Valve refused to comment for the video.
Honestly, Valve should just ask for proof that you are 18+ if you want to sell items on Steam market or trade them.
Easiest solution IMO.
When they were asked to implement age verification in Germany, they simply pulled anything off their platform in the country that would require it instead. Mind you Germany has a system that makes age verification anonymous so if privacy concerns you, you could just implement it. (Almost no platform does because they want your data though.)
Valve doesn’t want to touch age verification with a 10 yard stick and that tells me it is probably the way to go here. Because once they have it, the path for more regulations is clear.
In this arena, more regulation is needed. Anonymous age verification is a good idea, but I question the actual anonymity. It usually depends on trust of some entity. And I just can’t fathom an entity that can really be trusted.
Well the entity is the government. You know, the guys who create your ID in the first place. It’s not perfect but it’s the best one I could conceive.
You can trust them to create the ID because it benefits them. But to guard you anonymity… that actually hurts them. So you can be sure they won’t.
Foreign corporations are much more aggressive about harvesting data than the German government so you should think twice about using their products in the first place. Most of the time the German government is under fire for privacy concerns it’s because they trusted products from Microsoft or Huawei and the like.
My bad, I had the german government mixed up with probably the brits who are constantly saying they need to be able to read everyone’s messages. That said. It’s hard to know what the intelligence arm of a government is really doing. So if they give themselves a backdoor, it’s hard to ensure only they come in. And the government is always only one election away from dramatic policy changes.
Not going to happen since Valve doesn’t want to manage a database of IDs. It’s why sex games with real life actors aren’t allowed on Steam since that would require Steam to have IDs and consent contracts of all the actors stored on their side.
And Gaben is a hardcore libertarian, probably despises government IDs.
Previously, I had mused over vague ideas about whether blockchain technologies could go into a “proof of real person” system, by one-way-hashing information used to verify only basic details about a person. Eg: They exist, are a unique person, and are over a certain age. Ideally, it could be set up in a way that cannot easily correlate them between company databases.
That said, no real need to poke holes in the idea, because…that was the easy part, and it will probably never happen (or be far more draconian than I describe)
It absolutely can be done with zero knowledge proofs, but it needs to be from an authoritative source.
It could prove you are over the age of 18 (or 21) without having to divulge any other sensitive information, and be untrackable between sites or any outside agency (e.g government doesn’t know and can’t know you visited a site or location that verifies your age)
They could add it to our drivers licenses or passports or whatever which would cover the authoritative part. Your ID is an NFT at that point, and could be fully digital.
Edit: they might even tie generating the proof to requiring a biometric verification (fingerprint) so you can’t give your ID to someone else.
Bit invasive if you have to provide photo id…
How often can one get a credit card at under the age of 18?
Surely that is a decent measure of it.
Also age of account? Mine is 21 in just over a week…
Or on the stock market or gambling which this is basically a mix of.
Same way as most kids got gta at 13
It is a solution for underage gambling, but adult gambling is also a problem
Valve just needs a way to ensure you are over the age of 18, and I know a way they can do that WITHOUT collecting IDs. They need to incorporate an age quiz like leisure suit Larry.
It’s not up to Pokemon to ban pack opening gambling any more than it is valve to ban item gambling.
It’s up to the us government to ban gambling.
I don’t think CSGO skin gambling is worse than draftkings or whatever else runs ads on American tv 24/7
I’ve heard more stories about CSGO over the years compared to other gambling games, but never heard people criticize the game like they do FIFA. It’s just my corner of the world, where Valve is a holy corporation.
I know Valve would never do this…
Surely if the items hold no real-world value, putting it on hiatus for an indefinite amount of time would be the answer. The casinos which depend on Valve can’t really sue the loss of the feature, as it’s always in Valve’s purview to remove it at any point from the game & platform.
If they made it a limited time feature in CSGO in a year, they would still achieve the “stickiness”.
where he squarely puts the blame on Valve
I know G*mers are far to Stockholmed by the monopolistic hell scape that Valve is responsible for.
But it’s nice to see someone say it.
Its the problem with corporate worship. People cant admit that their team might be bad, and by extension…their worship might be wrong, so they just get angry and hostile.
Especially when you point out that a lot of what they praise about Valve, was forced reactions to actual consumer protection lawsuits, or the threat of a possibility of one.
I really don’t get the love for Valve. They charge double the fees of some other digital platforms, and people flip the fuck out when a developer is like "we’re releasing on origin because paying Valve would cost more money than the entire net profit of the game.
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Getting tired of these “shock” youtube channels drumming up drama for views. It’s only a matter of time before someone points the youtube cannon at these channels.
I see your point entirely and I understand why you feel that way. Just want to give you my friendly opinion on Coffee. I wouldn’t consider him a “shock” Youtuber, personally. He is an entertainer and a journalist, and pretty good at both IMO. He is definitely drumming up drama to a degree but I think this topic is especially worth the attention. I’ve watched the series this is a part of and can tell you that dude has done his homework. He included several interviews he did with different people that offers up a few pretty interesting perspectives. I recommend checking it out! At the end of the day, clickbait thumbnails and titles work well on YouTube and for some creators that otherwise might not drum it up it can be a matter of, “if you can’t beat em, join em”, but I definitely think the ends justify the means considering all of his work is what I and many others would call “fighting the good fight”.
