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Joined 2 years ago
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Cake day: June 12th, 2023

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  • That was 2023, and one of very few things made not to specifically promote their hardware or as a cheap spinoff of existing IP. And define “actively maintaining”, because general bug fixes for decade old multi-player games and managing item marketplaces doesn’t require much manpower.

    Going further back there’s Aperture Desk Job which was a tech demo for the Steam Deck in 2022. Then an extended cut version of Artifact originally meant as a sequel in 2021, which is a Dota 2 card game, but still remains unfinished, so effectively abandoned. Then Half Life: Alyx in 2020 which 90% of gamers can’t play because it’s VR only, and clearly made to further promote their VR hardware. Dota Warlords in 2020 which was originally a community game mode. The original Artifact in 2018, which had abandoned iOS and Android ports. The Lab in 2016 which was made to promote the launch of the HTC Vive. A zombie CS spinoff in 2014, Dota 2 in 2013, CS:Go in 2012, Portal 2 in 2011, and Left 4 Dead 2 in 2009.

    If you remove the spinoff and niche stuff from the list you get game releases in 2023, 2020 (arguable since it’s VR only and thus inherently niche), 2013, 2012, 2011, 2009.

    That’s a pretty big gap of not much for the last decade game-wise. Its been previously documented and published that Valve has issues getting games developed because of the flat organization structure. Articles like this.







  • Probably not. The amounts were talking, and the time frames are pretty big.

    A quick search shows statewide retail sales in Q4 2023 was $60.9B. So extrapolating that out, that’s $243.6B for the state in a year. If we assume Charlotte is about 1/5 of the State’s retail footprint, which seems reasonable for the largest city, with over double the population of the 2nd largest… we get $48.7B. Then 1% of those sales comes to $487M. Multiply that by 40 years and you get… $19.4 Billion. And that’s just using numbers I found with a quick Google search and basic math.









  • So how is that fake? I can’t do any of those things you mention in the first paragraph.

    You’re not rich enough where banks know you always have stock available to give them. Where there’s virtually no limit to your stock pool that the bank can just liquidate after the fact. You need to be in the top .1% for that. The fact you’re on lemmy means that’s not a possibility in the slightest.

    Getting loans based on assets is not at all the same as selling those assets.

    It is for the rich. That’s why so many don’t care about their traditional salary. That’s why so many went out of their way to advertise they were taking a $1 salary during the recession, or even today. Because their salary is subject to income tax, but loans are not. You can get the same end result of cash in hand by receiving your pay in stock, then taking loans against that stock.


  • I count that in the sold category. Because they just get more loans to pay off the previous ones, or default and the bank just takes the shares and does it again because what the loaned is less than the share value. All the while avoiding income and capital gains taxes.

    It’s why boycotts and cancelling subscriptions actually do work when done in large enough numbers. Their money can disappear very quickly if shareholders get spooked.

    It’s also why Tesla isn’t being affected as much now despite Elon pulling the mask off and going full Nazi, resulting in massive sales drops. Years and years of short sellers and complicit media trying to tank the brand, largely funded and promoted by things like entrenched oil interests and competing car brands have trained many shareholders to ignore a lot.