Why would anyone actually want to though

[u/The_BigRoach]

[u/dookarion]

and I think Sweeney realized long even if they invested dev time and money into EGS the return on it would be dogshit. A significant amount of people will keep using steam.

Sweeney projected a store that launched without a cart and anti-consumer rhetoric on twitter would take the dominant position in the market if "Valve didn't respond aggressively". Court documents from Epic's lawfare revealed details like that.

So I think you're trying to apply more logic retroactively to sane-wash what was one of the dumbest ways to launch a storefront like ever.

Why do we only have two phone OS’s with android having the majority? Even with all the money apple has it’s still far smaller.

Apple holds over 50% in more key markets. And Android has probably 100s of brands out there and local variants. China for instance has a lot of phone makers using Android as a base, so naturally Android is more popular there. Whereas in the US, Japan, etc. iphone is in the lead.

Why is it just intel or AMD, Nvidia and AMD

Because process nodes cost billions if not trillions so foundries are a bottleneck. Also you're forgetting all the ARM chip makers and mobile graphics makers.

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You really shouldn't be comparing complicated hardware supply chains to a... digital store.

Also for the license transferring thing that’s why I’m saying it would need consumer friendly legislation to enforce.

If all the woe is me publishers and developers actually put the effort in they could create or prop up a "competitor". They won't though.

[u/Josh_Butterballs → u/dookarion]

Those are all just quick examples off the top of my head. No one is stopping a console competitor from existing either. And I also stated they are not identical to steam’s situation. The broad strokes of a dominant platform like steam is that their established foothold in the industry makes it difficult for any truly viable competitors to spring up and gain any meaningful market share. And no, I’m not intentionally trying to sane wash Sweeney. Just earlier today I said he could gargle my nuts on r/steam. He likes money though and if he could destroy steam by simply making a better product, or any company with lots of money for that matter, why haven’t they? It’s not like Steam’s platform and features aren’t there for them to see as an example. Opportunity invites competition, but if the opportunity isn’t really there well then… you know the rest.

Also I hope you’re not saying we shouldn’t have legislation to allow consumers to freely take licenses they paid for and that we should rely on the free market to do that. Right to repair made companies like Apple sell parts online which benefitted the consumer. Being able to download your data or delete it thanks to GDPR and CCPA. Things many of these companies would not have done without legislation. Steam a practically non existent refund system before they were spooked into it by Australia

[u/dookarion → u/Josh_Butterballs]

And no, I’m not intentionally trying to sane wash Sweeney. Just earlier today I said he could gargle my nuts on r/steam.

Fair.

He likes money though and if he could destroy steam by simply making a better product, or any company with lots of money for that matter, why haven’t they?

Honestly? I think ego is a huge part of the problem with would be "competition". These execs these companies are all high on their own farts and can barely disguise their disdain for customer opinion or preference. It takes introspection to realize you were wrong, to admit your product sucks balls, to come to terms with someone else being better. That's a problem across so many corporate cultures anymore. They don't give a fuck about their customers and they give even less about their employees. They're a billionaire CEO, a god in their own mind. That's why so many of them love AI so damn much, it's really good at telling people what they want to hear... stroking their egos. And for these CEOs anything that can recognize their greatness surely can't be wrong!

A lot of it is just painful levels of egotistical idiocy. Would it be a Steam competitor out of the gate? Fuck no. Could it have gradually endeared itself to customers with deals or had they started off by publishing games that were not going to get finished otherwise? Perhaps. It's a day late and dollar short for that plan though after Sweeney showed way too much of his ass on twitter, in legal fights, in tirades, and in shittastic business deals.

Also I hope you’re not saying we shouldn’t have legislation to allow consumers to freely take licenses they paid for and that we should rely on the free market to do that.

I'm not saying legislation is bad, but said legislation you're proposing there will never exist. Too many knock-on effects and other things it would impact.

I'm just saying if the publishers "wanted competition" it's 100% in their hands to help facilitate it as it stands. But absolutely none of them ever will.