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Though if someone offered FreeSteam with the exact same interface, convenience, selection, etc. as the official Steam, but the only difference is that everythin

by biot 10y ago

Though if someone offered FreeSteam with the exact same interface, convenience, selection, etc. as the official Steam, but the only difference is that everything was free... people would use that instead. It's not just about convenience.

overcast 10y ago
Yeh sure, you know why FreeSteam doesn't exist? Because people don't work for free. The required infrastructure, developers, and legal fees are just insurmountable. What are you going to do, have donations, like...paying for games? Steam is already doing things nearly perfectly, and people don't seem to care.
- milesokeefe 10y ago
  I think the parent is implying it would be pirated content. Like Popcorn Time for games.
  - overcast 10y ago
    Fully aware of what they were implying. Infrastructure, developers, etc, still needs to exist. Who would be managing that monstrosity of a repository, all of the auto-updating patches, bandwidth, lawyers, and foreign governments to keep the content creators at bay. Never mind the interface to all of it. No one. Steam is far too valuable to even bother ripping off.
    - milesokeefe 10y ago
      I would imagine the same type of people that are maintaining Popcorn Time and the type of people cracking/seeding games currently. The backend would be bittorrent, so it wouldn't require bandwidth. If all of the contributors would be sufficiently anonymous, lawyers and governments wouldn't matter either. So it would just be an interface connected to a repository of curated torrents. Not trivial but not nearly as hard as you're making it out to be. I think the only reason it doesn't exist is that videogame pirates are largely content with their current system. That or no one capable of implementing it has had this idea.
- johnchristopher 10y ago
  Well... there used to be some kind of `FreeSteam`. But keeping it up-to-date was indeed a hassle for both the `maintainers` and `users`. Not worth the time once you get a paycheck or enter college.

by biot 10y ago

overcast 10y ago

Yeh sure, you know why FreeSteam doesn't exist? Because people don't work for free. The required infrastructure, developers, and legal fees are just insurmountable. What are you going to do, have donations, like...paying for games? Steam is already doing things nearly perfectly, and people don't seem to care.

milesokeefe 10y ago
I think the parent is implying it would be pirated content. Like Popcorn Time for games.
- overcast 10y ago
  Fully aware of what they were implying. Infrastructure, developers, etc, still needs to exist. Who would be managing that monstrosity of a repository, all of the auto-updating patches, bandwidth, lawyers, and foreign governments to keep the content creators at bay. Never mind the interface to all of it. No one. Steam is far too valuable to even bother ripping off.
  - milesokeefe 10y ago
    I would imagine the same type of people that are maintaining Popcorn Time and the type of people cracking/seeding games currently. The backend would be bittorrent, so it wouldn't require bandwidth. If all of the contributors would be sufficiently anonymous, lawyers and governments wouldn't matter either. So it would just be an interface connected to a repository of curated torrents. Not trivial but not nearly as hard as you're making it out to be. I think the only reason it doesn't exist is that videogame pirates are largely content with their current system. That or no one capable of implementing it has had this idea.
johnchristopher 10y ago
Well... there used to be some kind of `FreeSteam`. But keeping it up-to-date was indeed a hassle for both the `maintainers` and `users`. Not worth the time once you get a paycheck or enter college.