[Nadya]

Since when did rules/laws start mattering for vc-backed startups? Continue paying fines until you're large enough to bribe, I mean lobby, for the law to change. It's just cost of doing business.

It's very difficult to go after/shut down sites that breach ToS like this. See nearly every gold-selling site for any MMORPG in existence. They do sometimes get shutdown eventually but typically after many years and they often re-open with a new brand name.

[ibaikov]

Honestly it's just bittersweet that YC does due dilligence like this for gaming startups. I mean some of them are cool businesses (like this one), but I'm a little salty since selling items not through steam is absolutely against valve's TOS. Remember that startup that wanted to do an mmo with thousands of players, VR etc etc and the demo was a compilation of free assets in UE4..?

Ok, now back to work.

[martinlykkesuhr]

It is not against valves terms of service. They actually embrace the developement community around steam and their games

[ibaikov]

Valve only allows non-commercial use [1], and selling items not on steam marketplace is clearly against it.

[1]: https://store.steampowered.com/subscriber_agreement/ (2 A)

[martinlykkesuhr]

This is for the steam client, and thi agreement is mainly aimed at content/game developers

[ibaikov]

Which service and API do you use to trade items then? Is it not steam?