Not entirely correct probably since i doubt all the different publishers happened to all suggest 5 days. Seems more likely GOG suggested 5 days to them and they accepted. (likely because it wouldn't be likely they'd get much more, maybe after some initial attempts to get permanent)

be reading and coming and going from this post, damn my eyes even start to hurt. But have not figured out yet what is the purpose of connect??
I already connected my account, but what is the future of it?? like are they trying to sync the two platforms?? merge them together??
still no clue

It's a marketing move to drive people to GoG and gain publicity. GoG gets in the gaming press, Steam users hear "Free stuff at GoG", connect accounts, then wham - GoG Summer sale. Steam users spend money, discover GoG is a great store, GoG grows.

It's not about merging the platforms, it's about growing GoG.

None of us know what contractual or legal obligations are in place so it is just pure speculation. What is sensible to conclude though is that the publishers decide if they are going to give their games away and under what conditions they'll do so. If GOG wanted to extend the time then they most likely have to go to each publisher and request it and get them to agree with it, with no guarantee they would do so. It is very unlikely that GOG could just decide on their own to say "We're going to extend this by 2 days due to the problems that occurred." without the publishers having any input, unless GOG decided they will personally eat the losses for any games redeemed.

So yes, they probably sold the idea to publishers with a specific 5 day timeframe and that's what they all agreed to, but that doesn't mean GOG can just randomly change it arbitrarily without getting everyone to agree to it.

If anyone is going to assume anything, the only sensible thing to assume is that GOG needs to get permission from publishers to do things like this, and that most likely there will be specific terms and conditions that include timelines, maximum redemptions and other factors. All sides of the equation have to cover their legal bases. We don't know any of this for certain, but it makes common sense with rights ownership and contract agreements to do such things (even if we're not privy to the details of such).
It might help to go to the GOG connect link and read the FAQ on the page that explains it in full detail.

yes read over and over and over again
I advice you to read it again
especially focus on 8 and 14
i can understand in rule 8 " connect one Steam library per GOG.com account " but do not understand that the two accounts cannot be disconnected ( btw if anyone who connected his accounts is willing to sell his/her steam account in future he have to sell gog account too )
and still for now you are getting a free copy of a game you own nothing more, and even though you want to quite steam rule 15 , and I quote ," not all games support multiplayer gameplay between Steam and GOG.com "
and still i am confused of the purpose of combining these two platforms together most gog users hate steam as far as i know

Except every time I came back to check if it had connected I got the message that I was still in the queue. Given I couldn't do anything and it ended up taking over the 5 days to connect my accounts, I miss out because the fact is the service didn't work.

That's EXACTLY what I meant by problems, and kinks in the system. Even still to this day there are people like yourself saying they were having issues with the system. While it is nice they are doing this, they really should have worked out the problems first, now people are missing out just as it wasn't behaving correctly. That's why I was hoping they'd note that "don't worry if you missed out this time around, we are still working out the issues, and will do another round later once it's working as it should."

Since you're not allowed to sell either of them I doubt this'll be an issue

I connected my accounts literally as soon as it would let me without 404ing (~the 2nd day) and I'm still in the queue. My steam profile is set to public, I've tried on 3 different browsers, I've tried over a VPN and over a tethered WiFi connection. It still doesn't work. It promises that I'll be able to get my games no matter how long it takes, but most people here say that isn't true. I was interested in GOG as I was worried what would happen to my steam library if Valve suddenly went bankrupt, but I am very quickly being driven away by what seems like a clear bait and switch.

Your GOG account is linked to your Steam account and you can't change it later to link it to some other Steam account. Your Steam account is never linked to your GOG account in the other direction, that is impossible unless Valve decides to offer a feature within Steam called SteamConnect to link to your GOG account. The two accounts are completely independent, the only connection is one that GOG allows you to configure in your GOG account to point to one and only one Steam account and never be able to change that link.

Selling your Steam or GOG account violates the terms of service of both services at any rate. But there's nothing about your Steam account that knows about GOG or has anything to do with GOG. The only connection is the URL of your Steam account stored in a GOG database, nothing more, Valve has nothing to do with it. Steam is only being used for:

1) An OpenID authentication provider, the very same way it is used on steamgifts.com, steamcompanion.com and multitudes of other Steam oriented websites that let you log into their site by using your Steam OpenID login. This is not permanent, and you can revoke remote access to your Steam account completely within the Steam client's settings for anything you've authorized.

2) Access to your Steam profile, in particular your list of owned games which must be set to public in order to access it through the Steam API.

So if it were actually legitimate to sell a Steam account (which it is not), then one simply logs into the Steam client, goes into settings and revokes all remote access, family sharing, etc. and changes the password. Nothing can access the account remotely other than what you permit to do so within Steam itself, and any of that can be revoked.

What is permanent, is when you tell GOG to connect to a specific Steam account, they only let you configure it one single time, so you can't go and change it from one Steam account to another Steam account later on, and presumably you can't link more than one GOG account to a single Steam account. For anyone who wonders why they would do this, it is to prevent fraud. If you could unlink from one Steam account and link to another, then people would game the system and link to their Steam account, redeem all the games, unlink it, link it to friend #1's account, redeem all the games, repeat for 500 friends, then each of those friends would do the same thing. So the priviledge of receiving free GOG copies of games owned on Steam is confined to a single Steam account configuration that can never be changed after it is set.

So for example if someone linked their GOG account to their Steam account and violated the terms of Steam's service and sold their Steam account, when they reset the Steam permissions on remote access then GOG can no longer access that account and the new owner of the illegitimately sold Steam account will themselves be unable to link their own GOG account (if they have one) to this Steam account because it has been linked to one already previously and GOG wont let multiple GOG accounts ever link to the same Steam account.

If someone has a problem with that, then that person is presumably wanting to do exactly what GOG (and Steam) want to prevent them from doing - committing fraud.

GOG Connect does have a feature to handle this situation too though, simply by not linking a GOG account to a Steam account, and not getting DRM-free copies of games owned on Steam on GOG. :)

As for connecting the two platforms together - they are not being connected together like you are envisioning. The _only_ thing that is happening, is you are pointing GOG to one single Steam account and they are then using Steam's OpenID authentication for you to log into Steam to confirm you own the account. Once you log in, then they validate it is your account and permanently store that Steam account ID in your GOG account. After that, you have to make your Steam profile public for them to access your games list (same thing with any website wanting to access your games list or wishlist) at which point they are able to access your list of owned games through the Steam API securely, which allows them to confirm which games you legitimately own in that account. If you own a game that is on Steam, and it is under GOG Connect promotion by GOG and the publisher of the game, then you may be eligible to redeem such games for free on GOG. That is all that happens, there is no integration between the two platforms, the games do not talk to each other. It is quite simply a conversation between the two companies electronically like this:

GOG to user: Tell us your Steam ID and prove that it is yours by logging in through Steam's service.

You: Ok, here is my Steam account ID, and I just logged in through Steam's authentication service.

(note, at no time does GOG have or know your password, nor can they do anything other than view your profile information like a friend could, and only after you grant the permission on Steam to do so)

You then click "check for games that are compatible with the promotion"

GOG's webserver connects to Steam through the Steam API and says: Give me authenticated user XYZ's list of games.

Steam's webserver says: Here is user XYZ's list of games.

GOG's webserver compares that list with the list of games being promoted on GOG Connect, if there are any matches that you do not already own on GOG, it gives you the opportunity to say "yes I would like a free copy of those games on GOG also please!"

You say to GOG: "Yes, please give me free copies of the games I own on Steam which are in this promotion currently"

GOG says "Ok, here you go, enjoy your free copies of these games.

That is it. That is all it does. It has nothing to do with multiplayer or playing the games, there is no communication between the games on GOG and Steam. It is an automated mechanism for giving free copies of games on GOG that one owns on Steam after authenticating that you actually own the games on Steam and that it is your account because you were able to log into it.

That's about as clear as it can possibly be explained I think. If it isn't clear to someone still, then I'd highly recommend not using the feature at all. :)

Yeah, ticket to support sent, let's hope they'll deal with it before another date expires.

And they told me to "try again later" as if I haven't tried again later for three days straight. -_-

Ok, i know that. It's why a buy games on GoG first. But why linking my GoG account to my Steam account ? Is there any advantage ?

And The Witcher 2 ?! :( :(

Could you be any more vague?

For you, no