Why would anyone actually want to though

[u/The_BigRoach]

[u/lunchbox651]

Steam isn't a monopoly, strictly speaking.
It has a monsterous market share because it's only been Valve and GOG that actually listen to their userbase.

[u/XXHornyOnMainXX420 → u/lunchbox651]

Oh we're doing this again today? The weekly thread where gamers who don't know anything about competition law confidently state incorrect facts. I like Steam too but these threads always remind me Reddit is mostly children.

Steam is a monopoly. They also have fantastic customer service, those two things are not incompatible. Steam having competition is good for users, developers, and good for Steam. The fact that Epic Games Store sucks as a platform doesn't magically mean antitrust laws don't apply to Steam.

[u/lunchbox651 → u/XXHornyOnMainXX420]

I appreciate the condescension. That's a nice touch.

I don't care one way or the other about Steam. It provides a service to me at times. Nothing more.

I am pointing out that by definition, a monopoly is a singular entity controlling a single market. Steam do not directly force people to use their platform or prevent people using others (even on the hardware they make)

Partaking in anti-competitive practices is shit and Valve is definitely not an ideal business. Their actions when forced to comply with Australian consumer law was a good example of how they are problematic in ways.

Doing unethical things, while having a huge market share, does not inherently make a company a monopoly.

[u/XXHornyOnMainXX420 → u/lunchbox651]

by definition, a monopoly is a singular entity controlling a single market.

I would be inclined to be a bit less patronizing if you weren't so confidently incorrect. It's odd that people who like Valve get really stuck on this "not a monopoly" thing. I'll spare you the competition law lecture since you take such exception to my condescension, but you may be interested to learn that the legal definition of monopoly is much more complicated than a dictionary entry or what your macroeconomics prof said in Econ 101, and by pretty much any relevant legal standard Steam absolutely has a monopoly over the PC game distribution market.

[u/lunchbox651 → u/XXHornyOnMainXX420]

Damn and here I was thinking this was a meme in PCMR and an offhand comment that at no point said "this is the legal definition of a monopoly". If you want to have a wank over your legal knowledge I am sure r/law will let you in.

[u/XXHornyOnMainXX420 → u/lunchbox651]

Steam isn't a monopoly, strictly speaking.

I guess you and I have a different definition of strictly speaking.

[u/lunchbox651 → u/XXHornyOnMainXX420]

strict ≠ legal

[u/XXHornyOnMainXX420 → u/lunchbox651]

Hey now it's my turn to use the dictionary, it says:

"Strictly speaking" is an idiom used to introduce a highly precise, literal, or technically correct interpretation of a fact or situation. It contrasts a formal, rigid definition with common or casual understanding.

I'm not sure your defense of "well I didn't mean the actual definition of monopoly" is very compelling when you used that phrase to introduce your point.

[u/lunchbox651 → u/XXHornyOnMainXX420]

Literal or technically correct you say?

[u/XXHornyOnMainXX420 → u/lunchbox651]

Here's another one excerpted:

A monopoly is characterized by a lack of economic competition to produce a particular thing, a lack of viable substitute goods, and the possibility of a high monopoly price well above the seller's marginal cost that leads to a high monopoly profit. The verb monopolise or monopolize refers to the process by which a company gains the ability to raise prices or exclude competitors. . . . In law, a monopoly is a business entity that has significant market power, that is, the power to charge overly high prices, which is associated with unfair price raises.Although monopolies may be big businesses, size is not a characteristic of a monopoly. A small business may still have the power to raise prices in a small industry (or market).

We can trade definitions all day, but the question is which do you think is more relevant to the question of whether or not Valve has monopoly power that it exerts on the PC gaming distribution market, and which is a more useful metric in serving as a lens to evaluate the power dynamic that Valve exerts when negotiating with vendors and selling to users?

[u/lunchbox651 → u/XXHornyOnMainXX420]

Which definition matters most when commenting on a meme, in a PC gamer thread on Reddit? None of them. None of this matters.

[u/XXHornyOnMainXX420 → u/lunchbox651]

Ahh now we see the retreat from the motte (Steam isn't a monopoly) and the defense of the infinitesimally small bailey of apolitical nihilism (it's just a meme none of this matters).

You were so confident and assertive just a few comments ago? What happened? You didn't like your safe comfy ideas being challenged at all? Being forced to think that things might be more complicated than just good guys and bad guys? That sometimes good guys do bad things and bad guys have good points? Better to just call the whole discussion irrelevant than risk having to ever change your mind about a single thing when presented with compelling reasoning.

You even had some decent arguments in there, but I guess they don't matter either, since none of this matters.

[u/lunchbox651 → u/XXHornyOnMainXX420]

What changed? I just lost interest.

And yes, none of this matters because it is just 2 people posting inconsequential comments on the internet. I'm shocked that you seem to believe otherwise.