I don’t disagree with you, but you’ve put some thought into this so maybe you can help us understand your logic and rationale more.
as soon as they deem profitable
What’s profitable about losing sales of adult games?
Also, what leverage do these groups have over banks and payment processors? If you have leverage over Visa and MasterCard, some of the most profitable companies in the world, I could imagine doing way more nefarious things than this. I just don’t get it. Some random group in Australia has leverage over Visa and MasterCard - American companies - is that what we’re saying here?
Those are things that should be handled by a government in defence of the public interest of everyone
I think you might have too much faith in government. Facebook and YouTube shouldn’t be hyper-polarizing brainwashing machines either, but here we are 20 years later and governments have done jack shit to address that. If anything, we’re going the wrong direction - Governments are seeing that and the TikTok model as tools they can have at their disposal to suppress dissent. But ironically, I think YouTube and many other platforms quietly accept that if we want to live in a somewhat harmonious society, we can’t leave it to the government to make all the rules. (eg. YouTube banning vaccine misinformation and disinformation during a public health emergency.)
On a tangent here, maybe the only potential upside from this situation with Steam is that horrifically misogynistic waifu simulators aren’t going to be 1 click away from the new Call of Duty. Seriously, Steam is just full of super gross anime shit that kids shouldn’t see, but the main audience of the platform is kids. The way Steam puts that content beside everything else is really gross and they really should get called out for that.
Super insightful, thanks. Didn’t think about any of that.