this post was submitted on 09 Apr 2024
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Steam (and other parts of SteamOS) is non free software, it can do anything on your system and there is no easy way for you to change that or even know what it does. Valve developers put themselves in a position of power over you. They keep secrets from you on your own device. This in itself is unethical, but they also abuse their users with DRM. How can you say that you have control in this case?
DRM is what publishers and developers want. If Valve didn't have DRM they wouldn't be anywhere near as big as they are today. The influx of developers happened when Steam released their DRM for the public.
And that makes it ethical? DRM-free stores exist: gog.com and itch.io for example.
Yes, but those aren't the companies that would have replaced Steam if they weren't successful. It would've been a company like Microsoft, EA, Ubisoft, or Blizzard who would've taken over the game distribution market. Valve is a saint compared to any of those companies. As much as we wish for everything to be DRM free it would never happen. At least not with the current market. Also, the average person doesn't care about DRM. They don't understand the implications of what makes an ethical market. They just want to install a game and hit start.
Valve is an enemy of freedom. It doesn't matter if they abuse us less than other companies. They are still an unethical company.
If you don't fight for it, then of course it won't happen. Also I'm pretty sure you could say this about any difficult problem: Free Software, privacy, global warming, wars. You could say that we will never solve those issues, so why bother doing anything?
An average person doesn't mind running Windows either. But we still try to build a better world for ourselves and we try to convince others to join us.
They are not DRM free. They verify your ownership before letting you download games.
They are DRM-free. I can send you a copy of those games and you can run them on your computer. Without you having to log in anywhere or install an additional proprietary application. Without anyone verifying anything. Isn't that amazing?
By that definition Steam is DRM free too. I can download tons of my games, pack and send them to you and they'll work. My rough estimate is that about half of all games are like that. Half of the remaining games rely on Steam environment for community or multiplayer functionality.
Some games on Steam are DRM-free and you can play them without running Steam. That is good, but you still need the proprietary Steam client to download them and Steam doesn't tell you which games have DRM before you buy them. gog.com and itch.io prove that this can be done better.
You do. But hey you end up with DRM free games you like so much. By the way why so you even want games? Aren't most of them unethical?
Gog offline installers are also unethical, no?
But to get there I have to use unethical proprietary software that I hate so much.
Who said I do?
Of course. This is why itch.io is better than gog.
Have to use that to get more unethical software. I see no problem.
Games don't come with the source code. It's unethical software by your definition.
Do they provide ethical installers?
Most of them don't, but some do. Just like with programs and apps.
They don't provide any, you just download the game itself. Or you can use their Free Software client, which will download and update the games for you.
Steam OS is easy, you can install literally any other distro. With regards to steam itself sadly we don't live in a fairytale land where everything can be FOSS, there aren't enough people motivated to work for free. Steam drm is great it makes publisher executives happy, while being extremely easy to crack.
You can say the same about Windows. You can replace it with another OS, but that doesn't make it ethical.
If everyone had this attitude, there would be no Free Software at all. It took 40 years of hard work to get to where we are right now. I don't understand why you think that anyone has to work for free. Free Software is about freedom, not price. Itch.io is a store that has a Free Software client (and it's optional - you don't even have to use it). Valve could do the same, but they don't want to.
Yes, it's great that publishers can abuse us and that you need a proprietary app on your system and be logged in to an account to play singleplayer games. Thanks Valve.
Not other parts of steamos, just steam
Also the Linux kernel and possibly some drivers according to the FSF: https://www.gnu.org/distros/common-distros.html. But I don't know how to verify that last part.