[MagnumOpus]

> Well, price is zero

Except it isn't - Steam reportedly charges a chunky 43% extra on top of what the publisher gets (30% of the retail price you pay goes to Valve).

Other platforms try to charge the same, but for a near-zero-marginal-cost good, it is a bit strange that there is no price competition yet...

[Fnoord]

True, my bad -- it isn't from a developer PoV, and if the developer forwards the cut to the consumer, Steam is more expensive. This actually regularly happens.

The article does mention this, and also mentions a platform who don't take a cut, and explains how it is difficult to compete with these.

I'd argue though that if you self host instead of outsource (to e.g. Steam), this also has costs. So the reasoning that you'd save that 30% would be unreasonable.