• sp3tr4l@lemmy.zip
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    8 hours ago

    … What?

    It… it goes into the company.

    https://www.theverge.com/2024/7/13/24197477/valve-employs-few-hundred-people-payroll-redacted

    They run an absurdly profitable business.

    They make approximately $15 million in profit per each of the roughly 360 employees.

    That’s after wages.

    Nobody knows exactly what an average Valve salary is (they’re a private company, they have no obligation to disclose that), but they almost certainly just continue to accumulate a stupendous amount of money, which they can then throw at any ideas that require all kinds of potential material or licensing or technical costs.

    The employees are not making $15 million dollars a year. Probably more like 1/10 to 1/100 of that.

    • helenslunch@feddit.nl
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      3 hours ago

      It… it goes into the company.

      …what? How…does fucking around researching and developing products for their team members benefit the company?

      • ggppjj@lemmy.world
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        2 hours ago

        The steam deck is making them money, that was a product developed by fucking around.

          • Olhonestjim@lemmy.world
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            9 minutes ago

            It seems that you can only think of value in terms of making a profit. But there is also great value in making something to see what is possible, regardless of profit. If you can’t see that, you’ll never make something innovative.

            • FigMcLargeHuge@sh.itjust.works
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              54 seconds ago

              This person is an idiot and can only think of one possibility. They are ignoring the fact that fucking around on the job can have implications like increasing skills. I made the mistake of replying to this person with an anecdote of mine which I am sure will be deconstructed by them like they were there. Point is, boss allowed us to goof off with pet programming projects and that resulted in me experimenting with code I wouldn’t have had the chance otherwise and making a breakthrough, which I then realized how to implement that. So I wasn’t fucking around to make money, but the fucking around gave me the knowledge and skills to them apply that indirectly. But hey this person is determined to infect the thread with their single minded theory that doesn’t make a shit to the actual conversation.