# Gabe Newell of Valve gets political



## Firky (Jan 29, 2013)

*Gabe Newell on ‘Productivity, Economics, Political Institutions and the Future of Corporations’*

This sounds really interesting, I hope a transcript is put online.



> In recent months, as some of you know, I have been working with Gabe Newell (of Valve Corporation) exploring the social economies that have spontaneously emerged within the vast and intriguing communities of video game players. Convinced that students of economics, politics and public policy in general have a great deal to learn from this weird and wonderful universe, I took the initiative of suggesting to the LBJ Graduate School of Public Affairs that they invite Gabe Newell to give a talk on these matters from his perspective. The result is the following invitation to whomever happens to be in the Austin area this coming Wednesday. See you there, if you will…


 
http://yanisvaroufakis.eu/2013/01/2...orporations-29th-january-university-of-texas/


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## Fez909 (Jan 29, 2013)

> get's


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## Firky (Jan 29, 2013)

NOOO!

Mrs Magpie will fix it. She loves to fiddle with titles.


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## Random (Jan 29, 2013)

Varoufakis seems to throw around the term "anarcho syndicalist" without actually bothering to show how Valve matches any definition of that term. I'm sure it's great that there's a horizontal management structure in this company, but while the workers' surplus value is still being controlled by others.

he's more honest when he says that "Valve is a private company owned mostly by few individuals. In that sense, it is an enlightened oligarchy: an oligarchy in that it is owned by a few and enlightened in that those few are not using their property rights to boss people around." http://blogs.valvesoftware.com/econ...nt-structure-fit-into-todays-corporate-world/

Valve sounds like yet another tech development  company that is kind to its small elite workforce in order to stimulate greater productivity.

I'd like some of the heavyweight politics thinkers to read that article and also comment on it. How do I tag people?


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## tommers (Jan 29, 2013)

Random

oh, it gets rid of the sign.  Put an @ sign in front of somebody's name.


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## Firky (Jan 29, 2013)

Random said:


> Valve sounds like yet another tech development company that is kind to its small elite workforce in order to stimulate greater productivity.
> 
> I'd like some of the heavyweight politics thinkers to read that article and also comment on it. How do I tag people?


 
@THEIRNAME

Valve seem quite at pains to be a 'good' or 'different' corporation with a better approach that the norm. Take a look at their employee hand book, it's a good bit of propaganda for their business ethics and a bit of backslapping. Trying to find a good anaylsis of it to save you wading through it but I can't (on my tablet anyway)


http://www.g4tv.com/thefeed/blog/po...rking-of-company-aka-your-job-probably-sucks/



> At heart, Valve is organized in a non-hierarchical manner, and relies on no outside funding or influence. Even Gabe Newell doesn't have people who report to him. The idea is to hire awesome people who want to do awesome things and the just let them do those things


 
I've read similar things about Virgin, people are hired and let to do their own thing and organise themselves - so as long as there's a central focus.

I don't think the heavyweights would be that interested in it, sadly, game's aren't as interesting as yellowing and musty trot books 

(was going to post this to P&P but it would sink).


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## Random (Jan 30, 2013)

firky said:


> I don't think the heavyweights would be that interested in it, sadly, game's aren't as interesting as yellowing and musty trot books
> 
> (was going to post this to P&P but it would sink).


 it's not about the games. it's about a business that claims to be non capitalist, or post capitalist. I think butchersapron and @lovedetective and sihhi are better than me at pointing out exactly why this kind of "horizontal" company isn't really going beyond capitalism; it's a niche for privileged technicians within it, imo.


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## Kid_Eternity (Jan 30, 2013)

Fascinating.


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## ohmyliver (Feb 1, 2013)

video is here


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## John Hoffman (Sep 18, 2015)

I think it is important to pay attention to what Gabe has to say.  It seems to be the direction that business, industry, politics and even religion will take and for that reason I am excited about it.  But what Gabe doesn't seem to be saying from what I can see is his model is just an extension of Bill Gate's original model for Microsoft.  That model included taking Open Source developed by the whole internet community, tweaking it and calling it Microsoft's own.  If royalty rights for some specified period are provided to every independent developer for an idea that gets incorporated into any  base product produced by Valve I will be impressed.


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## Crispy (Sep 18, 2015)

Random said:


> it's not about the games. it's about a business that claims to be non capitalist, or post capitalist. I think butchersapron and @lovedetective and sihhi are better than me at pointing out exactly why this kind of "horizontal" company isn't really going beyond capitalism; it's a niche for privileged technicians within it, imo.


Are the cleaners decentralised and free to choose their hours? Does everyone get paid the full value of their labour? Are their democratic processes to ensure the company's decisions reflect the will of its members?

No.

Valve has an interesting structure, but it's only possible because they hire exceptionally bright creative people, and have a bottomless well of cash from their Steam distribution network.


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## elbows (Sep 19, 2015)

John Hoffman said:


> But what Gabe doesn't seem to be saying from what I can see is his model is just an extension of Bill Gate's original model for Microsoft.  That model included taking Open Source developed by the whole internet community, tweaking it and calling it Microsoft's own.



I dont recognise this version of history. Microsoft often stood on the shoulders of others. But the concept of open source didn't really get going till many, many years after Microsoft, nor did the 'internet community' resemble the one of today back then, since widespread public access to the internet didn't arrive until well after Windows 95, yet alone the many years of Microsoft prior to that. A narrative can be constructed about Microsoft doing the sorts of things you describe, but it certainly wasn't Bill Gates original model.


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