There's no end in sight for the meme "Gabe does nothing but keeps winning." I'm.. not surprised at all at the small number. Steam doesn't need large numbers when all they really have to do is keep...
There's no end in sight for the meme "Gabe does nothing but keeps winning."
I'm.. not surprised at all at the small number. Steam doesn't need large numbers when all they really have to do is keep the shop running. It's the epitome of a company that knows what their core business is and doesn't stray too far from it.
You could even argue that the Steam Deck is just a very powerful store front.
Good on them. There's no need for infinite growth, although ironically the one company that seems to be able to pull it off is the one that's staying most stable.
Sayings akin to 'trying to reach perfection ensures you'll never reach it' that have often appeared in many cultures over time comes to mind. Few manage to achieve it this well though. Something...
Good on them. There's no need for infinite growth, although ironically the one company that seems to be able to pull it off is the one that's staying most stable.
Sayings akin to 'trying to reach perfection ensures you'll never reach it' that have often appeared in many cultures over time comes to mind. Few manage to achieve it this well though.
In a similar vein, back in 2015 WhatsApp only had 50 engineers despite at that point providing dependable service to 900 million users. Wise management, capable employees, and smart design can get...
In a similar vein, back in 2015 WhatsApp only had 50 engineers despite at that point providing dependable service to 900 million users.
Wise management, capable employees, and smart design can get you an astonishingly long way in the tech world. The hypersonic growth and bloat that's been characteristic of VC-backed tech companies in the past decade+ is not at all a requirement when the right people are involved.
Valve is one of the few companies that has show just how tremendously powerful proper automation and setup is. Further how communities will gladly build on what you've built if you give them the...
Valve is one of the few companies that has show just how tremendously powerful proper automation and setup is. Further how communities will gladly build on what you've built if you give them the tools to do so.
It's one of the things that always annoyed me about their dota updates, that they kept coming up with features that could NEVER last, because they would require insane scaling to man them (guilds and arguably how they handled cosmetics).
I suspect if more companies downsized to a reasonable number of employees WHO ACTUALLY know how to use their tools (hell imagine if 10% of people out there actually knew 50% of outlook), they would see similar gains.
Imagine what the community could have built on Google if they didn't kill all their projects, or throw them into a cup like bugs, give them a shake, and see who survives the thunder dome.
Imagine what the community could have built on Google if they didn't kill all their projects, or throw them into a cup like bugs, give them a shake, and see who survives the thunder dome.
Yeah google is a fascinating one given how it feels like they have the EXACT same issue valve has (they'll never support something forever if it's not minimal) but don't have any of the benefits...
Yeah google is a fascinating one given how it feels like they have the EXACT same issue valve has (they'll never support something forever if it's not minimal) but don't have any of the benefits (and extremely small company)
I don't know about that. It's a storefront and they have the users to attract devs. Devs' incentive to build upon Steam is obvious. It's not like Steam itself is some open source modding...
Further how communities will gladly build on what you've built if you give them the tools to do so.
I don't know about that. It's a storefront and they have the users to attract devs. Devs' incentive to build upon Steam is obvious. It's not like Steam itself is some open source modding playground. It just got early to market and cemented it's network effect.
I suspect if more companies downsized to a reasonable number of employees WHO ACTUALLY know how to use their tools (hell imagine if 10% of people out there actually knew 50% of outlook), they would see similar gains.
It's complicated. There are a lot of inefficiencies and some of those are by design:
cheaper to outsource, big wigs don't see the long term profits
tech companies are very reactive to the market. So they layoff and hire like devs are trading cards. This of course causes huge brain drain compared to keeping a mature team around that knows your tech
most tech companies' revenue does not directly come from tech. Google sells ads, Microsoft and Adobe sells enterprise support. Facebook sells user data. Etc. When your skin isn't in tech, you don't value devs, even though you need to maintain and update your product.
ads. It's a huge, speculative money sink. Valve more or less revolutionized marketing by doing direct to customer marketing, adopting social media very early for a company. They more or less let organic word of mouth do the same.
And I can go on for 20 more points on compensation, tax evasion, political theater, and more. So there is a lot to optimize.
But at the same time there are valid reasons to need a larger worker base for these companies
most obvious is products. Valve works 95% on steam, 4% on games, and maybe 1% on hardware and other experiments. The largest tech companies are always trying to grow and expand their reach. And they are fine failing on 10 products if one of them really takes off.
The most stark difference between Valve (and WhatsApp) and other tech companies is that Valve is a purely digital vendor. Most companies can't really do this.
in a similar vein, offering worldwide support is where costs really skyrocket. The time and effort needed to deal with thousands of vendor's and conform to thousands of different laws is massive. More support means more offices, more workers, etc.
a lot of companies are selling themselvss and services to other businesses. Valve of course talks to other studios for negotiating rates and offering support , but AFAIK they rarely "go" to a company. Maybe as a product of network effects, but Valve doesn't need to use resources to reach out and appeal to studios to keep growing as much as other game studios.
So while there's a lot to improve, there still are good reasons other tech companies can't run this lean.
It seems like when we talk about jobs there’s a common assumption that working longer at the same place is better, that a “good job” is one that lasts for decades. But even in good times, Silicon...
tech companies are very reactive to the market. So they layoff and hire like devs are trading cards. This of course causes huge brain drain compared to keeping a mature team around that knows your tech
It seems like when we talk about jobs there’s a common assumption that working longer at the same place is better, that a “good job” is one that lasts for decades. But even in good times, Silicon Valley is largely not like that. Switching jobs is common and expected, the best way to get a raise. The flip side of “brain drain” is the outside experience that new hires bring with them from previous jobs.
There were more senior people at Google than at most places, but even so, sticking around for five years meant I was working there longer than 98% of my coworkers. (There was an internal website someone built where you could find that out.) And they weren’t lacking for talent either. Sometimes I was working on teams where having a PhD was pretty common. And I did once meet a real old-timer who had worked on a Apollo module; he retired not long after.
There are some things that last, but a lot of the tech changes, so experienced engineers aren’t valued so much for their knowledge of specific technologies that are now in the Computer History Museum (though it is pretty neat) as for knowing general principles. And sadly, it can be harder for an older worker to get a job due to the perception that they didn’t keep up, that they kept doing the same job until the technology they’re an expert in became obsolete. Job-hopping can be a way to keep fresh.
I wouldn’t want to be looking for a job in this market, though.
Well, it's definitely complicated, but in a very short summary: if you prioritize growth, expertise, and impact you'll only job hop when you truly start plateauing. Which should not be in 2 years...
It seems like when we talk about jobs there’s a common assumption that working longer at the same place is better, that a “good job” is one that lasts for decades.
Well, it's definitely complicated, but in a very short summary: if you prioritize growth, expertise, and impact you'll only job hop when you truly start plateauing. Which should not be in 2 years at a "good job". If you prioritize compensation, you are best off job hopping. So it's a very personal question to ask what is a "good job".
In an ideal workplace for an employee, you stay at one role, get regular-ish promotions as you grow, get regular raises, and your work/life balance is respected. There will still be the ambitious (having more companies on your resume is ideal for various entrepreneurial goals), the compensation min-maxers, or the misaligned who will hop. But I imagine retention in this setup would be really high. This seems to be something Valve does better than most other companies, to their credit.
The flip side of “brain drain” is the outside experience that new hires bring with them from previous jobs.
indeed. I know it's a capitalistic dog whistle these days, but you always want to be finding new talent and growing. The conflict comes from doing this at the cost of laying off personnel who keep the train running (new fresh talent is cheaper and more eager, after all).
But for that "brain drain" that's where things get muddy. You can be wide/narrow and shallow/deep, and companies many times may not even know what they need for their roles. Some do need those domain experts who spent 8 years at google working on VR (spoilers, many companies suck at interviewing domain experts). Others, especially startup sized companies, may need a generalist who can wear multiple hats. Some fields (especially web) will change popular frameworks every other year, while others like C/++ can be done for an entire career.
I think in short, I'd still call it brain drain because these layoffs are more concerned with preventing litigation (I have worked at [large company with layoffs in the news] and have pretty much heard internal discussion talking about some targets just being there to cover the tracks for a discimination lawsuit). So if you're throwing darts at your talent, no one is going to feel safe. Even non-laid off people will take a huge morale dip.
I wouldn’t want to be looking for a job in this market, though.
After being in this market for 10 months running, I wouldn't recommend it.
I think it's a bit more than that. Being early to market certainly helped them, but they also do interesting projects like the steam controller, steamdeck, their own VR set, and general Linux...
It just got early to market and cemented it's network effect.
I think it's a bit more than that. Being early to market certainly helped them, but they also do interesting projects like the steam controller, steamdeck, their own VR set, and general Linux support.
Idk, I just find that there's something about them that's different/better.
in this case, I do think the chicken came before the egg. Valve got popular and got a lot of money, so it can afford to experiment with stuff like Steam machines that may fail. And iterate on it...
in this case, I do think the chicken came before the egg. Valve got popular and got a lot of money, so it can afford to experiment with stuff like Steam machines that may fail. And iterate on it until it becomes a steam deck that is something in tun with what users what. Steam revenue will more than carry that.
But that iteration took 8 years. Any larger company would have long abandoned that pursuit and laid off the team before they got to the Steam Deck.
I recall having to use steam to play half life 2 at launch, and it wasn't smooth. It felt at the time a lot like using ubisoft or ea's proprietary store fronts more recently I love steam now, but...
I recall having to use steam to play half life 2 at launch, and it wasn't smooth. It felt at the time a lot like using ubisoft or ea's proprietary store fronts more recently
I love steam now, but it's probably only in the same way I prefer Netflix to Disney. First mover advantage and an irrelevant but entrenched sense of a plucky underdog.
It's interesting to be able to acknowledge this and yet still feel some strange affinity for one group of merchants over another....
Is it really that powerful? What kinds of things can it do? I've always liked gmail because it's just simple mail and outlook feels like the opposite of that.
hell imagine if 10% of people out there actually knew 50% of outlook
Is it really that powerful? What kinds of things can it do?
I've always liked gmail because it's just simple mail and outlook feels like the opposite of that.
It's interesting, but it does gloss over one thing. How many people are not directly employed by valve but through contractors. I'd be willing to bet that a lot of work is done through those as...
It's interesting, but it does gloss over one thing. How many people are not directly employed by valve but through contractors. I'd be willing to bet that a lot of work is done through those as well. Things like support tickets are obvious but it wouldn't surprise me if things like the steamdeck also don't involve a lot of contractor resources.
I do think that valves business lends itself to such automation, and they have made some very smart decisions. They remind me of AWS. When you bring your enterprise to AWS they require a first...
I do think that valves business lends itself to such automation, and they have made some very smart decisions. They remind me of AWS. When you bring your enterprise to AWS they require a first meeting where you bring all your contracting folks and with them is a very smart, very articulate lawyer who explains the area of the agreement that they have some flexibility, and where they absolutely do not for reasons of scale and efficiency, and that lawyer knows your localities laws well enough to answer your questions and tell you how you will be able to comply with any rules.
So valve has made purchases, refunds, complaints, account management, etc, mostly automated and mostly structured their policies to be customer centric which saves them labor on dealing with more escalations than necessary. Their major compliance requirement is probably GDPR and PCI, and I wouldn't be surprised if they outsourced legal talent for international business compliance.
So they get away with a small team relative to the value they create, and leaves their core team to focus on iterative enhancements and projects like the steam deck.
Some other sectors require more customer driven development, manual regulatory compliance, complex mergers and acquisitions, etc. So I suspect there is still room for many more capable developers. Though the CRUD only developers prospects might not be so rosy.
There's no end in sight for the meme "Gabe does nothing but keeps winning."
I'm.. not surprised at all at the small number. Steam doesn't need large numbers when all they really have to do is keep the shop running. It's the epitome of a company that knows what their core business is and doesn't stray too far from it.
You could even argue that the Steam Deck is just a very powerful store front.
Good on them. There's no need for infinite growth, although ironically the one company that seems to be able to pull it off is the one that's staying most stable.
Sayings akin to 'trying to reach perfection ensures you'll never reach it' that have often appeared in many cultures over time comes to mind. Few manage to achieve it this well though.
Something to strive for, no irony whatsoever.
In a similar vein, back in 2015 WhatsApp only had 50 engineers despite at that point providing dependable service to 900 million users.
Wise management, capable employees, and smart design can get you an astonishingly long way in the tech world. The hypersonic growth and bloat that's been characteristic of VC-backed tech companies in the past decade+ is not at all a requirement when the right people are involved.
Valve is one of the few companies that has show just how tremendously powerful proper automation and setup is. Further how communities will gladly build on what you've built if you give them the tools to do so.
It's one of the things that always annoyed me about their dota updates, that they kept coming up with features that could NEVER last, because they would require insane scaling to man them (guilds and arguably how they handled cosmetics).
I suspect if more companies downsized to a reasonable number of employees WHO ACTUALLY know how to use their tools (hell imagine if 10% of people out there actually knew 50% of outlook), they would see similar gains.
Imagine what the community could have built on Google if they didn't kill all their projects, or throw them into a cup like bugs, give them a shake, and see who survives the thunder dome.
Yeah google is a fascinating one given how it feels like they have the EXACT same issue valve has (they'll never support something forever if it's not minimal) but don't have any of the benefits (and extremely small company)
I don't know about that. It's a storefront and they have the users to attract devs. Devs' incentive to build upon Steam is obvious. It's not like Steam itself is some open source modding playground. It just got early to market and cemented it's network effect.
It's complicated. There are a lot of inefficiencies and some of those are by design:
And I can go on for 20 more points on compensation, tax evasion, political theater, and more. So there is a lot to optimize.
But at the same time there are valid reasons to need a larger worker base for these companies
So while there's a lot to improve, there still are good reasons other tech companies can't run this lean.
It seems like when we talk about jobs there’s a common assumption that working longer at the same place is better, that a “good job” is one that lasts for decades. But even in good times, Silicon Valley is largely not like that. Switching jobs is common and expected, the best way to get a raise. The flip side of “brain drain” is the outside experience that new hires bring with them from previous jobs.
There were more senior people at Google than at most places, but even so, sticking around for five years meant I was working there longer than 98% of my coworkers. (There was an internal website someone built where you could find that out.) And they weren’t lacking for talent either. Sometimes I was working on teams where having a PhD was pretty common. And I did once meet a real old-timer who had worked on a Apollo module; he retired not long after.
There are some things that last, but a lot of the tech changes, so experienced engineers aren’t valued so much for their knowledge of specific technologies that are now in the Computer History Museum (though it is pretty neat) as for knowing general principles. And sadly, it can be harder for an older worker to get a job due to the perception that they didn’t keep up, that they kept doing the same job until the technology they’re an expert in became obsolete. Job-hopping can be a way to keep fresh.
I wouldn’t want to be looking for a job in this market, though.
Well, it's definitely complicated, but in a very short summary: if you prioritize growth, expertise, and impact you'll only job hop when you truly start plateauing. Which should not be in 2 years at a "good job". If you prioritize compensation, you are best off job hopping. So it's a very personal question to ask what is a "good job".
In an ideal workplace for an employee, you stay at one role, get regular-ish promotions as you grow, get regular raises, and your work/life balance is respected. There will still be the ambitious (having more companies on your resume is ideal for various entrepreneurial goals), the compensation min-maxers, or the misaligned who will hop. But I imagine retention in this setup would be really high. This seems to be something Valve does better than most other companies, to their credit.
indeed. I know it's a capitalistic dog whistle these days, but you always want to be finding new talent and growing. The conflict comes from doing this at the cost of laying off personnel who keep the train running (new fresh talent is cheaper and more eager, after all).
But for that "brain drain" that's where things get muddy. You can be wide/narrow and shallow/deep, and companies many times may not even know what they need for their roles. Some do need those domain experts who spent 8 years at google working on VR (spoilers, many companies suck at interviewing domain experts). Others, especially startup sized companies, may need a generalist who can wear multiple hats. Some fields (especially web) will change popular frameworks every other year, while others like C/++ can be done for an entire career.
I think in short, I'd still call it brain drain because these layoffs are more concerned with preventing litigation (I have worked at [large company with layoffs in the news] and have pretty much heard internal discussion talking about some targets just being there to cover the tracks for a discimination lawsuit). So if you're throwing darts at your talent, no one is going to feel safe. Even non-laid off people will take a huge morale dip.
After being in this market for 10 months running, I wouldn't recommend it.
I think it's a bit more than that. Being early to market certainly helped them, but they also do interesting projects like the steam controller, steamdeck, their own VR set, and general Linux support.
Idk, I just find that there's something about them that's different/better.
in this case, I do think the chicken came before the egg. Valve got popular and got a lot of money, so it can afford to experiment with stuff like Steam machines that may fail. And iterate on it until it becomes a steam deck that is something in tun with what users what. Steam revenue will more than carry that.
But that iteration took 8 years. Any larger company would have long abandoned that pursuit and laid off the team before they got to the Steam Deck.
I recall having to use steam to play half life 2 at launch, and it wasn't smooth. It felt at the time a lot like using ubisoft or ea's proprietary store fronts more recently
I love steam now, but it's probably only in the same way I prefer Netflix to Disney. First mover advantage and an irrelevant but entrenched sense of a plucky underdog.
It's interesting to be able to acknowledge this and yet still feel some strange affinity for one group of merchants over another....
Rereading my comment makes it clear what a mug I am. YOU'RE NOT BETTER THAN ME, YOU'RE ALL THE SAME.
Is it really that powerful? What kinds of things can it do?
I've always liked gmail because it's just simple mail and outlook feels like the opposite of that.
It's interesting, but it does gloss over one thing. How many people are not directly employed by valve but through contractors. I'd be willing to bet that a lot of work is done through those as well. Things like support tickets are obvious but it wouldn't surprise me if things like the steamdeck also don't involve a lot of contractor resources.
I'm wondering how many contractors they need for moderation alone?
Moderation of reviews or...?
Yeah, given how rude gamers can be. Do they have other social features?
Yes, very many. It's actually a whole social network.
I do think that valves business lends itself to such automation, and they have made some very smart decisions. They remind me of AWS. When you bring your enterprise to AWS they require a first meeting where you bring all your contracting folks and with them is a very smart, very articulate lawyer who explains the area of the agreement that they have some flexibility, and where they absolutely do not for reasons of scale and efficiency, and that lawyer knows your localities laws well enough to answer your questions and tell you how you will be able to comply with any rules.
So valve has made purchases, refunds, complaints, account management, etc, mostly automated and mostly structured their policies to be customer centric which saves them labor on dealing with more escalations than necessary. Their major compliance requirement is probably GDPR and PCI, and I wouldn't be surprised if they outsourced legal talent for international business compliance.
So they get away with a small team relative to the value they create, and leaves their core team to focus on iterative enhancements and projects like the steam deck.
Some other sectors require more customer driven development, manual regulatory compliance, complex mergers and acquisitions, etc. So I suspect there is still room for many more capable developers. Though the CRUD only developers prospects might not be so rosy.