IAmSinistar: Actually, it is inevitable, just the date thereof is not known. Every company eventually goes under. Maybe next week, maybe in five decades. Perhaps by the time they do you're no longer using them anyway, in which case you're not out much. But it will happen.
Again, the case of
JManga should be sobering to people who think any of these schemes is infallible. While a business is successful it is easy to believe it always will be. Just ask AOL, MySpace, Lycos, ...
From a practical point of view, it's safe to assume that Steam is not going anywhere. I might be worried about where it will be in 15 years time but not tomorrow. And that's not a problem now.
True, it might be suddenly bought out by a huge evil corporate giant but a truck can run me over tomorrow as well.
IAmSinistar: They definitely want all content to be on-demand, streaming, and pay-per-use. Why sell you a DVD for $20 that you can watch as much as you want, when they can charge you $2 a view? Same with your books, your music, etc. Plus they can finally put unskippable commercials back in, defeating the DVRs (at least for a while). AND they can track your usage, giving them valuable marketing data.
Governments only wish they had this kind of control and surveillance.
It's not exactly a new attitude is it? Remember what the movie studios did when
the first VCRs came about?
And now that anyone can replicate and distribute content at no cost. So of course they're terrified, and with good reason, look at what's happening to the record companies.
That is a good thing.
So to them, limiting how those bloody rubes can get their hands on their revenue producing properties is essential or they might have to gasp; give up on their third yacht.