I'm stuggling to make sense of your points. To the extent that I can't tell whether you're coming down on steam or not.
But one thing that isn't relevant here is the "free market". The "free market" refers to a system where prices, production, and distribution of goods and services are determined by supply and demand, without government intervention. Examples of threats to the free market include monopolies, price fixing, government regulations, and trade barriers.
Steam is not a monopoly, indeed it's one of many ways of getting gaming entertainment. It very rarely even has exclusive games (unlike say XBox and Playstation). It does not,to the best of my knowledge, engage in price fixing or impose trade barriers on others. Government regulations are not relevant in this context because they are not a government entity, nor to they receive preferential treatment under the law with regard to permission to engage in selling software.
My point was that Steam's point was not focused on the user, it was neither the client nor the outstanding features that made it popular.
They were driven by a solid business plan, not "features".
It's just a convenient proposition to retail games, because it's easy for the developper, and securing for the buyer.
This was an addition to the parent comment.
And the previous comment complained about the Steam launcher. The comment was fair, especially on lower end PCs with an old school HDD. He felt like someone was bloating his PCs with functionalities he didn't need.
So yeah, the Steam launcher is there because it's a technical requirement to retail games.
But I don't agree that it was successful for its new features. It's just ok because it sells games.
Games for Windows Live tried to do the features without actually retailing the games, and it didn't work.
And I will not reply further. As usual, there are more downvotes than actual replies. I never understood Reddit mobs on that.
But one thing that isn't relevant here is the "free market". The "free market" refers to a system where prices, production, and distribution of goods and services are determined by supply and demand, without government intervention. Examples of threats to the free market include monopolies, price fixing, government regulations, and trade barriers.
Steam is not a monopoly, indeed it's one of many ways of getting gaming entertainment. It very rarely even has exclusive games (unlike say XBox and Playstation). It does not,to the best of my knowledge, engage in price fixing or impose trade barriers on others. Government regulations are not relevant in this context because they are not a government entity, nor to they receive preferential treatment under the law with regard to permission to engage in selling software.