from October 18th. There's currently no word on a fix.

Of course EA's position on Darkspore was that it was an online game, and that it wasn't DRM so much as how you played with other players, if you wanted to play with them. That means solo play is online, even though (as a Diablo clone) there was no reason for it to be. Diablo III will be using a similar system. I do not understand why any company thinks it's acceptable to fail to provide an offline option for a game that can (and will) be played offline and solo by the people who purchased it.