When Steam first hit the marketplace lots of people thought it wasn’t going to take off - and the bigger companies didn’t want it to. Over time it really gathered momentum. The bugs were being ironed out, the process was working well, and the subscriber count was going through the roof. As more time went by, some smaller indies signed up to use Steam to deliver their games - giving the small player a chance to get a great deal of exposure to their game at a pretty small cost and at the same time allowing it to be delivered onto desktops on demand. Awesome stuff!

So as expected, the bigger players are wanting a piece of the action now that the theory has been proven. EA are the latest contenders in this market, and they’ve recently attempted to release their competing product - EA Link.

The release didn’t actually go according to plan. In fact, according to
The Inq, it is:

… so buggy that it just doesn’t work, and the EULAs are scary.

Nice! Not just that, but it also has some nasty side-effects with regards to privacy:

I read the second EULA they presented, and this one is much darker and less user friendly than the last. I got about a third into it before I decided that the terms were unacceptable, basically they could use my personal info and share it around.

It looks like the only similarity that EA’s first iteration can draw to Valve’s baby is that there is some sort of stinky vapour rising from it - which technically is a form of steam.

So, feel free to use EA Link if you’re happy to have your innards shared with EA. If not, stick to something that’s tried, tested and proven: Steam.

Disclaimer: I don’t work for Valve, or anyone else mentioned in this post. The comments reflect my personal opinion only.