Going to put on my mod hat for a second and gently remind people that whilst it is admittedly pertinent to the discussion, this thread is about SimCity, not the ethics of piracy in general. I think at this point we've derailed enough in that direction. (Although admittedly it's not like anyone's been able to play the game to discuss it )

Something I heard which some players have been testing, and as far as I know it's a legit thing, is that the game starts inflating your population figures after you build for a short while. The example I saw was a city whose actual simulated population was approximately 15,000 residents was being displayed as over 100,000. I can understand if things were padded a little but that's 85% of the city not existing, which is a pretty damning indictment of the Glassbox engine.

Also, a Maxis insider has stated that it'd be pretty easy for them to remove the always-on stuff. Maxis Insider Tells RPS: SimCity Servers Not Necessary | Rock, Paper, Shotgun