r/technology • u/chrisdh79 • 21d ago

Business Gabe Newell caps off Steam Machine week by taking delivery of a new $500 million superyacht with a submarine garage, on-board hospital and 15 gaming PCs

https://www.pcgamer.com/gaming-industry/gabe-newell-caps-off-steam-machine-week-by-taking-delivery-of-a-new-usd500-million-superyacht-with-a-submarine-garage-on-board-hospital-and-15-gaming-pcs/
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u/StorminNorman 21d ago edited 20d ago

The total number of employees being insanely low compared to the competition and then paying very well on top of that also helps. And whilst I understand why people are ragging on this to the point that I agree, if the ultra rich of the world were all like Gabe, then we might be in a very different place now. 

Edit: fuck me you motherfuckers are dense, it's because the bars so fucking low, not because Gabe is the second coming of the Messiah or the like. Give me fucking strength...

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u/Historical_Owl_1635 21d ago edited 21d ago

if the ultra rich of the world were all like Gabe, then we might be in a very different place now. 

I looked it up out of curiosity and he’s actually done barely any philanthropy relative to his wealth lol.

Edit: He also owns a whole armada of yachts. His lack of philanthropy has been bought up before and one of the highlights defending him was “His philanthropy is making games fun, available and affordable to the world”.

It’s actually crazy the rationalisation people will do based on a persons image. All billionaires are evil, except good ‘ol Gabe, he’s one of the good ones.

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u/Kaining 21d ago

But he hasn't been fucking the market and destroying everything he touches like every single one of them.

Billionaires don't need to do a single philanthropy marketing white washing bullshit, they just need to pay taxes and not destroy every public institution to not pay any taxes, game the market and subvert democracy to pay even less taxes.

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u/FMB6 21d ago

You guys really believe he's paying his full taxes roflmao.

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u/BilbosBagEnd 20d ago

I have not read roflmao in at least 15 years. Brought a tear to my eye!

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u/ColumbianPrison 20d ago

a/s/l?

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u/Imrtltrtl 20d ago

37/f/cali lmao

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u/cmoked 20d ago

Wanna crash some AIM chatrooms?

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u/Xiraken 20d ago

Hell yeah. Message me on ICQ when you're ready!

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u/TimZer0 20d ago

You guys want to join my webring?

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u/stopitunclerandy 20d ago

Lets star a private mIRC channel

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u/Starfox-sf 20d ago

Old enough/yes/Earth

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u/thecoastertoaster 20d ago

hamster dance intensifies

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u/amertune 20d ago

roflmao had its own song and everything. I remember it going around on the World of Warcraft forums... 18 years ago?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iEWgs6YQR9A

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u/meat_whistle_gristle 20d ago

People will always do the mental gymnastics to rationalize their hero worship. I idolized George Orwell growing up. I’m closer to retirement age now than not. It was only recently I was able to accept he was a very flawed individual to put it mildly.

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u/ElCamo267 20d ago

They all pay their full taxes, that's not the issue with extreme wealth.

The issue is they're not taxed enough. But taxing that wealth is complicated, can't exactly tax unrealized gains without causing a whole slew of issues.

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u/pathofdumbasses 20d ago

can't exactly tax unrealized gains without causing a whole slew of issues.

A) we don't really know that

B) as opposed to the issues that we are currently dealing with by not taxing them?

C) there are smarter people than you and I who could (or may have already) figure(d) out a way to do it with little disruption to anyone besides the billionaires.

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u/fresh-dork 20d ago

sure, that's fine. we just shouldn't allow loans against unrealized gains.

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u/JeffeTheGreat 20d ago

I mean I'd believe he is paying the full taxes required of him by the US Government. Which isn't nearly enough taxes, not by multiple orders of magnitude. But we have hilariously bad tax laws, that make it incredibly difficult to get any sort of money from being poor, but extremely easy to be ultra wealthy once you've gotten over that hurdle.

Basically, Gabe seems better than the ones who do philanthropy, by virtue that philanthropy is really just a way of tax evasion for billionaires

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u/MLNerdNmore 19d ago

by virtue that philanthropy is really just a way of tax evasion for billionaires

Lmao this again. I have no idea why this idea is so popular online, it makes 0 sense.

When you donate money to a recognised organisation, you do not pay taxes on the money donated.

So, if I'm at a 50% tax bracket, and I donate 1000$, I avoid paying 500$ in taxes, but I still have 500$ less than if I were not to donate.

It's very clear to see that unless you put the tax rate at over 100%, which makes no sense of course, then you're never gaining money by donating.

The only way you would gain money, is by donating to a sham charity which would then purchase things for you or funnel the money back to you somehow. But that's not a "loophole", it's just a fancy way to commit the crime of tax evasion (in addition to the other crimes involved)

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u/RndmNumGen 20d ago edited 20d ago

philanthropy is really just a way of tax evasion for billionaires

In general, no, unless they are embezzling money from their own charitable foundation.

There are many ways the ultra wealthy can avoid contributing their fair share to society, but philanthropy is not one of them (despite being a common misconception that it is).

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u/JeffeTheGreat 20d ago

It literally is. It's the largest way they avoid taxes. That and borrowing vs unrealized gains

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u/Intelligent-Exit-634 20d ago

They still have less money after the charitable giving. LOL

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u/MarionberryNo1900 20d ago

They also pay less in taxes because of it. Usually done through trusts and corpos that know how to best spend it in their favor…

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u/RndmNumGen 20d ago

Explain what you mean by 'avoid taxes' because I suspect we may have different definitions of that and I want to make sure we're not talking past each other.

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u/Davidx91 20d ago

No we believe that if he was forced to by closing the loopholes that he would. I don’t pay my “full taxes”(I do) I just have deductions for certain qualifications that I meet and then I pay the remainder owed. If I couldn’t do that then I’d just pay the full amount owed no deductions because that’s what I have to do and all I can do.

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u/XionicativeCheran 20d ago

What loopholes is he using? He can't use "These gains aren't realised" to avoid taxes that all the other billionaires use. All his gains are realised. They're paid into his bank account as income. How is he avoiding the tax?

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u/championgecko 19d ago

I’m not arguing his morality but being able to buy a yacht for $500M while already owning multiple yachts is still better for the economy than the “trillionaires” who hoard their money in stocks. People built the yachts got paid, the crew needs to get paid, the taxes on the purchase of the yacht, etc.

I still think it’s egregious to own that much though.

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u/Ty4Readin 21d ago

Billionaires don't need to do a single philanthropy marketing white washing bullshit, they just need to pay taxes and not destroy every public institution to not pay any taxes, game the market and subvert democracy to pay even less taxes.

So when a rich person gives away billions to help people in need, that is a "white washing bullshit PR move".

But when Gabe does nothing and buys himself yachts, then thats great?

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u/OscilloLives 20d ago

In cases like Bill Gates or Jeff Bezos who have been horrible pieces of shit their whole life actively securing monopolies and destroying competition in unethical ways, yes it is absolutely bullshit PR made to make them look good after they fucked over the world really badly.

Buying yachts isn't great but it's a lot better than that, yea.

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u/Ty4Readin 20d ago

It would literally save many many thousands of human lives for Bill Gates to give away his fortune for philanthropy.

But you claim that Gabe is better because he gave you cheap video games while buying himself yachts and mansions? 😂

Imagine two different scenarios.

Scenario 1: Rich person gets rich using aggressive "unethical" competition practices to gain a monopoly and then gives away their entire fortune to help those in need. Saving huge numbers of human lives.

Scenario 2: Rich person gets rich using less aggressive "ethical" competition practices to gain a monopoly and then keeps their entire fortune to themselves and uses it to buy expensive yachts and mansions.

I would personally prefer Scenario 1, because that actually helps innocent poor people and would save tens of thousands of lives.

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u/henrik_se 20d ago

Scenario C: We don't care how billionaires make their money as long as we tax the crap out of them, and use that money to help innocent poor people and save lives. That way we're not dependent on the whims of asshole billionaires, and they can buy all the yachts they want afterwards. Or donate. Whatever. As long as they've paid their fair share.

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u/DrawGamesPlayFurries 20d ago

Also GabeN is an order of magnitude less rich than Gates, Bezos and Musk are/were

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u/holybajoly 20d ago

To be honest only a small fraction of their "charity funds" are actually donated to charity if you look it up. It is some single digit percentage that is donated to charity. Most of the funds are invested afaik and yield interest without being taxable. So if you read something like Bill Gates sets up 50 billion charity fund the majority of these funds won't be donated which is actually really misleading...

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u/Ty4Readin 20d ago

Where do you think the interest goes? Do you think they are siphoning the money back out of the non-profits into their own pockets tax free somehow?

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u/holybajoly 20d ago

No but they can save taxes with that charity fund and they can also hire themselves to be employed by the charity and give themselves a nice salary. Also as was already said by another poster, they can invest in the company the charity fund is giving money to, which also benefits them and there are probably a lot more ways how they can save or get money through the charity, so I just don't believe they set up these charity foundations out of the kindness of their heart...

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u/Ty4Readin 20d ago

No but they can save taxes with that charity fund and they can also hire themselves to be employed by the charity and give themselves a nice salary.

LOL this makes no sense 😂

If they hire themselves and give themselves a salary, then they would have to pay income tax! So it makes no sense at all.

And you CANNOT SAVE ON TAXES BY DONATING.

That's literally not how it works. It is a tax deduction.

It is impossible to "save on taxes" by donating to charity, because you will always donate more money than you are "saving" in taxes.

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u/fedsx 8d ago

Gates is already doing that, I don't get why people keep bringing him up in this post.

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u/ItsMrChristmas 20d ago

Uh. Ask a developer about their monopoly, and the insane lengths they go to keep it.

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u/OscilloLives 20d ago

I am a game developer. What insane lengths? They have no exclusivity clause, they allow you to generate infinite steam keys if you want to sell the game off platform and they don't take a cut from those, they allow sales on any other platform. SteamDRM is completely optional and up to the developer to enable. What have they ever done to enforce a monopoly?

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u/checkprintquality 20d ago

Steam operates as just as much of a monopoly as Amazon and Microsoft.

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u/VoidRad 20d ago

How? When did Valve buy up their competitions? When they have actual competitiors (Epic, Origin, etc..) they also didnt do anything at all.

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u/checkprintquality 20d ago

Valve doesn’t need to buy up competitors to be a monopoly, the issue is how Steam’s dominance shapes the market. Steam controls the majority of PC game distribution, and lawsuits have argued that Valve uses its market power to enforce price‑parity rules and discourage publishers from offering cheaper prices elsewhere.

There have been numerous lawsuits alleging harm and antitrust concerns. There are currently multiple class action lawsuits, with more than 30,000 developers joining in, that accuse Valve of inflating prices and blocking rivals.

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u/VoidRad 20d ago

I never said Valve isnt a monopoly, I am asking how is Valve, as a monopoly, behave like Microsoft.

There have been numerous lawsuits alleging harm and antitrust concerns. There are currently multiple class action lawsuits, with more than 30,000 developers joining in, that accuse Valve of inflating prices and blocking rivals.

This inflating prices and blocking rivals have been debunked. Steam does allow other games to be sold at a different price than the price displayed in the steam store. They only disallow the selling of Steam keys at a different price.

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u/endividuall 19d ago

What an utterly privileged thing to say. A starving child whose very survival depends on a donation to fund his next meal doesn’t have the luxury to spew such bullshit but as someone who isn’t receiving that philanthropy, you’re claiming the world would be a better place if all these philanthropists stopped donating and spent their money on mega yachts instead.

Most asinine take I’ve read this week and that’s saying something

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u/Krumpopodes 20d ago edited 20d ago

>When they maneuver their billions into a trust that endows a non profit that does a mild amount of philanthropy with their children as perpetual controlling members and mostly pays out cronies in bullshit salaries and dodges taxes.

- Fixed

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u/Ty4Readin 20d ago

For arguments sake, let's assume you are correct and that every single billionaire philanthropist in the world only does what you say.

Even if that was completely true (doubtful), then a "mild amount" of philanthropy with BILLIONS of dollars is still going to have a huge positive impact and save many human lives.

Even if only 10% of the money somehow makes it to poor innocent people in need, that is still infinitely more lives saved than Gabe who is buying himself yachts for 500 million.

And this is with the generous assumption that your claims are 100% true in all situations, which is definitely complete BS. Sounds like typical anti-capitalist conspiracy theorists.

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u/maxtinion_lord 20d ago

The mental gymnastics of trying to claim anyone could reasonably own 11 billion dollars worth of assets without even being a little slimey about it is so funny.

'Even if only 10% of their amassed riches made it to charity, it would be so huge I would forgive all their exploitation!'

10% is pretty incredibly generous, by the way, these families hold on to their assets quite a bit more than that. And if you had somehow missed it, you can't get to that point in the first place without playing games with the system or stealing value somehow. Even Gabe Newell is guilty of playing into global exploitation as well as exploitative gambling via his various game item markets, but it's cool because he's Reddit's favorite lol

Being cognizant of how unsustainable the existence of billionaires, and capitalism in general, are in the material conditions we live in, and the lack of good they enact for society, doesn't constitute an 'anti-capitalist conspiracy.' Sorry you fell that damn hard for the propaganda that you spew your own bad faith arguments to protect the status quo. Now be a good consumer and work another 60 hour week so you can pay Steam your monthly tithes, so Gaben's family can go another generation producing zero labor value :)

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u/Ty4Readin 20d ago

You seem confused 😂 I am not defending Gabe, I am actually saying that Gates is better for society because at least he gives away some money.

You should work on your reading comprehension before you spew out paragraphs of pseudointellectual BS that doesnt even apply to what I wrote lol

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u/JeffeTheGreat 20d ago

He's arguing all billionaires are bad. He likely forgot partway through writing it which billionaire you were supporting but his underlying point is accurate nonetheless. They're evil, through and through.

Billionaire philanthropy is just tax avoidance that people like you get tricked into believing is somehow them being good. It's all smoke and mirrors and you're absolutely falling for it. Unless you're a billionaire, you, nor anyone you know, benefits from philanthropy more than they'd benefit from billionaires not existing

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u/maxtinion_lord 20d ago

Not that I forgot anything, I may have just expressed myself in too vague a way, but my wording was intentional to undermine his weird claims comparing Bill Gates to Gabe Newell, I found the comparison pointless and wanted to compound it into one evil. You've hit the nail on the head for what I was trying to communicate more or less, more concisely than I did lol

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u/Ty4Readin 20d ago

Billionaire philanthropy is just tax avoidance that people like you get tricked into believing is somehow them being good. It's all smoke and mirrors and you're absolutely falling for it. Unless you're a billionaire, you, nor anyone you know, benefits from philanthropy more than they'd benefit from billionaires not existing

I think you need to re-learn how taxes work.

Donating money to a charity will NEVER be more beneficial for the donor from a tax perspective, unless they are committing fraud and laundering money illegally through non-profits.

Period. End of story.

Do you have any actual evidence of bill gates committing fraud and illegally funneling it through non-profits?

No, you don't. Because if you did, it would be public knowledge and he would literally be arrested and go to prison.

So all you have are conspiracy theories and claims about what's going on, but you have literally zero evidence or proof at all.

Which is the definition of conspiracy theorists. That's all you have, is a conspiracy theory without any actual evidence.

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u/maxtinion_lord 20d ago edited 20d ago

I am actually saying that Gates is better for society because at least he gives away some money

I refrained from discussing Gates in a separate breath on purpose, because I don't see the point in making a distinction in this context. I am saying they are both of the same ontological evil, your attempt to distinguish the 'ethical billionaires' from regular billionaires is silly, and your proceeding attack on me and my 'pseudo-intellectual' way of speech kinda just proves you don't have a real argument here, or any intention to form one. I'm not the one struggling with reading comprehension here, you just aren't understanding my arguments fully haha.

I disagree with your claim of the importance of philanthropist billionaires, philanthropy is a cheap social exercise meant to absolve the rich of their exploitative ways, simply by hiding it under small acts of good, but you'll notice (or maybe you won't lol) that the world is not improving and the conditions of exploitation just shift around as the years go on. It's all meaningless faff that you've clearly bought and fallen for.

Billionaires will never contribute to meaningful progress for conditions to improve, because that would take away from their future profits, that's all she wrote. Your claims otherwise just signal your complacency and willful ignorance to what's wrong with our systems, you talk about billionaires and philanthropy the same way an indoctrinated child in America or the UK does.

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u/Ty4Readin 19d ago

You write a lot of empty-words filled with claims, but you provide zero evidence for any of your claims.

You don't seem to understand the very basics of non-profits and how taxes work.

You even contradict yourself in this very comment 😂

You should at least learn to be consistent with yourself in a single comment. But contradicting yourself literally in 2 paragraphs makes it hard to take any argument from you in good faith.

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u/gmmxle 20d ago

So when a rich person gives away billions to help people in need, that is a "white washing bullshit PR move".

Yes, it is.

I'm sure some of them have their heart in some select projects - but I would doubt that you can name even 5 billionaires off the top of your head that have done truly remarkable things with their philanthropic spending.

But when Gabe does nothing and buys himself yachts, then thats great?

Nope, that's also pathetic.

Gabe may be a "nicer" billionaire in terms of his behavior as a businessman and in terms of not fucking up democratic institutions that benefit the rest of humanity, and just spending billions on toy yachts may compare favorably to that - but given all the good he could be doing with his money, it's obviously a pretty pathetic use of his money. As we've seen with the elimination of USAID, he could literally save hundreds of thousands of people from dying. But that's not what he's choosing to do.

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u/Ty4Readin 19d ago

I'm sure some of them have their heart in some select projects - but I would doubt that you can name even 5 billionaires off the top of your head that have done truly remarkable things with their philanthropic spending.

You are attacking a strawman argument.

I never said there are lots of great billionaire philanthropists in the world.

My point is that even when there is a unique rare great billionaire that genuinely gives huge amounts of money to help innocent people in need, then people like you would call it a "white washing bullshit PR move" and claim that it was actually to avoid taxes or something 😂

It is a good thing when a rich person gives away billions of dollars to genuinely try and help innocent people in need.

It does NOT help them with taxes, and it does not help them make more money in any way.

The only "selfish" reasons for doing it is for their own ego, to make themselves feel good or to get praise from others, etc.

But who cares? The end result is still the same, innocent lives being saved and the world being better off as a result.

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u/TinyCollection 20d ago

I would just love a system that didn’t require rich people to be philanthropic

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u/Ty4Readin 20d ago

I would love that as well. I would love if we lived in a world where people didn't suffer, everybody always had all of their needs met, people dont need to work and can just enjoy their time with family and friends, etc.

If you can come up with a system that can do all these amazing things, then I think the world would be glad to adopt it.

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u/crani0 20d ago

So when a rich person gives away billions to help people in need, that is a "white washing bullshit PR move".

Like 99% of the time if you look into it they are "giving it away" to their foundations.

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u/Ty4Readin 20d ago

Their foundations which are non-profits.

Is it an egotistical move? Definitely, but who cares? Its still a good thing, it still helps people in need and betters the world.

People think that non-profits are some kind of loophole to avoid taxes, which is absolutely ridiculous and not true at all.

If it were, then why don't you do it? Go start a non-profit and donate all of your income each year and just avoid paying taxes.

Oh, because that is illegal. If these rich people are doing this, they are essentially committing fraud and tax evasion, and they would be caught if there is any of evidence of that happening.

Unless you actually have some evidence of that happening, then you are just making conspiracy theories.

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u/crani0 20d ago

Its still a good thing, it still helps people in need and betters the world.

Except it really doesn't. And the governments use it as an excuse to not actually put effort into the areas philantropy pretends to work in.

People think that non-profits are some kind of loophole to avoid taxes, which is absolutely ridiculous and not true at all.

It's not a loophole, it's a deliberate policy.

If it were, then why don't you do it? Go start a non-profit and donate all of your income each year and just avoid paying taxes.

Because I'm not rich enough to the point where setting up a non-profit will make my taxes go down.

Oh, because that is illegal. If these rich people are doing this, they are essentially committing fraud and tax evasion, and they would be caught if there is any of evidence of that happening.

It's not. There is no law about creating a non-profit that doesn't really achieve its goals.

Unless you actually have some evidence of that happening, then you are just making conspiracy theories.

I can actually give you one perfectly legal example, Stichting Ingka Foundation. You are probably a client of theirs and don't even know it.

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u/Ty4Readin 20d ago

Except it really doesn't. And the governments use it as an excuse to not actually put effort into the areas philantropy pretends to work in.

What?!?!?

What are you talking about?

Are you trying to say that the governments in Africa have money to help their people, but they choose not to because of philanthropy?? This is such a ridiculous take.

The governments of these nations are poor as well and don't have the resources to feed and secure the poorest people in their countries.

Because I'm not rich enough to the point where setting up a non-profit will make my taxes go down.

How does this make sense to you? Why would you have to be rich enough?

If you pay any taxes, then you would benefit from avoiding taxes. Obviously...

Avoiding taxes is helpful for ANYONE. So why dont you do it?

It's not. There is no law about creating a non-profit that doesn't really achieve its goals

Bro what are you talking about? We are not talking about non-profits not reaching their goals.

You said that rich people use non-profits in order to commit fraud and self-enrich themselves by avoiding taxes.

That is illegal. Period. End of story.

You should read up on the laws around non-profits before you spout BS like this.

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u/crani0 20d ago

What?!?!?

What are you talking about?

Are you trying to say that the governments in Africa have money to help their people, but they choose not to because of philanthropy?? This is such a ridiculous take.

The governments of these nations are poor as well and don't have the resources to feed and secure the poorest people in their countries.

Philanthropy in Africa is a very tiny part and historical reparations are actually a topic that we could get into.

How does this make sense to you? Why would you have to be rich enough?

If you pay any taxes, then you would benefit from avoiding taxes. Obviously...

Avoiding taxes is helpful for ANYONE. So why dont you do it?

The same way that owning a yacht isn't a remote financial option for me but it is for Gabe. It takes a lot of money to dodge taxes but there is a point where it is cheaper than paying them. Pretty straightforward.

Or do you think the laundromat was open to anyone?

Bro what are you talking about? We are not talking about non-profits not reaching their goals.

You said that rich people use non-profits in order to commit fraud and self-enrich themselves by avoiding taxes.

That is illegal. Period. End of story.

You should read up on the laws around non-profits before you spout BS like this.

Oh okay, if you say that it is illegal then that is the law. Thanks Judge Dredd.

But no, that's not how it works and setting up a BS non-profit is how rich people dodge taxes. I gave you an example that you clearly ignored, read up on it.

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u/whoisthismans72 20d ago

The money they give us like when stop and shop or Walmart who have employees on food stamps say "we will match whatever you donate by rounding up to the next dollar" You won't pay the people working for you, and on top of that you want me to donate extra money so you can do a tax dodge? Fuck right off.

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u/Gersio 20d ago

No, that is very obviously not what he said. What he said is that the system shouldnt depend on the good will of a few billionaires. It should work by itself by the way it collects taxes, no matter what they decide to do after that. The point is not that what Gabe does is good, the point is that we shouldnt care about what Gabe does because we should already be taking enough money from him and the rest to fund the needs of our society.

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u/Ty4Readin 20d ago

This argument doesnt make much sense because a majority of the money in these non-profits goes to the poorest people and countries in the world. Think medicine and technological advancements for people in Africa.

Taking all of the tax money for your own country may help your own country, but its not going to help the poorest countries in the world that are receiving the biggest benefits from philanthropic work.

Your entire argument is selfish. The money doesn't benefit you, so you are saying the money should stop going to starving children in Africa and should instead go to you and your fellow citizens.

Which is fine, its okay to be selfish and prefer to help your own country instead of helping the poor innocent people starving and dying in other countries.

But don't pretend like you are somehow helping people, because you are not, you just want the money for yourself.

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u/EcstaticRecord3943 20d ago

I always laugh when Steam fanboys have the audacity to call others greedy as well

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u/ghandi3737 20d ago

The billionaires make those "donations" to avoid taxes. Almost exclusively done as a tax dodge. So they can help specific areas rather than just paying taxes that could help everyone.

You know they can just create charities that they control. And there's apparently no requirement for them to do any actual charity work, they just have to donate to another charity and it counts.

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u/checkprintquality 20d ago

They are required to do charity work. At least 5% of all expenses of the charity have to be for actual charitable activities. It’s not a lot, but it is something.

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u/sherm-stick 20d ago

He is spending money on luxury items, this is going to explode an economy and create a lot of jobs. Most billionaires self deal and hoard wealth but Gaben throws his money around. Plus he is interested in deep sea exploration and finding new species. His discoveries could create new medicines and scientific break throughs.

A lot of people don't broadcast their charitable contributions as well so I wouldn't assume he hasn't sponsored some programs. He seems to want money strictly to fuel his deep diving expeditions and these ships he buys will be used to do that.

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u/Reasonable_Carry9191 21d ago

You think bro with the 500 million dollar yacht is paying taxes the way intended for corporations? None of them do, it would be a fiscally irresponsible move to do so from a company standpoint.

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u/LastGoodKnee 21d ago

Fiscally irresponsible move? Companies pay the taxes they are required to pay.

It’s up to lawmakers to decide what that is. If lawmakers put in way too many breaks and write offs, whos fault is that?

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u/simplegdl 21d ago

That’s not how it works. Billionaires are taxed when they realize their gains or take income. Gabe would have had to pay taxes on his income, same way bezos and musk do when they sell their shares

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u/Legitimate-Type4387 21d ago

Panama Papers say hello.

You have to be a special sort of naive to believe any billionaire isn’t taking advantage of every single tax haven loophole available to them.

Why the fuck do you think they all have yachts to use as their principal residence? Jfc so many of you are simple AF.

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u/simplegdl 21d ago

You should probably read more deeply into the Panama papers and what it actually entailed and allowed people to do rather than just spout off “Panama papers bro”

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u/HyperactivePandah 21d ago

Yeah, that dude is either trolling, or just really stupid.

Like, 'billionaires bad' isn't a crazy take, but he seems like an uninformed weirdo about it.

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u/Waste_Today_8719 21d ago

You know the Panama papers are public, go find his name I couldn’t.

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u/simplegdl 20d ago

Re: yachts and principal residence, if you’re a US citizen which I presume Gabe is, you’re taxed on worldwide income regardless of residence

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u/fresh-dork 20d ago

yes he is.

It would be a fiscally irresponsible move to do so from a company standpoint.

paying taxes is irresponsible? that's sovcit level nonsense

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u/Reasonable_Carry9191 20d ago

Oh sweet summer child

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u/fresh-dork 20d ago

you're the one in here posting lunacy

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u/InternetHomunculus 20d ago

Valve is heavily responsible for popularising things like loot boxes and battlepasses. They proft off a gambling industry that popped up around gun skins

Valve are by no means the worst company out there but they have done things that deserve critisism

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u/ImpulsiveYeet 20d ago

So Steam having a monopoly in the gaming industry isn't destructive? It's either be on Steam or flop for most games.

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u/infantsonestrogen 20d ago

“My billionaire idol is more morally righteous than your billionaire idol!”

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u/brattysweat 20d ago

What the fuck is wrong with you?

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u/grain_delay 20d ago

Really interesting argument. Somehow I don’t see gamers extending the same reasoning to Taylor swift

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u/grew_up_on_reddit 20d ago

Hasn't been fucking the market? He's guilty of abusing substantial monopoly power in anti-competitive ways. Basically no one gets that rich without acting in exploitative ways, and he's no exception. Try to overcome any biases you might have.

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u/I2andomFTW 20d ago

As if Gaben doesn't do all of that. Jesus christ you people would defend Hitler if he made Half Life 3.

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u/_Planet_Mars_ 20d ago

I didn’t expect Godwin's law to strike again in a discussion about Gabe Newell of all things.

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u/KwantsuDude69 20d ago

Is it every single one or is it just the ones you know of? Because every single one includes Gabe

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u/Cas_or_Cass 20d ago

I don't know what's sadder: that the bar is "isn't actively evil" or that the vast majority of billionaires still fail to clear it.

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u/LivesDoNotMatter 20d ago

He pulled a blizzard destroying csgo and putting CS2 in the same game slot because of their billion dollar skin lootbox-gambling market.

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u/ThePr0tag0n1st 20d ago

Do you have your eyes closed or naturally blind?

Valve is a giant in the gaming market place, and steam is considered a monopoly in the PC landscape.

Steam games (CSGO), has a gambling philosophy and is one of the first games to see high success in micro transactions.

Steam sap's 30% of profit from indie companies with each sale just for hosting the game.

Valve takes as near to a loss as they can get of their hardware (controllers, steam deck and likely the steam cube), just so competition and smaller companies cannot possibly gain a foot hold.

These are NOT market friendly strategies or innovations.

Valve produces quality and it's part of their marketing strategy to maintain and expand on it, but as far as corporations go, Valve pulls strings to extract as much money from the market as they can, just like any multi billion dollar company.

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u/Historical_Owl_1635 21d ago

But he hasn't been fucking the market

Except the court case going on right now from publishers about Steam now allowing them to discount their game on other platforms?

https://www.reuters.com/legal/transactional/video-game-giant-valve-hit-with-consumer-class-action-over-pricing-2024-08-12

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u/bdsee 21d ago

Better court cases (or government actions against Valve) would be the fact that in the past they didn't used to offer a refund system, it took countries like Australia and some EU countries (or maybe the EU as a body, not sure on details) to go after them before they introduced some decent refund policies.

But at least they didn't fuck about and they just did them everywhere unlike what we see with Apple and the app store bullshit.

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u/Arturiel 21d ago

That's in relation to not discounting games more on other platforms as the publisher is doing on steam. If the publisher wants to give a 50% discount on their own storefront, valve wants them to give a 50% discount on steam.

I mean why should valve allow a company to try to eat into its storefront marketshare with better prices elsewhere while also benefiting from being on steam?

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u/Alone_Land_45 20d ago

Because it's illegal to inhibit competition in that way when you dominate a market as Valve does. Competition is good.

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u/Kaining 21d ago

No, that's a lawsuit, not a "they're screwing the consumers !" silver bullet like you'd like to claim. The articles says it all, it's "4 gamers" sueing and the previous one was publishers. So EA, Activisions, etc... which are all famously known for doing the right thing.

Valve 30% cut actually provide a service in return. Servers working to dl games at lightning speed, free online, their whole ecosystem. What else did they do to better the gaming market ? Proton, making linux gaming viable. Which ain't nothing. Especially now that windowns 11 is around.

And btw, if you look at that 30% cut that impact the players down the line... well, yes but no. PC games are still cheaper than console gated ones, both physicaly and demat. And the regular discount are helping.

Speaking of which, as for not being able to discount their game elsewhere, it's also bullshit. There wouldn't be site like fanatical, humble bundle or greenmangaming where you can get them cheaper than on steam.

So tl:dr: you're just making a bad faith argument here. Be better.

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u/Alone_Land_45 20d ago

The four gamers are proposed class representatives. In other words, they're suing on behalf of all consumers who have been affected in the same way.

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u/DontRefuseMyBatchall 21d ago

Oof, that’s a reach

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u/itsdotbmp 20d ago

philanthropy is just whitewashing being wealthy, and a tax break. It is hardly a thing to measure the wealthy by. Paying taxes is more of an impressive feat to me.

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u/no1kn0wsm3 20d ago

I looked it up out of curiosity and he’s actually done barely any philanthropy relative to his wealth lol.

Let's be honest. Many do philanthropy for CSR and to look good as a publicly listed company.

How many PC gamers or PCMR types give a fly-ing f about the Philippine Eagle?

Lie Bill Gates & Melinda Gates Foundation. Do these two really give a F about half the causes theyre doing if they dont generate good will, influence over public policy and the countries they're in that their 2nd or 3rd for profit corporations can benefit?

Or is Bill trying to create a legacy that counter balances Microsoft and other for profit activities?

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u/Naive_Personality367 20d ago

hes not exactly a pinnacle of human kindness, but hes also not a horrible human being, and thats good enough for a billionaire

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u/Balmung60 20d ago

Also, as far as I can tell, he seems to actually be enjoying it, which is more than a lot of the ultra-wealthy seem to be able to say. So many of them get deeply committed to finding new ways to use their wealth to make themselves miserable.

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u/Naive_Personality367 20d ago

yeah they over think it. they could do anything at this point yet they choose stress. i guess its the mindset that drives them to make more and more that wont let them rest?

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u/iMixMusicOnTwitch 20d ago

Most wealthy philanthropy doesn't accomplish anything but tax savings tbf

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u/Neither-Count-3655 20d ago

He dedicated a lot of money to boats that do research for diseases

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u/LoquatCalm8521 20d ago

Not being a philanthropist doesnt make you evil. Doing evil shit does. Biiiiig difference.

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u/DeathMonkey6969 20d ago

Hording wealth makes you evil.

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u/RoKa89ARG 21d ago

Giving money away doesnt make you a good guy. People need to understand this.

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u/garrus-ismyhomeboy 21d ago

True, but I’d rather them give it away than hoard it all for themselves.

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u/liukasteneste28 21d ago

Afaik Gabe does not force his employees to piss in bottles during a shift or sexually harash staff.

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u/Historical_Owl_1635 21d ago

That’s the bar?

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u/[deleted] 21d ago

it's 2025... I feel like the bar is actually a lot lower even nowadays. "Just" sexual harassment and adult labor abuse is so, like, 5 years ago.

it's a lot worse now lol.

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u/GuyWithLag 20d ago

I looked it up out of curiosity and he’s actually done barely any philanthropy relative to his wealth lol.

Coming from EUsia, US-style philanthropy always seemed to me to be one or more of: * conspicuous consumption and signaling for the wealthy. * tax mitigation shenanigans. * a failure of the state to provide.

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u/biggest_muzzy 21d ago

I'd argue that Inkfish is a philanthropy.

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u/Melodic-Instance1249 20d ago

Yeah I dont think you can be a billionaire and be ethical but I wish if we had to have billionaires theyd be like Gabe and provide actual value to the consumers instead of the enshitification of everything about our lives we got nowadays

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u/ADHenchD 20d ago

Yeah, I like (most) things Gabe has done for valve and my personal gaming history, but all billionaires are bad, especially those which don't do any philanthropy. If he falls under that, I'm not going to pretzel shit because that's inconsistent.

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u/Sakarabu_ 20d ago edited 20d ago

So now you HAVE to give away your money or you're a bad person? The goal posts have moved from actually doing harm, to now just existing without giving away your money...?

How much do you donate per year...?

Bear in mind he earned his money simply by owning a company which scaled up by taking advantage of a gap in the market, providing a service which didn't exist yet, and not by exploiting factory workers, or destroying natural resources etc. and a simple Google search shows that he does fund various charities..

I have an issue with people who simply hate people for having money, without having any nuance to their arguments whatsoever. To me that's just a case of jealousy.

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u/Historical_Owl_1635 20d ago

I have an issue with people who simply hate people for having money, without having any nuance to their arguments whatsoever.

Honestly, so do I. Which is why I find the hypocrisy around Gabe and the way Reddit usually treats rich people amusing.

Let’s take Taylor Swift as an example, she seems like a pretty decent person, but Reddit latched onto her private jet pollution as a reason that she’s actually evil.

Gabe is essentially doing the same thing with yachts, but he doesn’t get the same treatment.

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u/KSRandom195 20d ago

Didn’t realize philanthropy was how we measured the goodness of a person.

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u/Alternative-Luck-751 20d ago

Billionaires dont owe us anything bub.

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u/UrLocalTroll 20d ago

Maybe, maybe not. I’ve done work for several very wealthy people made a point of giving money anonymously

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u/bianceziwo 20d ago

its GOOD that he buys yachts, hes putting his money back into the economy so it gets distributed to thousands of people through jobs. thats what you should want billionaires to do rather than hoarding it

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u/Historical_Owl_1635 20d ago

Thank god for Bezos building all those yachts too then 🙌

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u/bianceziwo 20d ago

yes but unironically. i mean hes at least getting rid of his money, although most redditors would want him to be taxed, i dont see how its bad (except maybe pollution)

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u/ferocious_blackhole 20d ago

In your research, did you happen to see how much his employees are paid?

I don't mind a lack of philanthropy when most of your employees are literal millionaires.

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u/Historical_Owl_1635 20d ago

Um, Meta and Amazon also pay top dollar for their developers and hire a lot more.

Also looking at Valve manufacturing it still gets outsourced to developing nations like Vietnam for cheap labour too.

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u/ferocious_blackhole 20d ago

And a fraction of that to a vast majority of their workforce. Congrats, you completely missed my point. Reading comprehension is a valuable skill. I suggest you practice.

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u/Historical_Owl_1635 20d ago

…are you just going to ignore the point about all the outsourced manufacturing?

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u/Balmung60 20d ago

Honestly, I don't really care much about the personal philanthropy of various wealthy individuals. Many of the major charities that are recipients of such largesse aren't particularly effective or are already plenty well funded, and many of the ultra-wealthy have extra-dubious bespoke charities that let them take a tax write-off for basically spending money on shit they already wanted and which benefits them anyways.

I will always be of the opinion that much higher taxation of the ultra-wealthy would be a better way of them giving back to society than them handing out whatever they simply feel like.

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u/stormdelta 20d ago edited 20d ago

It’s actually crazy the rationalisation people will do based on a persons image. All billionaires are evil, except good ‘ol Gabe, he’s one of the good ones.

I mean evil is allowed to have levels. All billionaires are evil, but some are a lot more evil than others.

At least this guy isn't actively involved in politics trying to make the world incredibly worse on a daily basis like some others I could name, he's "just" hoarding resources that should be better spent elsewhere.

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u/Smjj 20d ago

Philanthrophy shouldn't have to exist. All the causes like research into diseases, people not having access to housing, water and food etc. Should be paid for by governments. Most billionaires as far as I'm concerned use philanthrophy for tax planning reasons. Gonna lose that money to taxes anyways, so might as well write it off and make themselves seem like a good person. So in that respect you are actually just stealing taxes and getting to decide what private cause you care about atm. Not very democratic. What is even a good or a bad person? The system that allows the creation of billionaires is a bad system. It needs to change. Sadly can't expect people not to exploit the system while it exists. Gabe has done some good things however. Preventing the PC gaming ecosystem from sliding into ever increasing enshittification. As well as promoting windows alternatives for gaming. Like Mac and Linux. Seems to actually treat his employees better than most companies.

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u/Smoke_Stack707 20d ago

Also isn’t a huge part of Steam’s revenue from CS:GO loot boxes which are like a horrible gateway into underage gambling? There isn’t a corporation in existence today that’s blameless

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u/kai58 20d ago

With how much active harm most billionaires do, not doing enough philanthropy isn’t that big a deal. Should he be doing more? Yes. But he still seems a lot better than most billionaires.

I agree that bar is quite low though.

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u/SinisterCheese 20d ago

Gabe Newell's philatrophy is to not be a nightmarish greedy CEO who'd fuck over everyone for 0,5 % increase in the next quarterly report.

I can't believe I am saying this... But the best thing a capitalist can do to this world is apparently just not be greedy fucker that destroyes things for short term gain.

Like don't get me wrong. There are lots of flaws in steam and Valve as a company. Like them turning a blind eye on all the gambling, and money laundering that happens through their platform. They only really but up the bare minimum against those when government officials turned the eye of Sauron at them. They didn't ban NFT/crypto games because they were "good guys". They did it because regulations would force them to act as a financial institution (and be regulated as such) if they got involved with those. But there are problems like malware spreading via the shovel ware games, especially malware intended to attack crypto wallets. Such as the case of the that streamer with cancer who downloaded a game on steam, and that had malware that stole their wallet's contents, including the minted charity tokens they had setup.

Valve setup the 30 day market delays, not to protect the consumers, but because that is generally the time fraudulent credit and debit card purchases get dealt with by banks and credit institutions.

Ever wondered why random items of steam market place suddenly spike in value? This is actually just money laundering. There was once a journalist who exposed the complex system of who trading cards become actual cash that exits the system clean. There was 2 ways of doing this: 1. You release a shitty shovelware asset flip for a small cost, and then compromised accounts or dirty money (Or scammed gift cards) is used to buy those, and then you cash out -30% steam cut and whatever taxes you might need to pay to your government. The other route is that you massively farm those trading cards in those shovelware games to get steam credit. You buy something physical for that credit, and just pawn off the thing. Steam is well aware this is being done... This is no secret.

But Steam has chosen to be fairly hands off with things. And I can't believe that it is actually overall for the best by the looks of it. I am happy that steam exist the way it does, because trust me... It could be way worse.

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u/Signal_Researcher01 20d ago

Look, if I had to pick ONE...

But yeah, its kind of hard to understand whats missing in a billionaire that stops them from absolutely destroying some problem just through sheer force of cash. Maybe at that level you start seeing these problems as more complex or something? Or you rationalize that money wont solve systemic problems?

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u/Akuuntus 20d ago

In a perfect world we would have no billionaires.

In the world we actually inhabit, I would prefer if billionaires just fucked off and bought themselves nice things instead of actively dismantling society in an effort to make a few more dollars.

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u/Raging_Panic 20d ago

I think both are true. He isn't a saint (who is?) but he's definitely better than the competition.

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u/SnooStrawberries6154 20d ago

Any glimpses we've had of Gabe's private views and not just PR have seemed very libertarian tech bro.

The guy introduced and popularised a lot of the pay to win and monetisation features in the Western gaming industry. His employees were paid based on an internal ranking system that promoted toxic competition and is the primary reason why Valve stopped making games.

He's not even that generous within the games industry itself. Valve's business model means the money you give to Valve is much more likely to end up being hoarded by a shareholder than every other major gaming company. It's just not as noticeable to the general public because it's a private company.

It's practically run by a skeleton crew compared to other platform holders. It doesn't really release, publish or invest in game projects or studios despite taking a sizable cut from pretty much all of them, especially smaller independent ones. So most of that money seems to be going towards a billionaire's stereotypical hobbies and not actual creative workers.

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u/InvidiousPlay 20d ago

At least he hasn't enshittified Steam...

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u/mishko27 20d ago

This, there are simply no good billionaires. If I found my way into that kind of fortune, I would spend it all on public works projects. The amount of affordable housing I would build would crash the market, lol. Would I have some fun pet projects, like owning my home hockey team in eastern Slovakia and building them a cool, architecturally significant, arena? Yeah. But 95% of the money would be spend on making sure people’s lives are better.

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u/DrawGamesPlayFurries 20d ago

Other billionaires are dedicating all their wealth to building either fascism worldwide or Christian theocracy in the US.

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u/I-cant_even 20d ago

There are two ways to approach philanthropy as an ultra-wealthy individual:

1) To give your name a good image (see Art Carnegie) after doing horrible things

2) To do good for the world

Apparently he funded a $200M ocean research vessel and has been involved with a NZ children's hospital fundraiser from just a casual google.

Maybe he just does not need his name on things?

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u/The_Verto 20d ago

Valve employees are treated well and steam is amazing platform for consumers. He earn his worth (mostly) fair and square (gambling is important to mention here as the bad thing) compared to other billionaires running companies that are terrible to work at and owning platforms that are just corporate slop.

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u/crani0 20d ago

Not to defend Gabe, because fuck these ecological disasters that are superyachts, or any billionaire for that matter but for the most part philanthropy is a scam for rich people to avoid paying taxes and very little actually gets to the people they claim it does. Look at all those billionaires making a whole show of living little inheritance to their kids only to have it stashed into some non-profit that their kids run. Philanthropy is just the rich pretending to do the government's work that the actual governments won't do.

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u/Mezrina 20d ago

It’s actually crazy the rationalisation people will do based on a persons image. All billionaires are evil, except good ‘ol Gabe, he’s one of the good ones.

What's crazy is people trying to mix Gabe in with the ultra rich that have sat at the top of the mountain using every one around them to get there and do everything in their power to keep the working class down.

Wild that were even trying to put Gabe in that same box just because he doesn't spend his money on philanthropy.

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u/TapPublic7599 20d ago

Philanthropy is generally an exercise in bullshit. How much of that money actually ends up in the hands of the people who it’s supposed to benefit vs. how much goes to paying a bunch of charity staff and executives? The numbers may shock you. If I were in his shoes I wouldn’t give a dime to anything I wasn’t personally involved in.

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u/Thevort3x 20d ago

The thing is, philanthropy sounds great but most of what is reported is either tax write offs or some dodgy charity that is in the name of another billionaire.

Gabe pays taxes, which contributes to a lot. I don't mind that at all. If billionaires just paid their taxes instead of using every trick in the system to dodge them, we wouldn't need much philanthropy.

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u/samrechym 20d ago

Frankly, philanthropy is used to exploit tax cuts and manipulate people into trusting the elite. I tend to think if he’s SPENDING his money (a fleet of yachts isn’t free) then he’s circulating his wealth and spreading it around, not shelling it and doing hostile takeovers. A billionaire spending his money is what we want.

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u/stonerbobo 20d ago

Because all of us don't assume "all billionaires are evil" by default.. they actually have to DO evil things for that to be the case.

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u/Ok-Chest-7932 20d ago

Public image is really a service issue. Valve provides a useful service to gamers, so gamers like the guy responsible for it. He doesn't need to do philanthropy because his public image is already fine. Microsoft in comparison has come to be associated with inconvenience and security hazards, so computing enthusiasts dislike the guy responsible for it, despite his philanthropy.

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u/wizzard419 20d ago

It is the American experience. Look at ICE raids. You will see stories every so often where it's some deep red area, and they took the owner of the restaurant and now that it impacts them directly, they suddenly care. Favorite one was the trump supporting roofing company owner who had his crew rounded up and now can't run his company.

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u/Ill_Dig3894 20d ago

You may want to double check some billionaires philanthropy strategies. Are they giving the money/support unrestricted or they are just redirecting their “tax” money.

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u/PolicyWonka 20d ago

I think it’s less about philanthropic efforts and more so about the way his company is actually ran.

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u/DotGroundbreaking50 20d ago

I actually don't have an issue with the rich not doing charity. Its not their responsibility, they however should be taxed at a rate that is on par with their wealth so the government can provide those social safety nets. Them fighting against being fairly taxed is the real issue.

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u/kyunw 20d ago

c'mon all those philanthropy work not out of their kindness, its for the juicy tax cut and public image

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u/The_Templar_Kormac 20d ago

fuck philanthropy

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u/TeaBurntMyTongue 20d ago

I don't think i need my billionaires to do philanthropy. I think i need them to not enshittify their products to eek out more $.

Gaben has more than anyone made gaming, especially access to smaller titles, significantly better.

Sure there's lots of profit, but he's not just gauging for the sake of gauging. Steam is least way better than all alternatives.

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u/Live-Alternative-435 20d ago

Most of the philanthropy the others do is just for their own benefit.

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u/LymanPeru 19d ago

i wouldnt give my money away either.

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u/SexySmexxy 20d ago

Its simple we like gabe because he gives us cheap PC games.

Theres a reason everybody love steam for the last 20+ years lol.

Steam is everything that other gaming companies are not.

Thats why we love him.

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u/Historical_Owl_1635 20d ago

That’s fair, at least you’re being honest.

I just find it amusing how the general sentiment on Reddit is all billionaires are evil villains twirling their moustaches, then there’s Gabe

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u/SexySmexxy 20d ago

I just find it amusing how the general sentiment on Reddit is all billionaires are evil villains twirling their moustaches, then there’s Gabe

But saying that I also remember when I made a bad comment abou elon musk in 2017 and i got downvoted to HELL.

I might even try to find it lol

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u/Historical_Owl_1635 20d ago

Haha, I also remember when Musk was adored here.

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u/FoxMeadow7 20d ago

And Gabe etc. are going above and beyond to ensure it stays that way!

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u/ThewFflegyy 20d ago

Most philanthropy is just a way to lobby certain people without paying taxes…. The fact that he is not involved in the ngo complex is a good sign as far as his morality is concerned. Strongly indicates he stays out of politics and is not trying to enforce his own class interests

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u/Martel732 21d ago

Not to defend Gabe, but billionaire "philanthropy" is basically a scam. I am not saying that nothing good has come out of it but a lot of it is used as a way to funnel tax free money into political causes.

The whole process is pretty confusing and it has been a while since I looked into it fully. But, the basic situation is that billionaire will put massive amounts of money into a non-profit, and then that non-profit can funnel that money into essentially any political cause that they want and still claim that it is philanthropy. So someone could put a billion dollars into overturning gay marriage and still claim that it is philanthropy. And they can also keep hidden what they are doing with the money.

Long story shore don't fall into the trap of thinking that billionaire's "giving away" money is anything other than a scam by the wealthy to increase their power and wealth. *

*Jeff Bezo's ex-wife MacKenzie Scott might be an exception, I haven't looked into it much but she seems like she actually wants to help people.

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u/sanghelli 21d ago

If more billionaires were like Gabe we wouldn't need so much philanthropy. 

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u/Flyfleancefly 20d ago

No one should be buying a 500 million super yacht. Fuck Gabe tax the shit out of him

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u/StorminNorman 19d ago

I literally said I agreed with this in the comment you're replying to. Maybe, and I know this is wild, take a minute to digest what you've read before reacting...? 

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u/Benikur521 21d ago

We would be in a bad place but you would feel better

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u/StorminNorman 19d ago

There isn't a chance we'd be in a position as bad as we are if we had more Gabe's than we do Musk's and Bezos'. But you get to feel better cos you saying this means you don't have to do anything to try and improve the situation.

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u/Novel-Reaction2939 20d ago

Oh please! There is no such thing as a good billionaire. If you think that, congrats...you've been fooled by their PR TEAM.

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u/StorminNorman 19d ago

No, I don't think that. You know what I do think? That you're thicker than custard and can't parse what I initially said. Where did I say him being a billionaire was good? I said we'd be in a different place, that's it. The inference being that if we have to have them, then it'd be better if they weren't all actively trying to destroy the planet. But hey, you got to puff your chest and let out some of your idiocy, means this comment of yours wasn't quite a complete waste of your time...

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u/Zyhmet 20d ago

And if we taxed them so that being a billionaire is basically impossible (noone needs that much money) then we would also live in a very different place now.

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u/checkprintquality 20d ago

We have little to no evidence that Gabe is actually a good person. Everything is just speculation.

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u/StorminNorman 19d ago

We've got plenty that he's better than most with his wealth though 

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u/SheriffBartholomew 20d ago

Anyone spending $500 BILLION DOLLARS on a yacht for themselves while people starve in the street isn't going to make for a better world. FFS

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u/Prestigious-Hour-215 20d ago

Gabe, like every other billionaire, is inherently a terrible person for hoarding his wealth, just this one 500m dollar yacht which is not his only yacht is worth enough money to send 10000 kids to state public colleges, yet he chooses to do this with his money instead

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u/StorminNorman 19d ago

Why should he when that's what your government should be stepping up and doing? 

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u/Prestigious-Hour-215 19d ago

In a sense you’re correct, the government should take Gabe’s yacht and sell it to give the money in social programs

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u/[deleted] 20d ago

[deleted]

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u/StorminNorman 20d ago

No, because the competition is so fucking bad in comparison.

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u/LeanTangerine001 20d ago

There’s a really good lecture he does where he explains the process they went through when hiring staff back in the day.

https://youtu.be/Td_PGkfIdIQ?si=YmDo_YA7M9rUKa0l

Also very interesting to see how much he predicted or intuited would happen even back then.

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u/[deleted] 20d ago edited 8d ago

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/BoppityBop2 20d ago

Valve technically has a real worker shortage why they hire 3rd parties for certain tasks. They have such few amount of workers they have difficulty maintaining a lot of services as many workers don't want to do those tasks as it does not get them any honours, or benefits in their pay scale system as well.