Those same criteria aren't even really applicable outside Steam. In our case because we really haven't pushed Impulse's community features (partly owing to Reactor still being in development, and the different way in which it's implemented) in the same way as they have, and other DD outlets don't really have anything comparable at all that I'm aware of.

My point is that 1) you can't really rely on a press release for "real" data, and 2) figures indicating customer investment/commitment to a platform are more interesting from the potential monopoly standpoint, because it gives you some idea as to whether people will even give alternatives a chance or how quickly the market could shift.

Figures based on how many accounts bought something in X period of time, or have logged in within Y (which in Steam's case may mean they just played a game they bought months or years ago that uses Steam DRM) don't tell you anything that interesting, and basically just serve as a bragging point.

Hrm. I've been buying stuff on Steam as a matter of course. I have a few things on Impulse because you folks got it working faster or had it released earlier. Might have to change that, coming soon here.

As it stands, I'm rather tired of companies discussing their number of 'active' or 'working' accounts. Maybe that's just my hatred for Blizzard talking. Hnh.

Sure:

QUOTE=MikeBlaszczak;13289641 "Active accounts" are accounts that were online in the last 30 days. I'd have to double-check to be sure, but I think they're also accounts that own at least one game. We call this "accounts" because we don't know if each account represents a unique individual or not. /QUOTE

Link: http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?p=13289641#post13289641

I can look for confirmation that account must have at least 1 full game (and free games dont count) but that will take some time (googling topics about Steam generate lots of search results, most of which are not related to what I was looking for)

For our purposes, their idea of active accounts (active in the past 30 days) seems reasonable.

When one talks about active accounts, the key question is how many people can a given promotion realistically target.

That's the nub. While the default behavior of Steam is to pop up ads and the store page, both of those behaviors can be (and likely are) changed by users.

So I get counted as an "active account" because I got bored a few weeks ago and played a couple of rounds of Plants vs. Zombies, even though I never saw an ad, never browse the Steam store, don't use their friends or community overlay stuff, and close Steam as soon as I'm done playing.

I can't say how common that sort of usage might be, but unless I'm completely insane it'd probably indicate that the community users figure (even though that's inflated too by people who've just set up a page then abandoned it) is a better estimate of people who would actually be exposed to Steam marketing efforts.

I don't recall offhand if Steam runs at startup by default (think it does), but that'd add even more "logged in in the last 30 days" numbers that may not even be from users who've visited the steam site or played any steam games at all recently.

My issue with the whole thing is distribution rights. For example, I've wanted at one stage to buy "the witcher" from impulse. But as I have found a lot with D2D and impulse, the title is restricted to only the US and Canadian purchasers. So I brought a hard copy of it from my local EB store. I've found that a lot with so many games. E.G. When Civ 4 was going for $10 at D2D I wanted to buy it, was it resticted to overseas only.

Steam doesn't seem to have this issue. If I see the game, I can buy it if I wanted too.

I would love to purchase more from other stores but I can't, is there anyway that impulse can overcome this? If you could it would most likely increase your sales.  

Stardock's primary business is selling underground volcano bases to evil villians. (Someone really needs to make Evil Genius 2)

Anyway, Steam exposed itself to me... and I liked it. Whoever is to blame for sexy sales, I have picked up some serious fun from steam because of it. MoarPlox.

I still buy from 'retail' (as in box but the internet delivers it to my door) because I don't have such an awesome connection and I like feeling things. When I get a game that needs to be installed to steam (like the Brittish Empire Simulation Game, sorry, Total War: Empire) its cool because I get access to my friends, it auto updates, it sings at me in its emo self loathing - or maybe thats just my mind? Anyway while I know this is "bad", I benifit from it.

(If your wondering, Impulse sings a disco tune all night at me.)

This still doesn't show how many people are actually buying from steam.. I have an active account but have never bought through their online service.  I was made to have an account through supreme commander 2 and LFD2 of which I bought both retail.  They are just trying to blow up their numbers since many people flock to the place where most others go.  they want people to say "Wow that many people buy from there. Maybe I should too?"

Personally I put Gamestop and Steam in my don't buy from here list.  I mostly don't buy from steam since it bars you from using map editors and modding tools for 3rd party games.  Gamestop is always more expensive.

You say that like its a bad thing.

The sales are one of the best things to ever happen to video game marketing. In the past (and still true with a lot of console games), they come out for X, and stay at X for years. All the sales are front loaded, after 2 weeks there's virtually no activity.

With the sales on PC games, you get that initial surge market at full price, then you also get people a year later who would pick up the game for less but won't get it for full price. Those sales are pretty well pure profit with digital distribution, and they really help extended the life of a game on the market.

I've got several games that I'm disappointed in their price not coming down, because I'd like to play but they just aren't worth full price. The result right now is no purchase and no money for the publisher. Give me a sale, and they'll get some money.

I thought that the DLC content for the various games is also being "released" [heh what a funny word in this case.. ]  by the pirates. I might be wrong of course.

The best guide IMO isn't the number of users, but the total sales value from those users. I'd rather have 1m users spending an average of $100 a year than 10m users spending an average of $8 a year.

I think we'll see the distribution market shift a bit now that they're plastering Mac feature ads all over.

I just made my last Steam purchase unless something changes there.

Oh come on, not again. You know it's not true.

December 2007: http://web.archive.org/web/20071225164318/www.steampowered.com/v/index.php?area=news&id=1382&cc=US

Other source: http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/50525

Impulse has been released in June 2008.