I like Valve, but I will point out what’s been said before - Valve has a stake in making Linux gaming better, since it enables the Steam Deck to exist and prosper. They could’ve chosen other options that don’t help the community, but they didn’t choose this entirely selflessly, since they reap the benefits from not just their own work, but also that of the open source developers.
The steam deck wasn’t even a sketch on paper when Valve started pushing Linux. It’s been their route forward into all forms of hardware. I’m sure it’s not long before we get a stand alone VR headset that runs Linux, which seems to me to be the real goal. The Deck was just a step along the way.
One employee is a multi billionaire, so no, it’s not a cooperative where the profit is split fairly between employees or redistributed to the customers/members.
There is no such thing as a good monopoly. He leverages a 30% tax on a huge chunk of the gaming industry. Steam, Microsoft, Epic, Sony and Nintendo all essentially participate in collusion and anti competitive behavior.
Think of all the indie studios that closed and sequels that got canceled and ask yourself if they could have made it if steam only took 5%.
They leveraged linux to save on development and maintenance costs. Capturing the handheld market at a tenth of the price while making the same profit isn’t altruisme.
Only if the game is purchased directly on Steam. A developer can sell Steam keys on their own website and not have Valve take a cut of the price. I think the only rule is that you can’t sell the key cheaper than the price the developer has set on the Steam store.
It’s just a way to bring in and trap people in their ecosystem. It’s free like Gmail is free, not out of altruism. The bad seriously outweigh the good when it comes to steam, we shouldn’t praise them.
It says (pretty explicitly, if you go back and read interviews), that Gabe Newell really doesn’t like Microsoft in general, that the feeling is mutual and that the fact that his multibillion dollar empire is stuck as a Windows application MS may try to muscle out at any point has motivated him to bring PC gaming out of Windows from very early on.
Granted, MS has been sucking at attempting exactly that for a long time, but that’s the ultimate motivation here. That’s not a particularly disputed fact.
It’s a good monopoly, for now and hopefully for a long time.
The fact that Valve went out of their way to make gaming better in Linux, says a lot imho.
I like Valve, but I will point out what’s been said before - Valve has a stake in making Linux gaming better, since it enables the Steam Deck to exist and prosper. They could’ve chosen other options that don’t help the community, but they didn’t choose this entirely selflessly, since they reap the benefits from not just their own work, but also that of the open source developers.
I don’t doubt that, but Steam was available for Linux, a long time before the Steam Deck and even SteamOS, as far as I remember.
The steam deck wasn’t even a sketch on paper when Valve started pushing Linux. It’s been their route forward into all forms of hardware. I’m sure it’s not long before we get a stand alone VR headset that runs Linux, which seems to me to be the real goal. The Deck was just a step along the way.
I hope you’ve read the news that two Volvo devs are speeding up the Wayland development. :)
The only good monopoly is one where the profits goes back to the population or the customers.
It’s a private company, so you could argue that the profits go towards the employees and the customers in the form of improvements. Not shareholders.
Now, now. What would Marx say about that?
One employee is a multi billionaire, so no, it’s not a cooperative where the profit is split fairly between employees or redistributed to the customers/members.
You mean the owner?
Yuuuup
https://luxurylaunches.com/transport/gabe-newell-luxury-yachts.php
Well, that and the several billion dollars in Gaben’s bank account.
Private companies are still corporations, guys.
There is no such thing as a good monopoly. He leverages a 30% tax on a huge chunk of the gaming industry. Steam, Microsoft, Epic, Sony and Nintendo all essentially participate in collusion and anti competitive behavior.
Think of all the indie studios that closed and sequels that got canceled and ask yourself if they could have made it if steam only took 5%.
They leveraged linux to save on development and maintenance costs. Capturing the handheld market at a tenth of the price while making the same profit isn’t altruisme.
Only if the game is purchased directly on Steam. A developer can sell Steam keys on their own website and not have Valve take a cut of the price. I think the only rule is that you can’t sell the key cheaper than the price the developer has set on the Steam store.
It’s just a way to bring in and trap people in their ecosystem. It’s free like Gmail is free, not out of altruism. The bad seriously outweigh the good when it comes to steam, we shouldn’t praise them.
It says (pretty explicitly, if you go back and read interviews), that Gabe Newell really doesn’t like Microsoft in general, that the feeling is mutual and that the fact that his multibillion dollar empire is stuck as a Windows application MS may try to muscle out at any point has motivated him to bring PC gaming out of Windows from very early on.
Granted, MS has been sucking at attempting exactly that for a long time, but that’s the ultimate motivation here. That’s not a particularly disputed fact.