Dude the tunnel vision here jfc. I’m done. Last word is all yours. I’m sure it’s very important to you.

I agree they have not been abusive, but no they are not entitled to anything. That is a ridiculous outlook. You’re talking about a for-profit company dude. Stop letting your worship of Gabe cloud your judgment. Again, I like valve/steam a lot. I use it practically every day and I am happy to. The service is fantastic and they have earned their place at the top. But I really do not understand how you can’t see the potential issue with such overwhelming dominance. You seriously think there is nothing to worry about ever?

How they got to the top is not relevant.

I am not arguing about why the market is the way it is, it’s not relevant.

I am saying regardless of how we got here, valve controls the PC game market, and that will always be a liability no matter who is in control. We have to be sober about this.

I will respect a trolls pronouns even as I ban them, because to not do so, normalizes the idea that pronouns are something that are earned by good behavior…

Well said and something I couldn’t quite articulate myself as I have seen bad actors abuse the inclusivity of this community. Really really like this mentality.

You think that crowd will suddenly stop calling it divine intervention if the FBI says that’s not what happened?

He probably believes he was grazed and nothing we say or do will change that.

I didn’t say their success wasn’t due to offering a great product over a sea of bad ones. That isn’t relevant nor am I contesting it.

Aite objectively funny. I walked right into that one lol

Plenty of amazing companies change. We have to think about that man. They have my trust now and I really like valve - I have a steamdeck, I have hundreds of games on steam, they’re great. But you can’t seriously act like having all of that dominance in one company isn’t a potential liability down the road. Again, companies change. Gaben isn’t immortal.

That’s highly speculative. But again, I like valve and think steam is beyond a net good. We need to be asking these questions though. Market dominance is a risk in any hands.

You can’t discount the fact that if you are not on Steam then your game basically didn’t release on computer. You can’t just hand wave away that factor. It’s baked in.

I didn’t say otherwise. I’m emphasizing that this is an experience/observation the cartoonist was communicating that must’ve been decently common. Going “well actually…” about it just undermines it when you spend 95% of the comment explaining how it was common for younger people to have more responsibility (such as guns) and 5% giving a token acknowledgment that the cartoonist maybe had a valid perspective but only with alllll the other caveats behind if. It weighs the viewpoints implicitly, the cartoonist’s perspective is basically being stripped down the whole comment.

Yes. That’s why I said I’ll trust the creator, who is among them. Any other insights?

All of this is true but the ugly truth people don’t want to unpack is this is largely because over 90% of PC game purchases occur on Steam, meaning it’s not that they give you an advantage much as you’re nearly dead in the water if you aren’t on Steam unless you’re a AAA game made by a major dev. I’m sure they help as well but that market dominance means they’re essential more than anything.

Valve didn’t do something nefarious to get there, let me be clear. They run overall what most consider a good operation. But saying “they’re so helpful and expand your reach” is like saying “google search helped expand my business’s reach so much” when the reality is if you can’t be found on google you practically don’t exist due to their dominance in search.

TL;DR: Choosing not to be on steam unless you’re on console or a major AAA game is choosing not to exist. And sometimes I worry what kind of company we’ll see in the future if they don’t maintain their company culture/philosophy down the line.

Edit: see the defensive responses for my point 🤷‍♂️

Who cares? An attempt was made on his life. That’s significant enough. Why do these details matter at all?

I get that but clearly that experience/expectation wasn’t universal as evidenced by the cartoon.

I think people who lived in the 1900’s had a better sense of these things than you or I so I’ll go with the cartoonist on this one.

The dude literally said Harris opposed one of the major achievements of the Biden-Harris administration, the child tax credit. They will lie about literally fucking anything

It makes sense. And I disagree, but I didn’t need to come on so strong there.

Oh I get that, I’m just still rolling my eyes at the ridiculously cynical play she made using his assassination to get back into the GOP’s good graces.

After Haley already gave a full throated endorsement of Trump 🙄