My impression of "steam machine" and SteamOS was that they were at least intended as a hedging strategy, at a time when Microsoft was seriously considering beco

My impression of "steam machine" and SteamOS was that they were at least intended as a hedging strategy, at a time when Microsoft was seriously considering becoming a games distributor on Windows PCs. In that, it seems to me that Valve succeeded, in that there is now good awareness of SteamOS and Steam machines that Valve can start to refocus on should Microsoft start considering locking down on Windows apps again. I still think that with more investment, Steam machines and SteamOS can become a moderate success, but until push comes to shove it seems to me likely that Valve thinks concentrating on traditional OSes and PCs is far more lucrative, while maintaining work on Linux (see: Proton) so Steam machines and SteamOS always remains a feasible backup platform.