Depending on how you feel, you might want to consider having a talk with select people. Like if you didn’t want to let somebody go and thought maybe they felt the same. All relationships are still relationships, after all, and can be navigated roughly the same ways, within reason, obviously.

If you’re afraid to reach out and say something like “hey I’m worried we’re drifting apart”, consider that sometimes people who have kids and families do still want friends, they just lose track of time or focus, and can end up feeling lonely or whatever. Sometimes they just legit stop caring too, though, so, there’s also that.

I’ve lost a few friends in my life, sometimes I’ve had mutual desires to it not happen, but we both just… Lived too far away and grew into different people. And, I can only put in so much effort when my messages or texts stop getting returned before I feel like maybe I’m bugging them and the ball is (maybe forever) in their court.

/uj Wasn’t it implied (also in the obi wan series) that they needed to separate them literally as much as possible? So not just planetary, but also by the very walk of life, and by all reason, they shouldn’t have ever crossed paths, even accidentally. If they were both paupers on different planets and physically passed by each other, they might talk, but by separating them by class, even if they walked by each other, one is literal royalty and the boundary would be immense.

So that they eventually crossed paths by fate, shows the power and will of the force to bring good people together or some bullshit.

Ngl, it all reads as ffmpreg now. I had to look at it like four times before it didn’t look like ffmpreg

Google, a decade late to the party.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samsung_DeX

The infernal machine devours itself.

Jesus Christ.

The Microslop train doesn’t stop. It doesn’t falter. It doesn’t slow.

Microslop gon give it to ya.

Can’t push them, but you can sure as hell push their cart out of the way

Barium Pupitar Kupfer

Asking for a friend

Oh fuck I didn’t see what comm this was. Brb editing

Edit: 👍

Spending time with your dad

I haven’t played wow in like 15 years, so I don’t know either.

I do know that many other games have this system, some worse. I get the issue where you can get your money back out being actually a draw for people who could see it at profitable, that’s a helllllla dark pattern.

I don’t think Valve runs any of the third party platforms though. They only run the Steam marketplace, to my knowledge. I refuse to gamble on CS2 skins though, it goes against my values.

Being able to launder assets into money, while potentially being a draw (“wow, if I spend $20, I could make $1,000,000!”), seems really fucking obtuse as soon as you realize that it’s through buying sold out steam decks or valve indexes. If that is happening though, I wish it wouldn’t, because that encourages scalping.

I proposed a system for cs2 in a different thread:

You only get so many crates per week or hour played or whatever, and those crates are free to open and random. But, you can buy keys for specific crates where you can manually choose what you get out of said crate. The profits for that crate is split between the different skins in that crate, with more percentage going to the skin maker of the skin you chose.

The implications and nuances of this lawsuit are so incredibly deep and ripple so far, that anybody on here or anywhere else that says they strongly feel one way or the other is either completely full of shit, has an ulterior motive, or has a personal stake somehow.

This lawsuit, when deeply thought about, is the opposite of simple. The more you know, the messier it gets.

You, too. What an absolutely toxic and unhelpful thing to say to somebody.

Chill. This isn’t Reddit. People are allowed to express themselves or go on tangents here. No need to be an asshole.

Black pilled. But probably based. What if she is AI?

I’m convinced it won’t happen.

We’ve seen it age and age again, the young people and new people are too ignorant and weak. The only way is through learned family values, which take far too long to impart. Maybe, once the gaming community settles and all parents who vote with their wallet tell their kids to vote with their wallet…

The rate at which young people appear and give leeway to companies catering to inexperienced kids enforces a no-consequences for zero innovation and continuously evolving dark patterns cycle.

We have to solve the company bad behavior problem a different way. We had a very small window with zo years ago, but even then we flubbed it as a community.

Their argument is just “this is gambling, gambling is illegal in ny”

But it is also “you should be doing more to prevent this, this is your responsibility”

But then also "you let kids gamble*

And then sort of ALSO “therefore, you’re evil and all of your profits are ill begotten and you’ve built an industry around 100% preying on gambling for children and circumventing our moral highground laws that outlaw sin”

So, just based on the first one, yeah, guilty.

The second one, maybe. Requiring Valve to do all that suddenly would be a massive undertaking. I’d be curious to see what they could turn out. They’d go from game devs, to store owners, to a small government.

Letting kids gamble though… Like, this is such bullshit. Fuck off with that nonsense. This is unfair targeting on THAT issue. For what’s actually happening everywhere, this is such a targeted and unreasonable change of expectation of consequence. Yeah it has to happen somewhere, but can it happen to fucking EA instead? Or even Pokemon. Do it to the TCG market or the console market. Why the PC market’s best platform? Not muh boy Gaben. He’s been so good to us all. OUR LORD AND SAVIORRRRRRRRRR

I’m curious to see what happens though. If Valve does lose, I hope things change for the better and not for the worse. I wonder what the Trump admin and other Nazi benefactors and idealists want. Probably to see Valve fall.

You can use your steam wallet money to buy DDR5 RAM and HDDs!

This is a mess. I’ve rewritten this a bit of this and added sections and removed sections. The gist of what I think is just that I have a lot of mixed feelings about all of this, and it’s a very VERY complex topic that I just want to be done with…

In addition to asking Valve to modify or eliminate its loot box system, the New York suit asks for Valve to make “full restitution to consumers” for the disgorgement of “all monies” received from its gambling system, and for fines of “three times the amount of its gain.” Ars Technica has reached out to Valve for comment.

Lol.

Okay, so,

12. Loot boxes, like other forms of gambling, can lead to addiction and result in real harm. But Valve’s loot boxes are particularly pernicious because they are popular among children and adolescents, who are lured into opening loot boxes by the prospect of winning expensive virtual items that convey status in the gaming world. Research has shown that children who are introduced to gambling are at a significantly higher risk of developing gambling addictions later in life.

I read the “nature of the lawsuit” part of the lawsuit, as I think it’s enough to understand the gist of what’s going on. The lawsuit is like 50 pages long and I’m not a lawyer, I’m just laying in bed with my eyelids getting heavy.

Basically, 1-11, and 13 are entirely THIS IS GAMBLING with sprinkles of GAMBLING IS BAD. Like, yeah, no fucking duh. 14 states:

14. As described further below, Valve’s actions violate Article I, Section 9 of the New York Constitution, and Sections 220.05 and 220.10 of New York’s Penal Law.

Looks like article I section 9 is ‘gambling is illegal in ny’. It doesn’t immediately say what 220.05/10 are, but going off the really big focus on THIS IS GAMBLING AND GAMBLING IS ILLEGAL trend, I can guess what it says.

So, why the fuck is ny going after valve NOW? Why not… I dunno, a decade ago? This is so weird! And why not sue ALL the companies that have been doing it for many decades now? Niantic, Nintendo, Microsoft, Sony, the hoards of gacha games and trading card games? It can’t really be that the valve definition really just hit some specific conditions, like being otherwise useless skins, most crate opens are worth basically nothing, etc. can it?

And then mixed in is a pretty heavy amount of protect the children. Which… Yes, virtue signal, but yes. Valve shouldn’t allow children to be gambling. But also, I think this is a case of a mean-well situation that developed in the wrong way. Valve needs to check themselves and fix this, 100%.

If you don’t know, the skins thing developed over probably more than a decade. It was a way for modders and skinners to legitimately make money, rather than be barred by copyright. Valve would share in the profit, everybody would see your custom skins rather than just you, it would give everyone a sense of uniqueness, and wouldn’t unbalance the game because it was just cosmetics. Then rarity and logistics, and then it spiraled out of control. It was never meant to be “hey let’s give kids gambling addiction and steal their money”, Valve is one of the very few companies that that ISN’T their goal, as is very evidenced by anybody who knows anything about them. They aren’t EA. It’s unfortunate that it ended up this way, with other companies only seeing the dollar signs, with valve landing on it where they have, with the building hate for them.

I had a bunch of other stuff written out, mostly thoughts as I went. I have many thoughts on this. I think Valve should stop lootboxes and set an example as a leader of the industry.

I’m sad to see Valve get kicked so much, and would be devastated to see Steam and Valve fall (muh library!). They generally do try to serve consumers well, it’s very clear. They single handedly saved pc gaming by offering a quality service better than piracy. Always on DRM was the trade. I hope they can innovate and do better without further dark patterns. Maybe this lawsuit is just what they need to get their shit together. Maybe it’ll destroy them and a bunch of actually shitty companies will continue to be the shittiest companies to ever grace the earth in Valve’s place. I have a very bad feeling about this.

Valve, for all our sakes, do better, plz fix. Before this gets worse.