I’ve never seen a billionaire get defended like Gaben.
He literally owns a billion dollars worth of yatchs yet I’ve seen his simp squad compare him to Jesus, lmao.
Because his billions were earned from offering an actually decent service beholden to the customers rather than the shareholders, something not many other billionaires seem capable of. Yeah, nobody needs a billion dollars but literally everyone else in the gaming industry would rather shoot themselves in the foot to make a penny now rather than… Just simply not do that and make a dollar later.
You cannot possibly earn a billion dollars. That money is the excess labor value of Valve workers. In the context of how our society is currently structured Gaben certainly isn’t the worst of them, but he’s still a member of the parasite class.
Isn’t valve considered an amazing place to work at in the gaming industry?
I’ve heard that, yes, but that doesn’t change the fact that the relationship Gaben has with Valve workers is inherently parasitic. He may be a “good boss,” but he’s still their boss, has ownership of all their work, and could fire them at will.
Also worth noting that most of Gabe’s (and Valve’s) value is not based on anyone at Valve’s work, but instead based on taking a cut from every dev that sells on Steam. Valve is effectively a landlord renting out digital real estate. The fact that they’re able to make obscene amounts of money suggests to me that maybe rents are too damn high.
That’s a good point, it’s an interesting social phenomenon that people tend to be fond of Valve in spite of this because they’re seen as good stewards of the space. It’s like having a landlord that takes good care of the property and makes regular improvements. The property relations are still exploitative, but they’re doing better than most others would within that exploitative framework.
Also has to do with most of their competitors trying to come in immediately with anti-consumer practices or being a company already known for them.
Like as soon as I saw epic was paying game companies for exclusive access, I decided to skip whatever games actually went for it.
I don’t trust a publically traded company to not enshitify by focusing on “more money” rather than setting up a sustainable business.
That’s why I don’t have issues with valve, even if their 30% cut is a bit high. Steam has been dominating its market for like 20 years now and the worst they’ve done that I know of is display some ads for games when you start up. But even that IMO could be used as an example of how to do ads right because a) they are relevant to the thing you’re doing, b) don’t rely on sharing of data between steam and who knows who else (not that I have any certainty there isn’t any data sharing going on), c) the window can just be closed and doesn’t try to fight for your attention. And I can’t even recall seeing it much recently.
Plus I’d say that they provide value by dominating that space and being the standard that any new players need to compete with.
Hmm it was at some point, and then there were reports it’s not that amazing if you’re not part of the “in” crowd.
Most of Valve’s money comes from taking a 30% cut of all sales through the Steam store, which is a lot of money. They’re not abusing their market position as much as they could (e.g. if you buy a Steam key from anywhere else, like a key in a physical box at a physical store, or another online key retailer like Humble Bundle, Valve gets no money, as the publisher can generate as many Steam keys as they want for free), but it’s the surplus value of the labour of employees of other companies that Gabe Newell accumulates.
Yeah, if valve started taking step towards enshittification people would turn on Gabe too.
It is impossible to earn a billion dollars. This is a lie pushed by the ruling class to keep you submissive.
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This. You do not do a billion dollars worth of work in wages. You are given millions in stocks and those are invested an sat on until they are then worth billions.
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Homeboy ran a casino targeting gamers for at least a billion.
Every other game company does that, too, ON TOP of all the other shit they do.
literally everyone else in the gaming industry would rather shoot themselves in the foot to make a penny now rather than… Just simply not do that and make a dollar later.
Ah, the shortsighted joy of publicly traded companies.
You are apparently unaware of the literal tens of thousands of youtube/twitter/media people who basically did/do nothing other than promote Elon and everything he does.
Elon Musk Can Multitask Better Than You.
Elon’s new Hyperloop will revolutionize transit in America!
Tesla’s stock price will be $42,690 per share in 5 years, here’s why.
…
Its about a million times more obnoxious than people pointing out that Gabe actually knows what he’s talking about.
…
You can go outside and strike up a conversation with any random person, and they will almost certainly know who Elon is, and most people will still think he is some kind of genius real life Tony Stark.
You can go outside and strike up a random convo with any random person about Gabe, and chances are 98% of people will have no idea who you are talking about, unless you are at some kind of nerd/geek type outing like a video game convention, and even then, people under 20 - 25 are not likely to know who he is.
EDIT: Yeah, I am actually fairly confident that for you to make a statement like that, you probably, unironically, need to touch grass.
I fail to see any way you could have that opinion other than that basically all you do is argue on video game forums / discords / twitch / whatever, and that you just have almost 0 contact with real life human beings, or online spaces that do not revolve around video games.
You perhaps need to talk to people if you think people now have a high opinion of Elon Musk. His reputation has crashed since he bought Twitter
Now perhaps you’ll still hear space fans singing his praise, but the general position holds no respect for him
He’s one of the good ones, a real credit to his kind.
Yepp, CS:GO loot boxes are good. They’ve never destroyed lives or anything. They aren’t gambling.
Fuckin’ simps, man.
If he was a good one then he wouldn’t be a billionaire.
I saw an autistic kid wearing a “Tribe Elon” shirt the other day and honestly it just made me sad for him.
Gabe Newell is the only billionaire I’d bend the knee to. He earned that money by not constantly fucking over his player base and actually generating good content.
Plus he responds to literally anyone, I’ve got email chains with him just talking about hobbies and general life experiences. Name any other billionaire that you don’t have to jump through several agencies and hoops to even make an introduction.
He runs a casino… I think he’s “better” than others, but his money still rests on exploitation.
I have 0 sympathy for people caught in the casino aspects. The games are free, the game casino is for cosmetics, and you can play thousands of hours without paying a dime.
That’s an awful take. Most of the whales and people caught in the casinos who suffer the highest financial loses are neurodivergent or people with mental illnesses, kids with their parents credit card, the elderly and overall the most vulnerable to manipulation. Those are the people that the gambling mechanics specifically aim for.
No elder is case opening on csgo, valve is fairly lenient for kids with mom and dads credit card, all you have to do is email customer support, being neurodivergent isn’t an excuse, you are either functional enough to understand the risks and problems or you are not functional enough to play the game in the first place. If you have a gambling problem, get help, but I don’t have to feel bad for you.
You’re a terrible person.That was mean, sorry.
This is a fucking atrocious opinion to hold and you soil yourself by thinking this way.
It’s unironically not hard to avoid such mechanics in games and avoid real casinos. There is also an abundance of outside resources available to support you with a gambling addiction.
Remember when Michael Vick used the pseudonym Ron Mexico when getting tested for herpes and it became a meme?
He gave a girl herpes. That’s why he got tested and sued.
Also, you got me thinking of “Carlos Danger”.
I remember a friend of mine apparently got it when I was younger, when attempting to look into testing for it, I found most doctors don’t even test men for it. With a high amount of men showing no symptoms, women get the unfair hit of such. Apparently a lot of people view it as “acne” down there and no big deal. I think that’s shit, but it was eye opening seeing how much our medical field didn’t care about it.
That said, to those who may not know, it is transferred via physical contact, so condoms will not guarantee it does not get contracted. As the condom protects the member, it does not protect your inner thighs and other areas.
I got lucky and never got it, but be safe out there.
Most doctors don’t want to run full panel STD-tests anyway. I remember in the military I had to basically tell my doctor I slept with anything with a pulse for her to do anything beyond the basic STD panel (despite me not sleeping with anything with a pulse).
I had some bumps down under and had a doc look at them (after I got out of the military), and asked about an STD test, and she said they were skin tags, no test needed if I hadn’t been with anyone lately. Alright, fair enough, and the skin tags eventually went away on their own.
Now for herpes specifically: there are two main types, Herpes 1 and Herpes 2. I don’t remember which is which off the top of my head, but, they correspond to oral versus genital herpes. They’re not the same virus, though similar. Something like 80% of American adults have oral herpes and most don’t even know it. They’re cold sores more or less on your lips, and they can remain dormant for the entire time someone is alive.
Genital herpes is the “acne” type, and same thing, they tend to come during flare ups that can be exacerbated by stress or other life circumstances. It is possible, but rare, for someone to contract oral herpes on their genitals, and vice versa, and you are correct that it only takes contact or a small open wound for the virus to be transferred.
Does having either form of herpes make you unlovable? No, while there’s no cure, you just need to take precautions if you or a loved one has either form. Basically, do your best to avoid intimacy when you or your partner has a flare up, and if you still gotta get the deed done, consider mutual-masturbation or other sexual activities that don’t require direct skin-to-skin contact. Condoms obviously help, but they don’t protect against everything.
Thanks for the add-on, the woman who came up positive contracted it with her second partner. (Turns out the guy she got it from got it from their first partner, knew him for years prior to this).
That said, I entered a loving relationship with her after this all happened and we were together for ~3 years, and while she was worried at first I never cared, and I never even contracted it because we avoided direct physical contact of the area during flare-ups as you said.
It isn’t something to have gut wrenching fear about like some do, but it is always best to be responsible and make sure any partners are aware prior.
Carlos Danger was probably a significant contributor to the snuffing out of American democracy.
And saying “my pleasure” after the look in your direction.
