This means you can't pass the game around to your friends or sell it afterwards, which completely ruins the purpose of physical media imo. I mostly play PC these days so this doesn't affect me, but it's a disappointing direction for console games. At least they could've used an empty disc that has proof of ownership.
EDIT: Bethesda has confirmed that only the PC version won't include a disc. Physical versions of Xbox will include a disc. Whew.
I'm really curious who the target audience for this is. I guess if you have gift cards for Gamestop, although huh, this kind of turns them into a key reseller with extra steps.
This is really what NFTs were/are for. reselling digital content