Yeah, I want such giants (that are basically core infrastructure of a sector) to be regulated.
Just whip up a law saying their margins can’t be over 5% of a game’s sale price (the reason is to boost smal devs & market competition). Worst case 10 ppl don’t get richer.
(It’s a bit like capping the price of a medicine, but for cultural reasons instead of healthcare reasons.)
What, are they gonna quit the business bcs making only 100 million a year in net profit just isn’t worth it & would rather go do manual labour in the mines instead?
(Same logic as with taxes - if there was a 90% tax over 10 million ppl would still do the same things they do anyway, we were just taught to believe that someone earning 1bn per year would say ‘no, it’s not worth it for those 100m after taxes, I quit and now you can’t buy my good overpriced phones anymore so you lose’. It would never happen. The only difference would be in their wealth concentration, ie in their power over government/lobbies/public media.)
That’s a pretty significant pivot from the discussion about Steam’s operating costs and revenue share.
The original point was about whether Valve’s 30% cut is justified for the services and ecosystem they provide; things like the storefront, servers, payment processing, anti-cheat, and continued development of new features for both players and developers.
Bringing up a private individual’s personal expenditure doesn’t really engage with that topic. It’s an attempt to shift the focus from a business discussion to a personal one, which is a completely different (albeit valid?) argument.
That’s a very specific and bold claim about Valve’s internal finances. Do you have access to their private balance sheets and investment budgets? Unless you do, we’re both just speculating.
Factually speaking: Valve provides a massive, global storefront, handles all payment fraud and chargebacks, provides cloud storage for games, and maintains the entire friend/community network. The 30% is the price for that bundle of services.
Whether that’s a fair price is debatable, but the personal wealth of the CEO is a distraction from that debate.
Brother, go back and read the OP. You cannot claim that 30% is fair while the man camps on an Armada of yachts worth over a billion dollars. This is not a distraction, this is the problem. There’s just no way that makes any sense.
You’re putting words in my mouth. I never called the 30% “fair.” I’ve been trying to steer the conversation toward what a discussion about its fairness should actually be based on: the value of the services Steam provides.
You are fixated on Gabe Newell’s personal wealth as the sole proof that the cut is unjust. That’s an emotional argument about wealth disparity, not a logical analysis of the platform’s costs and value.
Let me be clear: whether a CEO’s personal spending is excessive is a separate moral and political debate. It doesn’t, on its own, determine if the price of a service is justified. The cost of servers, development, support, and the global infrastructure Steam maintains is what’s relevant here.
If you want to argue that the platform itself isn’t worth the cut, make that case. But simply pointing to a yacht and saying “see, it’s unfair” is a non-sequitur. It’s a distraction from the actual economic discussion.
Let me be clear: whether a CEO’s personal spending is excessive is a separate moral and political debate. It doesn’t, on its own, determine if the price of a service is justified.
LEt me be clear: It absolutely does. I can’t think of a better indicator.
That’s like arguing the guy who beats his wife isn’t so bad because he used to cut on her too, but stopped. It should be 10% max for a store. And publishers all take too big a cut as well
30% is too much! Clearly Steam doesn’t need that much to operate (the percentage of each sale that go to Valve)
Yeah, I want such giants (that are basically core infrastructure of a sector) to be regulated.
Just whip up a law saying their margins can’t be over 5% of a game’s sale price (the reason is to boost smal devs & market competition). Worst case 10 ppl don’t get richer.
(It’s a bit like capping the price of a medicine, but for cultural reasons instead of healthcare reasons.)
What, are they gonna quit the business bcs making only 100 million a year in net profit just isn’t worth it & would rather go do manual labour in the mines instead?
(Same logic as with taxes - if there was a 90% tax over 10 million ppl would still do the same things they do anyway, we were just taught to believe that someone earning 1bn per year would say ‘no, it’s not worth it for those 100m after taxes, I quit and now you can’t buy my good overpriced phones anymore so you lose’. It would never happen. The only difference would be in their wealth concentration, ie in their power over government/lobbies/public media.)
What’s with this obsession over Valve making profit? Should they never expand or develop new things? BTW tell your boss I want Unreal back
Oh I didn’t realize they were developing $500M yachts donations…
That’s Gabes money, not Valve’s and you know it
I don’t know what that’s supposed to mean. Gabe owns Valve. It’s the same money.
That’s a pretty significant pivot from the discussion about Steam’s operating costs and revenue share.
The original point was about whether Valve’s 30% cut is justified for the services and ecosystem they provide; things like the storefront, servers, payment processing, anti-cheat, and continued development of new features for both players and developers.
Bringing up a private individual’s personal expenditure doesn’t really engage with that topic. It’s an attempt to shift the focus from a business discussion to a personal one, which is a completely different (albeit valid?) argument.
The point is a very small percentage of that 30% is being reinvested in the company and the vast majority is going into Gabe’s pocket.
That’s a very specific and bold claim about Valve’s internal finances. Do you have access to their private balance sheets and investment budgets? Unless you do, we’re both just speculating.
Factually speaking: Valve provides a massive, global storefront, handles all payment fraud and chargebacks, provides cloud storage for games, and maintains the entire friend/community network. The 30% is the price for that bundle of services.
Whether that’s a fair price is debatable, but the personal wealth of the CEO is a distraction from that debate.
Brother, go back and read the OP. You cannot claim that 30% is fair while the man camps on an Armada of yachts worth over a billion dollars. This is not a distraction, this is the problem. There’s just no way that makes any sense.
You’re putting words in my mouth. I never called the 30% “fair.” I’ve been trying to steer the conversation toward what a discussion about its fairness should actually be based on: the value of the services Steam provides.
You are fixated on Gabe Newell’s personal wealth as the sole proof that the cut is unjust. That’s an emotional argument about wealth disparity, not a logical analysis of the platform’s costs and value.
Let me be clear: whether a CEO’s personal spending is excessive is a separate moral and political debate. It doesn’t, on its own, determine if the price of a service is justified. The cost of servers, development, support, and the global infrastructure Steam maintains is what’s relevant here.
If you want to argue that the platform itself isn’t worth the cut, make that case. But simply pointing to a yacht and saying “see, it’s unfair” is a non-sequitur. It’s a distraction from the actual economic discussion.
LEt me be clear: It absolutely does. I can’t think of a better indicator.
I’d rather see the developers of the game profit before the storefront
Yes and before Steam the Publisher kept 60%, 30% is fine
That’s like arguing the guy who beats his wife isn’t so bad because he used to cut on her too, but stopped. It should be 10% max for a store. And publishers all take too big a cut as well