this post was submitted on 24 Sep 2023
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The barriers to entry make them Monopoly. Steam does not enforce exclusivity, people are free to list their game on steam and any other platform with no penalties.
Steam may act as the de facto option, but it is not a monopoly. It is not excluding anybody from participating in the market
A monopoly refers to the market position, you don't have to abuse your monopoly to have one...
Disagree. Monopoly, by the term mono, means only one. Exclusive.
Steam is large, steam is de facto, but steam is not exclusive. The fact that GOG, Ubisoft, epic game store, Xbox, all exist without penalties. Means it's not an monopoly
https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/monopoly
The historical term has nothing to do with todays use, that's just the roots of the damn word. According to your logic monopolies can't exist, Microsoft wouldn't be one and Amazon and so on, that's plain wrong...
I linked to the definition of the word, because we appear to have a disagreement on what the word means.
As long as the system is not exclusive, it's not a monopoly. Steam is not excluding anybody.
But since we disagree on the definition, I don't think there's any point in talking anymore.
I don't think there is much of a point in it judging from the rediculess replies I got from you and others but that's just plain fucking wrong, a monopoly is a entity with abusable position and not a entity abusing it's position! "In law, a monopoly is a business entity that has significant market power" https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly
Definitional arguments are the least entertaining for anyone. So I'm sorry we have different definitions. Allow me to expand your quote from Wikipedia
"In law, a monopoly is a business entity that has significant market power, that is, the power to charge overly high prices, which is associated with a decrease in social surplus.[3] Although monopolies may be big businesses, size is not a characteristic of a monopoly. A small business may still have the power to raise prices in a small industry (or market).[3]"
In your opinion, can steam unilaterally raise the price of all games, and people will just have to accept it? If yes then sure it's Monopoly.
If steam increases all game prices by 100%, and doesn't give the developers a cut, I imagine we're going to see people move to GOG epic etc.
Update: https://www.cheapshark.com/search#q:The%20Last%20of%20Us%20Part%20I
I've never heard of this site before, but it compares prices against different game stores. So last of us part I, is available on a variety of different game stores, at different price points.
What would you call the 30% Steam tax, a justified price? Furthermore you can have a monopoly even if alternatives exist because especially at a certain size many of your users will be lazy and/or simply don't care enough to switch. I like Steam and their service and prefer it over other storefronts except itch.io because they do a fantastic job and don't act especially evil in most ways but I also aknowledge that a small developer essentially has to eat that fee. The only real competitor is Epic and that's just a terrible user experience so many (including me) will rather buy a different indie game than use that and releasing a game on your own can be hard and expensive, well and also comes with less publicity because Steam is also a great way to get some promo.
I don't disagree with your assessment of steam.
We are simply disagreeing about the definition of monopoly.
This is no longer an interesting conversation for either of us. I refer you to the dictionary, and you refer me to your usage. So we're stuck in a loop. Regardless, it's been nice chatting with you. I look forward to a better future
No, the market position makes a monopoly! What you are talking about are anticompetitive practices, a monopoly enables you to leverage those in a damaging way but they aren't part of a monopoly...