Valve:
piracy a "non-issue" for Steam by Robert Purchese (Eurogamer)
*Gabe Newell believes piracy stems not from price but
convenience, and as Steam offers so much, piracy is no problem
* "In general,
we think there is a fundamental misconception about piracy," "Piracy
is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem.
*"For example,
if a pirate offers a product anywhere in the world, 24x7, purchasable from the
convenience of your personal computer, and the legal provider says the product
is region-locked, will come to your country 3 months after the US release, and
can only be purchased at a brick and mortar store, then the pirate's service is
more valuable. Most DRM solutions diminish the value of the product by either
directly restricting a customers use or by creating uncertainty.”
*"Our goal is
to create greater service value than pirates, and this has been successful
enough for us that piracy is basically a non-issue for our company.”
*Newell added, "prior
to entering the Russian market, we were told that Russia was a waste of time
because everyone would pirate our products. Russia is now about to become our
largest market in Europe.”
*Steam requires a download and log in, something many DRM
services are criticised for, it also ensures games are up to date as well as
offers multiplayer matchmaking, friends lists, achievements and a community
*Many top end publishers opt to have steamworks tools
implemented, for use of multiplayer, cloud saving, authentication, so they can
be built into the game early on
*Half-life started steam in 2004, but wasn’t until 2005
steam got its first third party, now 7 years later, it dominates the pc/mac
digital distribution market.
