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Steam can't escape the fallout from its censorship controversy

polygon.com

21–30 of 178 posts

Re: Steam can't escape the fallout from its censorship controversy

#21

Everyone I know personally still loves steam. We hate more than a few banks and strongly dislike the visa/mastercard duopoly but steam is great. Guessing the game drought is causing some news publications to reach for a story.

The customer side of Steam is great but I think their partner program is even more impressive.

The quality of support I've received as a developer on Steam makes Apple's App Store ecosystem look like joke.

Re: Steam can't escape the fallout from its censorship controversy

#22

Everyone I know personally still loves steam. We hate more than a few banks and strongly dislike the visa/mastercard duopoly but steam is great. Guessing the game drought is causing some news publications to reach for a story.

It's more than love - I have friends who will actively refuse to buy games on other stores, even for significantly better prices. (To be fair - I think some stores like the Epic Games store actively make playing games on them worse, e.g. I played Alan Wake 2 through Epic and the achievements notifications were massively distracting, ruining many scary and dramatic moments, and they turn themselves back on every time…

Steam is just way better than other stores, because it's not just a store, it's got a bajillion features besides.

And now that I have a Steam Deck, this difference is even more stark.

Re: Steam can't escape the fallout from its censorship controversy

#23
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are better arguments to make than this one. Every law, order, rule, and regulation is captured by this argument. It needs to provide a scissor to be meaningful.

Point being that even though this time the takedown targets were reasonable, the next time they might not be, but the mechanism will be already in place.

Reasonable by your standard. As others noted not necessarily reasonable by theirs, especially when you contrast it with other games that remain available. It also flies in the face of research that shows that games probably prevent those fantasies from taking place in the real world which seems preferable.

Re: Steam can't escape the fallout from its censorship controversy

#24
post #20
post #4

If valve can escape the Microsoft store, it can handle a few payment processors. what would happen if Valve accepted Cryptocurrency? in turn, what might happen if valve decided to become a cryptocurrency exchange exclusive to the gaming community? EDIT: another solution is to use a load-wallet based system to shroud transactions from your financial nanny. money in, money out, no explicit evidence of a purchase.

> cryptocurrency A technological solution to a political problem. Visa/mastercard/banks will just censor the off ramps next. > wallet based system What does this accomplish? The same institutions will request proof that all transactions are compliant, which will most easily handled by simply banning the content.

Whose off ramps? Steam doesn’t need CCs for that. The more likely situation is them preventing payments through their system for Steam and Steam having to pick.

Re: Steam can't escape the fallout from its censorship controversy

#25

Everyone I know personally still loves steam. We hate more than a few banks and strongly dislike the visa/mastercard duopoly but steam is great. Guessing the game drought is causing some news publications to reach for a story.

It's more than love - I have friends who will actively refuse to buy games on other stores, even for significantly better prices. (To be fair - I think some stores like the Epic Games store actively make playing games on them worse, e.g. I played Alan Wake 2 through Epic and the achievements notifications were massively distracting, ruining many scary and dramatic moments, and they turn themselves back on every time…

I bought a game on Epic over Steam for the better price once and I'll never do it again. Steam is just too good of a platform and Epic has a lot to work out. Valve has also earned my trust way more than Epic has. Epic comes off as a company of the people sometimes when they drop a suit against Apple or something, but they're exactly the same when it suits them (like their dark patterns for in-game purchases).

There have been timed exclusives on Epic that I just waited out, partially out of spite, and mostly because I just wouldn't want to own the game on something that wasn't Steam.

Re: Steam can't escape the fallout from its censorship controversy

#26

Everyone I know personally still loves steam. We hate more than a few banks and strongly dislike the visa/mastercard duopoly but steam is great. Guessing the game drought is causing some news publications to reach for a story.

It's more than love - I have friends who will actively refuse to buy games on other stores, even for significantly better prices. (To be fair - I think some stores like the Epic Games store actively make playing games on them worse, e.g. I played Alan Wake 2 through Epic and the achievements notifications were massively distracting, ruining many scary and dramatic moments, and they turn themselves back on every time…

That's basically me. While Steam can always be improved (and has been), it has worked well and to me looks better than the alternatives. Additionally, I trust Valve and value it's products. So I don't mind paying more and it's also very convenient to use just Steam and not worry about anything else.

Re: Steam can't escape the fallout from its censorship controversy

#27

Everyone I know personally still loves steam. We hate more than a few banks and strongly dislike the visa/mastercard duopoly but steam is great. Guessing the game drought is causing some news publications to reach for a story.

It's more than love - I have friends who will actively refuse to buy games on other stores, even for significantly better prices. (To be fair - I think some stores like the Epic Games store actively make playing games on them worse, e.g. I played Alan Wake 2 through Epic and the achievements notifications were massively distracting, ruining many scary and dramatic moments, and they turn themselves back on every time…

I'm one of those. I have a few reasons. Initially it was just wanting to keep things in one place as much as possible, but as a Linux guy it's morphed into fierce platform loyalty as a way to support Linux gaming.

Re: Steam can't escape the fallout from its censorship controversy

#28
Ridiculous that a few large corporations get to decide this. The only people who have any business deciding what content is or isn't allowed on someone else's platform, are the People, or their representatives in government.

I can accept that some content goes too far and might have to be banned according to some people, but the only groups who should have the actual power to do that, should be the owner of the platform, the users of the platform, and the government, and definitely not some third party that might have completely different interests.

The only reason this is possible at all is that some of these payment providers are nearly monopolists. People should have about a dozen payment options to avoid this. Fortunately I do; Steam supports iDeal, which is not controlled by any payment provider. It just goes straight to my bank. If my bank were to try to ban certain types of legitimate payment, customers could simply switch to a different bank to avoid the ban.

The only kinds of payment that payment providers should ban, are those involving financial crimes, like money laundering, fraud and corruption.

Re: Steam can't escape the fallout from its censorship controversy

#29
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's more than love - I have friends who will actively refuse to buy games on other stores, even for significantly better prices. (To be fair - I think some stores like the Epic Games store actively make playing games on them worse, e.g. I played Alan Wake 2 through Epic and the achievements notifications were massively distracting, ruining many scary and dramatic moments, and they turn themselves back on every time…

I bought a game on Epic over Steam for the better price once and I'll never do it again. Steam is just too good of a platform and Epic has a lot to work out. Valve has also earned my trust way more than Epic has. Epic comes off as a company of the people sometimes when they drop a suit against Apple or something, but they're exactly the same when it suits them (like their dark patterns for in-game purchases). There h…

[deleted]

Re: Steam can't escape the fallout from its censorship controversy

#30

The monetary system is a public good and should be treated like one, with transparent upfront rules not arbitrary action that takes people by surprise.

I can understand banning bad actors that successfully or unsuccessfully perform fraud and other such direct acts against payment processors or merchants.

For pretty much anything else, nope only courts in jurisdiction should be able to act... If even then.

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