The research is mostly about overpaying, not high but equal pay for everyone doing the same job. It happens when people compare their effort to others’ and if they feel over-rewarded it can actually lead to two outcomes:

• Increasing effort to justify it, or
• reducing effort

And the evidence is actually mixed between the two outcomes, because different people respond differently to different incentives, like flexibility, holidays, etc.

Equity theory mostly applies only when the work is measurable and the teams/individuals compare themselves constantly.

IMO this can be solved by better management and equal pay for equal work/skillset.

There are also other incentives that can crowd out internal motivation, such as surveillance, pressure, inequality. But obviously management doesn’t want to talk about those, much more profitable to reduce the pay.

High pay alone doesn’t really trigger crowding out.

I still maintain my position that this is largely a management and greed issue. And high and equal pay alone doesn’t create a lazy, zombie workforce.

Here’s some studies and theories arguing the opposite:

Do financial incentives help or harm performance in interesting tasks? - PubMed

There continues to be disagreement about whether financial incentives help or harm performance, especially in interesting tasks. Although the Jenkins, Mitra, Gupta, and Shaw (1998) meta-analysis finds a positive effect of incentives, including in interesting tasks (reported ρ ^ = +.34; our computed …

PubMed (pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov)

Efficiency wage - Wikipedia

(en.wikipedia.org)

https://wol.iza.org/uploads/articles/275/pdfs/efficiency-wages-variants-and-implications.pdf

I don‘t think it’s very contrarian or whack to acknowledge the fact that I may need to sell on the biggest platform if I want my game to do well.

I’m referring to your prior comments and history speaking in communities. The most recent one I remember involved Portal, Half-life, and counterstrike.

You’re not at Lembot_0005 level comments yet tho, so that’s good.

steam has a 75% marketshare of PC games distribution in the US. the 2nd biggest player, epic games, has a market share estimated from 3% to 7,5%. i can’t find data for steam’s market share outside the US, but i’d expect it to be even higher.

if google can be considered to have a monopoly on web browsers with 73% of the marketshare, even as alternatives (like safari, 13%) exist, i don’t see why steam wouldn’t count as well.

Doubt it. But, for what it’s worth, last I heard, valve was one of the most sought after employers in the business. Apparently the salaries are generous and you get to work on whatever you want, not on what a manager tells you to.

Then again, somehow I don’t expect Valve’s expenditures are that high, except download server costs.

Hey that’s not fair.

Gabe is also spending all that money on Aston Martins Valkyries to race around the world.

No, Google pays off other browsers to use Google as the default search engine, among many other actual monopolistic practices. Steam does none of that and simply provides a product.

Yes, harassing users without context based on previous comments in other threads is much more valuable for a community. I don’t even remember having contrarian opinions about Portal or Half-Life, they are my favourite series‘.

Profit is always after all costs, including personnel.

You are equating “monopoly” with “abusive monopoly.”

No, I’m not. I’m saying they aren’t a monopoly by the simple fact that they aren’t the only providers of the service they sell. And while they are currently in a position to use their power to make themselves a monopoly, they are not doing that and instead are playing fair with their competition.

Buddy. Take a breath for a moment. I mean this constructively; it’s an opportunity to learn.

What you’ve just said here is essentially this:

1. Some journalists sometimes make errors.
2. Therefore I choose to make an interpretive error.

Please remember, we all make errors (myself included). The best of us learn from them.

If I remember correctly they have performance based bonuses

Not just that but I mean journalism geez. I can’t think of a profession that has had more of a fall from grace in the last 20 years. Furthermore the implication here is video game journalism, which has always been the lowest form of Journalism.

You could defend Amazon with that logic. the fact that the barrier of entry is high is exactly what let’s Steam, Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo abuse of their soft monopoly.

Nothing justifies owning a billion dollars worth of of boats.

Amazon doesn’t either. Most of the arguments defending Steam can easily apply to every other “bad” company.

The only thing that differentiates steam is their marketing budget targeting small forums and Reddit.

Nah he’s right. Nobody buys a widget for 5 bucks and sells it for 10 bucks and says, “I made 10 bucks”. By your rational I could buy a car new for 25 grand, sell it 10 years later for 12 grand and say I “made” 12 grand off it.
“Make” has typically implied profit for as long as I can remember.

I wouldn’t describe it as a “monopoly” per say. I’d describe it as “all of the competition is filled with idiots”:

I never mentioned Amazon, but it’s really no comparison, even the FTC in the USA has filed suits against them for monopolistic and illegal behaviour.

Ive never seen an advert for Steam myself, outside of on their own platform or a video on their own YouTube channel. They sell largely through word of mouth. I suppose recently they offered journalists to visit their HQ to show off their new hardware.

Is this fun for you?