[serf]

> Only because it's very hard to pay for switch ROMs. As gaben himself said, "Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem".

how many rootkit-level DRMs does Steam need to distribute before we can throw that comment of Gabe's out the window? They own the PC market, they have just about mastered software distribution, and everyone seems fairly happy with the service provided, yet piracy still exists and most everyone on the Steam marketplace go out of their way to implement various methods of software DRM to prevent it.

What kind of fantasy service provided is he imagining that would put a stop to software piracy?

Safe to say that the comment was plain wrong at this point, no?

[dartharva]

Gaben's comment is related to how you can curb the effects of piracy by making games accessible and easy to install, which Steam undoubtedly does. There will obviously be people still not willing to pay who pirate games, but these were never a marketable population anyway. By improving your services you reduce the relative appeal of Pirate sources for the actual target population of these games, i.e. people willing to pay.

Piracy often wins in cases when it provides a vastly superior experience than official channels themselves. A LOT of today's AAA titles end up giving a massively better experience in Pirate releases than in official ones - Assassin's Creed and Far Cry series, Bethesda's Doom and Wolfenstein series, the Mass Effect series, Rockstar's GTA series,... the list goes on and on - plainly because the official releases are so insufferably bloated and ridden with consumer-hostile designs. Piracy is indeed a service problem. Ensure your services are good and people won't turn to Pirate releases anymore.

[iinnPP]

I have a Steam library like many people (with 500+ games I will never play) and have not pirated a game since installing Steam.

It is easy, affordable, and acceptable to me. I think the user experience can improve a lot. At this moment however, it is my preferred method of buying games.

The service problem is the problem for me. A Prime example being that I "pirate" movies available to me as a Amazon subscriber because of the VPN policy.