Comment by energy123
2 days ago
Sure but it's just being morally lucky. They found themself in a situation where there was temporary and situational alignment, why give them any credit for that? They didn't create that situation.
It's like AMD open sourcing FSR or Meta open sourcing Llama. The outcome itself is good, but if they ever become leaders in these verticals, they will pivot to closed source quicker than you can blink, because the reason they're doing it is just coincidental to the public good, not because of a genuine motivation to do good.
> Sure but it's just being morally lucky.
No, it's not. They're choosing the path that builds user trust and positive sentiment for long term success, rather than choosing to fleece their customers and not worry about whether people hate it.
Other corporations in a similar spot for games and game platforms could choose to make the same type of choices, but they'd rather boost next quarter's profits, even if that means pissing off their userbase with consumer-hostile policies.
No one forced Valve to have a great form of family sharing. No one forced them to have generous policies around generating Steam keys. No one forced them to invent remote play together. They do these things because they're nice features that are useful for players and make people stay engaged on Steam, and more positively inclined towards Valve.
I strongly disagree with this approach in life.
I am “morally lucky” because every decision I make is to ensure I can always be morally lucky, 10 years later. I take certain kinds of jobs in certain kinds of industries.
It’s my same approach to reducing stress or getting things done. I never get a parking ticket not because I’m amazing — it’s because I know if I have to go out later and move my car, I’ll forget, so I’ll just park right the first time. 10 years later and no parking tickets and no stress — if someone tells me “oh you’re just lucky,” I can only chuckle.
I don't see it as an "approach", I see it as a description. If the FSR upscaler becomes better than DLSS, then my description leads to the prediction that AMD will make FSR closed source. The prevailing camp that says AMD are exercising their moral compass will predict that AMD will keep FSR open source. We'll see who has a description that aligns with reality if that day comes.
Why not give them credit for that? There is no moral rule that to be virtuous, it has to be self-sacrificial. If you narrow a commendable course of action to some sort of ascetic vision of martyrdom and self-punishment, then yes everybody and everything is evil.
So they may pivot to closed source when the circumstances will benefit it, or they may actually not do that. They have no shareholders that force them to squeeze the bottom line. The perceived benefits may just be slight and their culture will push them to stay the course on the long term, where other companies will do the reverse. Maybe if their survival is at stake, but wouldn't anyone faced with existential danger do anything to stay alive, including the worst imaginable?
Within certain commercial boundaries that keeps the business profitable, companies can and do make all sorts of decisions based on values and visions that are more than just economical, especially companies not beholden to shareholders that only care about short-term profits. Even the economical decisions aren't purely rational and often done from some kind of cultural bias.