this post was submitted on 04 Nov 2025
227 points (92.2% liked)

Steam

14539 readers
54 users here now

Steam is a video game digital distribution service by Valve.

Steam News | Steam Beta Client news

Useful tools:
SteamDB
SteamCharts
Issue tracker for Linux version of Steam

founded 4 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Ledivin@lemmy.world 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Even if there were literally no other competitors, GOG holding 1/6th of the market share (your words) absolutely precludes Steam from being a monopoly.

[–] Mk23simp@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

You're using a different definition of monopoly from what I'm using. To quote Wikipedia:

In economics, a monopoly is a single seller. 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 unfair price raises.

I'm using the latter of those definitions. I don't think it's particularly useful to only consider it a monopoly when there are literally no competitors. I think it is useful to consider it a monopoly when it has dominant market power. Steam's estimated 75-80% market share is dominant market power.

[–] athatet@lemmy.zip 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

So how often does steam charge overly high prices, which is associated with unfair price raises?

[–] Mk23simp@lemmy.blahaj.zone 0 points 3 days ago

the power to charge overly high prices

One doesn't have to actually use a power in order to have that power. If I was carrying a loaded shotgun, I would have firepower. I wouldn't have to actually fire the gun to have firepower.

Also, one could argue (and Epic Games has) that Steam's 30% cut is overly high for digital distribution. I'm not sure whether that's true or not, but that doesn't really matter to the question of whether Steam has dominant market power.