Spedwell

@Spedwell@lemmy.world

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Steam :: Introducing Steam Families⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  This is demonstrably wrong. The 30% cut is standard because Steam has used the same strategy as Amazon to fix prices across the market (a “Platform Most Favored Nation” clause—see the Wolfire Games v. Valve class action). Competing storefronts cannot undercut Steam, so why would they take less than a 30% cut?

  Epic Games Store—which is trying to undercut steam at a 12% fee—still list games at the same price as on Steam because of Valve has strongarmed publishers into fixing the prices. If Epic is charging 18% less but we the consumers are paying just as much, how is that not blatantly anti-competitive and anti-consumer?

  enshitifies

  Oh good, you are familiar with Cory Doctorow. He has an article on how Amazon abuses their position using the exact same playbook Valve uses.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Steam :: Introducing Steam Families⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  I said no such thing. Please come back to this later with a fresh mind, and remember how wrongly you interpreted what was actually said for the sake of trying to fire off a quick response.

  But if you’d rather disengage then it is what it is. Cheers.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Steam :: Introducing Steam Families⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  You have to have never seriously engaged with the details of the Valve monopoly if you think that’s what we are upset about.

  We know Steam is an amazing storefront—I buy my agames there because it’s the best experience for the cost. But Steam charges a premium. And despite taking smaller cuts, competing platforms like Epic cannot actual pass those cost savings to consumers because Valve is strongarming game publishers into fixing prices.

  You have your head in the sand if you think Valve’s 30% fee is a fair market price for what they do.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Steam :: Introducing Steam Families⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Yep. Because honestly, Steam is better than Epic in almost every way. When you want to buy a particular game X, you get a lot more from your purchase if it’s on Steam (workshop, friends, multiplayer, etc.). There is strong inertia and network effects that keep us all preferring Steam.

  Epic can’t compete with the Steam experience. But if Epic was able to list everything 18% cheaper (the difference in fees between Epic and Steam)—then they would rightly be able to compete on price.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Steam :: Introducing Steam Families⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  “Platform Most Favored Nation”. It’s a type of clause in platform/marketplace agreements that prohibit a seller from losting their product for a lower price on a different sales platform. Specifically, it prevents selling on a different marketplace with lower fees (e.g. Epic Games or a publishers own website) and passing the difference to the savings to the consumer.

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Steam :: Introducing Steam Families⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  CSGO cases pulled $1 billion revenue in 2023. The steam store brought in $8.5 billion in that same year. That’s a 30% cut of all sales traffic on steam vs. in-game purchases on a single FTP title.

  Loot boxes pull insane numbers. And yes they exploit children and problem gamblers). Not sure why so many Valve fans are here to downvote you :/

• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨Steam :: Introducing Steam Families⁩ ⁨⁨8⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago⁩:

  Sigh… I’m getting tired of the Valve apologetics in every thread. They make good products, yes. They alsp abuse their market share to implement anticompetitive policies. The first doesn’t absolve them of the second.

  Truth is, no one has any idea what it would look like if there were actual competition among the PC games platforms. Steam may be the best possible world, or maybe we don’t know what we’re missing.

  ---

  Anyone who wants to learn more about Steam’s anticompetitive practices:

  • See the complaint from the pending class action case Wolfire Games v. Valve (at a minimum items 204, 205 on pg. 55) for how Steam’s PMFN clause affect publisher pricing
  • See Cory Doctorow’s How Amazon makes everything you buy more expensive, no matter where you buy it for a dive into how a PMFN affects the market unfairly and harms the consumer
• ⁨Comment⁩ on ⁨What are the most mindblowing fact in mathematics?⁩ ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago⁩:

  ABSOLUTELY. I just recently capped off the Diff Eq, Signals, and Controls courses for my undergrad, and truly by the end you feel like a fucking wizard. It’s crazy how much problem-solving/system modeling power there is in such a (relatively) simple, easy to apply, and beautifully elegant mathematical tool.