• CileTheSane@lemmy.ca
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    1 month ago

    If only there were words for one company arbitrarily restricting who gets to reach customers.

    Freedom of association? Valve is not obligated or required to host everyone’s game if they don’t want to.

      • CileTheSane@lemmy.ca
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        1 month ago

        So what do you propose? Is there some action Steam is doing that they should be legally stopped from? As far as I am aware Steam has the most customers simply because those customers prefer it.

        • mindbleach@sh.itjust.works
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          1 month ago

          Here’s the funny part: it’s probably fine. AND YET, people will twist themselves inside-out to deny the premise.

          Your root post fully admitted the accusation:

          If you’re not in this one store, you lose access to most customers.

          That’s a fucking monopoly.

          As I’ve explained to people, over and over and over and over, anti-competitive practice is a separate thing. Monopoly just means market share. It’s enough power to become a problem. It is the ability to fuck people over. We need to recognize these situations, before they ruin everything.

          For comparison, Netflix was a monopoly, and I think the entire world would be happier if that was still the case. But saying so doesn’t mean they weren’t a monopoly. For a good while there, your choices for legal streaming video were Netflix, or lying to yourself about legality. The desirable solution would be multiple services offering all the same shows for competitive… not the exclusivity hellscape we got. And gaming would be better-off if every game was in every storefront, like boxes on shelves, instead of one store being a huge fucking deal and the rest being nearly irrelevant.

          • CileTheSane@lemmy.ca
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            1 month ago

            Here’s the funny part: it’s probably fine

            Then what have you been going on about all this time? You’ been saying repeatedly that it’s a problem and now you’re saying it’s probably fine? Pick a lane.

            If you’re not in this one store, you lose access to most customers.

            Customers who want your product can still access it.

            That’s a fucking monopoly.

            Not by the dictionary definition nor the legal definition you cited.

            We need to recognize these situations, before they ruin everything.

            But “it’s probably fine.”

            And gaming would be better-off if every game was in every storefront

            Which most of them are. For a while Epic was refusing games that wasn’t signing exclusivity deals with them, but that ended up not working out for them.
            In the past Walmart has refused to sell music of artists with content they disagreed with. Was that Walmart exploiting it’s market share, or a business choosing what they do and do not stock?

            instead of one store being a huge fucking deal and the rest being nearly irrelevant.

            Again, what should we do about that?