I think there's a real danger in labelling anything which has a remotely restrictive element as "DRM". Personally I only use "DRM" in a very narrow sense as a value-laden negative term to refer specifically to truly reprehensible schemes like requiring Internet access at all times or limiting the number of downloads/installs etc. Thus, from to my perspective some Steam releases are "DRM" and some definitely aren't.

Using DRM in a more general and descriptive way doesn't seem like a good idea to me since the online debate so far has shown convincingly that, at some point, *everything* becomes DRM if you go down that road. From a tactical perspective, it gets difficult to argue convincingly against those genuinely outrageous business practices (Ubisoft says hi) when you've previously used the exact same language to lash out against something as comparatively non-restrictive such as, say, offline-enabled Steam releases for their "draconian DRM schemes"...

Steam is not a DRM, there's a lot of ignorance over this. The DRM is called Steamworks and It's not used by every game on steam either, most of the big games are published with the same DRM they have in the retail version (eg. Games For Windows validation, SecuROM..), almost every indie game is DRM-Free (World of Goo, Machinarium, Aquaria, Gravitron 2, Gish, Mr.Robot, Darwinia, Defcon, Uplink just as example), and so are older games like Deus Ex, Dark Messiah, Thief, Painkiller, Far Cry and so on, that means that you can run them even without launching Steam.
Stop this hating if you don't know how it works guys!
Valve own games uses Steamworks (I'm not sure about Half-life 1 and expansions, those could be still DRM-free ), Some mayor AAA release uses Steamworks too, and it's the less intrusive DRM you can get (you don't even need to type CD keys, you download the game from steam and then you can play it also offline, you just need to have steam running in offline mode). Few games, for example ubisoft and rockstar ones, uses pain-in-arse DRMs that are present also in the normal retail version. You can't just ask Steam to be DRM free as they don't publish old games like GOG, they can't ask a publisher to do a special DRM-free version of the game for steam as they'll hurt their own retail business, Valve is just trying to get more and more game to use THEIR DRM instead, that at least is more human than the more aggressive ones you usually find in new retail games.

Ok D/L your SecurSteam Games. Now Delete SecurSteam off your PC. Now try to run your SecurSteam game without it on your PC. It won’t run!!! SecurSteam is DRM of the EA kind or the worst part of SecuRom. That is why I call it SecurSteam...

the steam client serves a DRM purpose.

a digital distribution platform with no DRM would allow downloads of games with no caveats.

even the old games on steam require some tampering with their intended format in order to get them running without steam running in the background.

essentially, no DRM scheme is truly uncrackable, so saying that steam isn't DRM just because it's not hard to crack doesn't make sense.

The whole purpose of DRM is to make games more difficult to copy, not impossible.
Steam makes all of it's games more difficult to copy, therefore it is DRM.

Hate to ask it, but are you sure, you know how Steam works?

Afaik every game (that has a price) on Steam needs online activation upon installation and sometimes additionally other activations (GTA 4 is the prime example there). Retail games like Sims 3 (one of the most sold games ever) do not (initially yes, but not anymore) need any online activation, only a disc check (maybe even not that, see Paradox games). Now, Sims 3 is not available on Steam. So, lets check another example. Mass Effect 2 has a disc check on retail and an online activation on Steam. So the DRM applied can differ between Steam and Retail.

Btw I would say that Steam's DRM is kind of both, convenient but particularly insidious because you think its only checking once, but in reality your whole games collection is affected all at once if your account would be cancelled and its checking also at every patch and patches come frequently.

So its better than always on DRM, but much worse than DRM free.

Compared to disc check, I prefer the later, but many prefer Steam. Have never understood them. How can somebody give away control? Much to valuable.

there isn't such thing like online activation (unless it's a boxed game that has Steamworks or requires other kind of activations or it's a game sold on steam with third party DRMs like I said, Rockstar games and Ubisoft ones). Normally you just have to be online do download the game of course, then you can play them offline, you don't need to run the game online the first time you play it, after downloading it it's already activated and ready to play

Sorry, but that''s nonsense. Publishers want their games on Steam because it means a large amount of new income from people who wouldn't buy them retail, so all Valve has to do is say 'any extra DRM, no sales on Steam'. They don't.

Thus we get into the ludicrous situation where to run GTA4 I first have to log into Steam, then I have to log into Rockstar, then I have to log into bloody Windows Live Crap... three different logins just to play one single game.

This isn't exactly what a DRM technically means. The problem is that even people that know that exact meaning and are adamant about it, immediately go against the exact specific meaning.

So when you get down to the nitty gritty, Steam is a system that has many components (kind of like your OS), one of those components is a DRM component (named as Steamworks by Eclipse). Some of those components are nothing like a DRM at all (chat, advertisments, etc).

Now this component may or may not be used in any specific game, but it is actually the game that has DRM or not. Sort of like SecureRom. It is a DRM, just like Steamworks. Some games have it some don't. But just because it is included in a game doesn't mean the game is DRM unless the game actually uses the code for DRM. If it is inert, you can't say the game has DRM if it doesn't use it.

That said, the technical definition of DRM is hardly being used by anybody on this thread and even when it is used, the user often jumps ship to make a point (excepting Eclipse and maybe others that I missed).

Most everybody is right and wrong at the same time in this thread, it is their assumptions and definitions that are different. There is no 'right' answer to the general question 'what is DRM', because it correctly has different meanings beyond the strict technical one. When you deal with both the general public and the tech world, it has worked out best for me to understand the difference between the 'real' meaning of a word and the way the word is used. The way the word is used always wins outside the lab (and rightly so).

In my view trying to fight the world by sticking to the technical definition is a waste of time, but I did the exact same thing years ago. So I expect others to have to go through that experience themselves and not listen to people's previous experience in a similar situation (just like I didn't listen) before they decide for themselves if it is worth it or even correct to be doing so. The thing I can do is point out where the differences in definitions are so that people can at least see the validity of the opposing viewpoint, if not the correctness of it.

So young grasshopper, you ask "Is steam DRM?", I ask back "what *is* DRM? Is it in a cloud or is it in the stream or ....". :)

One common ground is that everybody here loves them their zombie GOG!

Not really. They're too busy torrenting and playing the stuff to be upset, while the rest of us mess around with activations, limited installs and whatever other garbage gets strewn across the path.

If it were purely about piracy, any kind of objective analysis would tell you it is utterly ineffective, and it would go away. Unfortunately, the industry has now been seduced by the thrilling power trip that promises control over what people can do with the stuff you sold them, when they can do it, and the ability to make the stuff go away at their whim. It's a nice earner for the creators of the ineffective protection systems as well.

You realise you're saying this on a forum full of people who buy games here, quite a large number of which like this place because of it's lack of DRM?

Very true Loonie. If I was fine with pirating my games I wouldn't bitch about DRM because there wouldn't be any point. I bitch about DRM because I like to buy my games and not be treated as guilty until proven innocent by the publishers.

The usual way using the Steam DRM is to deliver a incomplete "Steam backup" on DVD to the buyer, install the Steam client and restore and update the backup online after activation. This method is used by many publishers, not only by Valve.

It has the following caveats:

1. If there is no online connection available there is no way to install such a game.

2. The steam client only runs on the most recent Windows and MacOS operating systems. The Windows 98 client is abandoned already and even if you own a Windows 98 game (like Half-Life 1) you can't play it any more on such a machine. The Steam client does an auto-update and then disables itself with the well-known message that you have to buy a new PC and a new operating system.

3. The same thing will happen to the still popular Windows 2000 and XP in two or three years. It depends on how many other players still use it. Even if you upgrade your machine with new hardware and software to get the auto-updated Steam client back to life, this doesn't guarantees you that your older purchased Steam games still run fine on the new configuration.

4. Publishers can update games, change gameplay and add and remove features at any time they like. If you decide, that for example the release version is fine for you and don't like the "new better balancing" you have no chance to stay with the old version.

5. In some european countries you only get crippled versions of the games, because Valve treats every customer from there as a teen or child. This also happens if you legally import a DVD from another country. Your "backup" will then be crippled by online update. They pretend they are forced to do this by law, but on the other side they sell nameless M rated titles unmodified to the same people.

Conclusion: Steam is "software as a service" and about renting games, not of owning them. This is not a question of DRM or not.

Don't forget, Valve have the legal right to ban your account for any reason whatsoever (legally they can do it just if they feel like it) as buying a Steam game is not regarded as purchasing data but rather purchasing a subscription (hence 'Steam Subscribers Agreement'), and a subscription can be terminated at any time preventing access to a service (in this case, playing your Steam games).

If you are banned from Steam you cannot play your games unless in offline mode (and that will only last for a finite number of time - get a new PC and the game is up). If GOG ban you for account sharing or whatever, you can still technically keep your installs and play forever. Such behavior as account sharing definitely should not be encouraged, but there is little in the way GOG can punish you except not allowing you to download your games again.

I see the "Steam is PURE EEEEEVIL" brigade has arrived, with their confusion on who's responsable for third party DRM (the publishers) and making obvious statements that are probably irrelevent in the vast majority of cases (comparisons to CD checks without extra internet activation).

Have I ever stated something like that? I specifically told that steam uses DRM, and yes the only way to install games is of course installing steam, logging in, and then downloading them. But in everyday life it's not very different from something you do using GOG for example. I never found myself to copy a game from steam to another PC without it (you can copy and run games if the other PC has steam, there's also a nice backup feature that makes single archives of a certain size you can specify).
Of course Steam has DRM, it's just not that intrusive (at least for the use I do).
You're also very wrong on a point: You have the possibility to apply fan patches and mods without steam screaming that the original game files are modified or corrupted, you can really do whatever you want like a DRM-free game, you just need to have Steam installed on your PC and it's not a big deal if you already use the service to chat with friends, meet online for multiplayer matches or buy games.
About auto-patching of games, that's a very good feature for me, not a bad one, and If you want to keep your game files intact (for example if you modified the game without using a proper mod tool or applied a fan patch), you can just disable auto patching to be sure to not download further updates. Steam will never try to patch the game if you modify it, even if there's a manual option that lets him check your game files and fix the "corrupted" ones, but it's manual and sometimes is useful to revert back to a vanilla version of a game.
It IS a DRM, or better, it USES DRMs, but Steam itself is the client, not the DRM. The actual DRM is inside Steam APIs and Steamworks.
Oh, you can't resell your game on GOG too anyway, it's something related to Digital delivery not to DRMs.
And last but not least, if you have a Mac and a PC, you buy just a single copy of the game but you can play it both on mac and pc because you always get both versions, and you can even share save states, that of course if the game is released for macs too.
In the end steam offers to me a whole lot of nice features, hassle free download+installation of games, awesome deals, a big and nice community, the possibility to invite my online friends to every game i'm playing, the possibility to talk with them chatting or by voice even if i'm inside a game and them in another one, and even during loading screens.
And another whole lot of nice things (auto patching of games, 3d driver updates, achievements, statistics, community groups with events, tournaments, clans and so on).
All these features are worth the fact I need to just keep steam on my hardisk. Even better, I configured it as it opens when my pc boot up and I'm almost always connected to the service, using it as instant messaging, browsing the news or the community pages.
Also, Steam keeps PC gaming alive against consoles they have no reasons to ban and no one ever complained about being banned without reasons really. Also even if you cheat on a game, you just get banned server side on THAT game, there's really no way you personally can get banned on steam, maybe only if you hack the whole service and write GABE NEWELL SUCKS on the store home page.
In that case, knowing valve, they'll offer you a position as network security manager