This is less true nowadays than it used to be, some games have quite a substantial amount of DLC of which no part is shipped with the base game. The Rock Band series comes to mind there, for one.
I'm not sure 'MS charged $800 more for NT server when it was basically the same as NT', given how much they're known for unfair and fraudulent business practices, is the greatest argument.
Expecting capitalism to be fair is probably where we're all going wrong here.