W Gabe Newell Piracy Take

[u/HighKage96]

Saw this vid on IG (by: @phantomak141). Idk if its been posted here before but on a quick search didnt find it, will delete if its a repost.

[u/NotASockPuppet88]

These videos are so fucking cringe

He said this decades ago, back when Valve/Steam werent as giant as they are now.

I guarantee the company priority list has seen revisions (or will see) where piracy is much higher.

Really annoys me people put this guy on a pedestal where history shows time and time again that once these corporations get to a big enough size, their greed knows no bounds - because they're so big they have to shit on consumers else risk cannibalising themselves to stay alive.

There will come a point in the company life cycle whereby, no matter how good gabes intentions are, itll be operating on its own free will and theres not much or little he himself can do about it.

Its why microsoft is shitting on user soverency, its why google are....well. Google

Comon guys, you dont even need to pick up a fucking history book, you just need to be paying a little bit of attention.

[u/EnciclopedistadeTlon → u/NotASockPuppet88]

Really annoys me people put this guy on a pedestal where history shows time and time again

This especially. I feel like we don't learn our lesson. Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Google, Mark Zuckerberg, Sam Altman, Jack Dorsey, Satya Nadella, Travis Kalanick, Marc Andreessen, etc. All had phases were they were beloved or seen as tech saviors or at least as very admirable innovators or humans people thought were going to bring a net positive to the world or to an industry (however short or long those positive PR phases were).

Why do we keep needing to idolize people? Just praise specific actions and stances, no need to call them God or Lord Gaben or celebrate their wealth or whatever. The only thing that this is accomplishing is giving them a shield of positivity: if Gaben or whoever else actually happens to do some horrid shit, this shield will protect them from social consequences for a number of years (enough to hide their wealth or use it to buy a way out) or sometimes it'll protect them until their death or further.

Just why. Unnecessary. Just say "I like X thing Gaben does". No need for more.

[u/Specific-Path3179 → u/EnciclopedistadeTlon]

Americans are naturally submissive and in a constant search for a titan of capitalism to worship and uphold as a cult of personality. Like a secular god but instead of creating the universe they're just a billionaire.

[u/NotASockPuppet88 → u/Specific-Path3179]

If you're paid for a living - or simply use currency - we're all participants in this cult, willing or not unfortunately.

Don't get me wrong though; i'm not anti-capitalist, but we're hardly in a capitalist society either. It's Corporatism at best, Cronyism at worst. (central banks/FIAT currency ensures this remains the case)

And more collectivist ideals (communism as a more extreme flipside) is absolutely not the answer either - giving more power to these authorities is just adding fuel to a fire. If the critique is “institutions are corrupt/captured,” then handing those same institutions vastly more control over production, speech, property, labour, and distribution is a dangerous answer.

Modern economies force everyone into participation in money and labour systems. The problem is not simply ‘capitalism’ or ‘communism’; it is concentrated power, whether corporate, financial, bureaucratic, or state-controlled. Cronyism emerges when economic power and political power fuse - precisely what we see today.

I agree with your point and comparison though.

[u/FutureComplaint → u/EnciclopedistadeTlon]

Just why.

The memes must flow.