Well this is just naive. Steam will die, too.
Exactly. And unlike many other companies there isn’t even any indication they would want to enshittify anyways. Why would they destroy the foundation of their platform? They have actual paying customers paying the bills, not some force-feed ad slop machine.
architect@thelemmy.club 5 days ago
ClamDrinker@lemmy.world 5 days ago
Kinda presumptuous to call it naive when I never said Steam couldn’t ever die, nor do I believe so. I’m saying that unlike other platforms that enshittify, paying customers hold the final say for Steam. Paying customers are why companies come to Steam, paying customers will not spend money on Steam if they even get close to enshittifying. There is no multi billion dollar ad industry in between that pays the bills, that dictates the enshittification because it demands advertisements be shoved down people’s throats.
Honytawk@discuss.tchncs.de 5 days ago
What do you think will happen when Gabe dies?
Other people will take his place. And you can be sure there are some greedy fucks pining for his role.
Companies do not have to indicate when they are going to enshitify. It can and has happened over night.
ClamDrinker@lemmy.world 5 days ago
You are right, when Gabe dies, that will be a huge point of uncertainty where people’s trust into Steam will need to be re-established to keep going as it currently is. But that’s a point aside.
It can happen, but it’s not the norm by far. Reputation is still to some companies their key indicator of profitability, and Steam is certainly one of those. By that logic you should at any time be expecting loot boxes instead of products in your supermarket tomorrow, but that’s kind of ridiculous because everyone would hop to a competitor immediately, assuming no foul play. As I mentioned in this comment, paying customers hold a firm grasp of the value of Steam. If the people stop coming to Steam, they companies do too, and Steam dies.