Steam

After the Disney debacle I've started noticing how many I see. It's really infuriating. I already had the opinion that they should be illegal but holy fuck they're everywhere.

Software has been leveraged to do mass arbitrations against companies that insist on enforcing it, somewhat leveling the playing field in the power imbalance, at no less a cost than courts ultimately for the corps. Tricky enough they've found it hard to make language against them too.

So in a sense, it is de-enshitification but it is more likely borne from Steam throwing in the towel against a losing proposition (preventing costly mass-arbitration) than doing so because they want every user to have the maximum legal recourse.

A W is a W though, imo.

Previously if you had a dispute with Steam you would go to a mediator appointed Valve and you discuss things with Valve and come to an agreement. Sounds good, as it doesn't mean you have to involve lawyers.
Until you realise, Valve is paying for the mediator so the mediator has an incentive to agree with Valve to keep the business. In addition, any agreement is purely between you and Valve. It effects no one else, any previous agreement between Valve and the previous person has no bearing.

Contrast that to going to court, court decisions are binding and are able to be used in other court proceedings.

forced arbitration means you can't go through the normal court system if you want to sue them, instead resolving it through a private neutral third party.

and before, the waiver meant that you gave up your right to sue them in a class action lawsuit

getting rid of those is a massive W

Without getting into the weeds of arbitration—if you want to sue Valve for some reason, you now have to file in King county, Washington. This makes it too expensive to be worth it for any amount less than the cost of flying to and staying in Seattle for a lawsuit. Even if you're right and Valve is wrong.

Amazon recently did this too and it worked out well for them I guess, since other companies seem to have followed suit.

Forced arbitration is already unenforceable in the EU, so it doesn't change anything for you. It just makes it so it works for the rest of the world the same way it already did for you.

It means that the key to getting a company to ditch arbitration is for enough people to win individual arbitration cases. There's arbitration lawyers who hedge their whole careers on arbitration payouts