this post was submitted on 01 Apr 2026
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Here's what I don't understand... Say we all agree they are a monopoly, what do you do about it?
It doesn't seem feasible to break them up into smaller companies, how would that even work? What are the dividing lines between what portion of the company goes where? Does that even solve anything?
Force them to charge less money? Okay, now they charge the same as Epic (or even less). Basically every other store is now being undercut by the biggest player on the scene. There is now even less reason to use a storefront that isn't Steam. It doesn't feel like that solves the problem either.
It seems like all the courts have tried to do so far is charge them money for existing, not get them to change what they do, which seems a lot less like the government trying to stop the big bad monopoly and more like the government wanting to get their cut. What does "stopping the monopoly" even mean? Are we happier and better off as consumers if Valve is forced to shut down Steam entirely? Is that the goal?
It is a shame how uncreative we as a society have becone to deal with monopolies.
Remember when Microsoft almost got divided over bundling a browser with their OS? 'Cause Pepperidge Farm remembers π
No, m$ got a fist up their arse for anticompetitive behaviour
Uh, Microsoft got in trouble for making their browser an unremovable part of the operating system, and aggressively trying to force you to use it as a browser. Not remotely accurate to say the problem was just including a web browser. And in the end, they got barely any punishment for it.
Erm
They even had the same shit going on some 15 years later in the EU.
I don't care if someone oversimplified it that way in a wikipedia article. That doesn't make it the full story. Notice the modifier "central" in any case.
We lived it, babe. We were literally there when it happened.
What's your point?
Are you saying that Microsoft being split up made no sense? If so, what would you suggest instead?
Or are you saying since they "almost" did it to MS, then they could do it to Steam? If so, where do you make the split that effects any change? You could split Valve the game dev company from the Steam platform, but I don't think that makes Steam any less monolithic in their space - they don't get their market share from the games Valve has made.
You could split Valve Dev from Distribution from Hardware. But that is a shitty split, I'm with you.
You could also just say: you have three years to split distribution into, idk, 4 subsidaries which are then "released" as own companies.
You could split geographically, and down the line those companies might compete with each other.
That's what I mean with creativity. A lot of shit could be possible. But here we are and are told "it makes no sense", "there is no alternative", just crippling our own imagination before even using it Β―\_(γ)_/Β―
Because Steam is simply not a problem when we have so many places to go!
Our utilities donβt have options AT ALL! Yet that isnβt being fucking fixed?!
Amazon owns ecommerce/distribution practically!
Because βfixingβ steam while leaving the rest in tact will fuck us all over worse!
To better explain the issue, I think, usually monopoly claims come from someone dominating multiple threads or connected elements of an industry. So, they don't just own all the wheat fields; but also some of the best grain transport companies, as well as all the best bakeries - such that anyone offering wheat, transport, or baking, can't compete with their integration.
That's when a company would be divided. But in this case, Valve is just one thing; it's the bakery. They choose to bake with flour and wheat because they've been baking for years. Everyone else is pouring billions into trying various mixtures of sawdust to cut costs, and no one is cutting into that industry as a result. Nothing has prevented them from building their own infrastructure from scratch, except for the fact that it's a long-term investment, and the stock market hates those.
Isn't there a difference between public and private companies?
There might be. But back tn the day we just knew that monopolies are shit for everyone (except the owner). So maybe we should sharpen that tool of law once again. But who am I kidding, not gonna happen.
I mean, it definitely isn't going to happen in the US anytime soon... We haven't had any teeth behind our anti-trust laws in decades. In my lifetime we have basically seen Bell Telephone get rebuilt under AT&T.
Yea we fucking should, but steam is not a monopoly.
Nationalize it. The public now owns it and it pays for utilities for the public.
"Nationalize it" is easy to say, but I honestly think even Microsoft would do a better job with steam than the US government would.
Any monopoly that is too big and important to be broken up needs to be nationalized.
I'm not sure how important Steam is.
Sure, we all like video games, but I don't think people are going to die if they start overcharging for them and we have to go outside to buy them in a store again.
Monopolies aren't issues per se, it's policies and practices that create and maintain said monopoly.
So is Valve engaging in anticompetitive behaviour? The fact GOG went from an abandonware site to Galaxy says wat. And also that isn't a monopoly.
What is and isn't a Monopoly varies from country to country, and always turns into the same circular debate every time it comes up anyway. That's why I was trying to avoid getting bogged down is "is it or isn't it" and focus on "if it is, then what?" because I'm not sure a lot of people have thought that far ahead. Myself included.
that's why it's always better to focus on anticompetitive behaviour. I mean if you're the only one that came up with PeeSchweeps, then a natural monopoly forms. But do you undercut and sabotage competing products to maintain it?
The interesting thing about Steam being a monopoly to me, is that the complaints are always that they charge too much... They aren't undercutting all of the competition in order to maintain massive market share at all. The biggest complaint seems to be "they charge so much money, but I have to list my game on their platform or else I will get basically zero sales and visibility to my game!"
Yea, Steam is huge. The eventual total enshittification of Valve terrifies me, but not enough to just nuke them today and hope a better alternative materializes out of thin air tomorrow. From what I can see, their market share is purely a factor of offering a better product, so smashing them to bits just sounds like being forced to use even worse products.
OK which fucking country thinks valve is a monopoly? Bonus points if they allow Amazon to operate unimpeded.
Weβd mostly all go straight to piracy and we all know it.
They aren't even close to a monopoly though
Try releasing your game on a different platform. It might as well not exist.
And the fanboys that do know about your game will give you death threats for not releasing on their favourite platform.
the best selling game of all time isn't even on steam
If true than how do consoles exist?
Other platforms sucking is not a monopoly. Thatβs the opposite of one.
We make their practice of forcing game companies to charge the same on Steam as other platforms illegal. If they could charge less on other platforms (due to the lower cuts of the other platforms) they would, and it would loosen Steam's artificial hold on being the de-facto place to buy games.
Their policy is not that you aren't allowed to sell your game cheaper on another platform, their policy is that you can't sell Steam keys on other platforms cheaper than you are selling the game on Steam. Basically, you can't use Steam's infrastructure when undercutting "Steam customers". Games that are on Steam go on sale on other platforms when they are not on sale on Steam all the time currently.
Sure let them sell cheaper on gog or epic. But what about the Free steam Keys they get? Those should still be the same price or will steam change it to non Free Keys and instead Charge the 30% they take so that These Keys can be sold at any price any where? Tbh even If the game is 60$ on steam and only 45$ on epic.. I should still buy on steam.. And i suppose most others aswell
I would pay $60 for a game on Steam before a free one on epic. I donβt want 1000 launchers. Bad enough these individual companies have them now.
Then they would just simply stop giving out free steam keys for off platform purchases. Depends on how many people buy from publisher site because they get to keep their games in a single library, it might end up with the game publishers getting less revenue overall.
They're not even a monopoly. We can always pirate the games, or more ethically, buy used cds with old games or open source games etc, even if steam enshittifies, it's not gonna affect me.