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Here is the latest instalment of Steam's Hardware Survey, as usual we do our monthly thing and compare it and talk about it and make sure you know not to use it as a hard figure.
Linux results for September 2014
Ubuntu 14.04.1 LTS 64 bit 0.51% +0.08%
Linux Mint 17 Qiana 64 bit 0.11% +0.01%
Linux 3.10 64 bit 0.09% +0.01%
Ubuntu 14.04.1 LTS 0.07% +0.01%
Total: 1.16% + 0.10%
Last Month: 1.06%
My thoughts on it
It's nice to see an increase even if it is small, but we are still talking about such low percentages overall. It will be interesting to see next months figures now that we have such massive releases as Borderlands 2 and The Pre-sequel.
Things to note
A minor point: Distro-hoppers will slightly mess up the statistics, Linux users are far more likely to switch between different distributions than say a Windows user due to how many we have.
Just be aware these results will probably not be that accurate as we don't know how they do their percentage results, they could be rounding up, rounding down or truncating the percentages. So a 0.5% could actually be nearly 0.6% as it could be 0.59% but they could do no rounding and simply truncate it.
Also remember it is a survey, so it won't ask every single one of you to do it. It would only be truly accurate if it did it behind the scenes, but that's not what a survey is for this is just to get a general idea.
Linux users typically shy away from any form of DRM, so you can bet there is a large bunch of Linux users who just simply refuse to use Steam.
Final Note: Look at it this way, Steam has around 100 million active users, 1% of 100 million is about 1,000,000 (1 million) people. What developer wouldn't want to hook into a market that big? Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Linux results for September 2014
Ubuntu 14.04.1 LTS 64 bit 0.51% +0.08%
Linux Mint 17 Qiana 64 bit 0.11% +0.01%
Linux 3.10 64 bit 0.09% +0.01%
Ubuntu 14.04.1 LTS 0.07% +0.01%
Total: 1.16% + 0.10%
Last Month: 1.06%
My thoughts on it
It's nice to see an increase even if it is small, but we are still talking about such low percentages overall. It will be interesting to see next months figures now that we have such massive releases as Borderlands 2 and The Pre-sequel.
Things to note
A minor point: Distro-hoppers will slightly mess up the statistics, Linux users are far more likely to switch between different distributions than say a Windows user due to how many we have.
Just be aware these results will probably not be that accurate as we don't know how they do their percentage results, they could be rounding up, rounding down or truncating the percentages. So a 0.5% could actually be nearly 0.6% as it could be 0.59% but they could do no rounding and simply truncate it.
Also remember it is a survey, so it won't ask every single one of you to do it. It would only be truly accurate if it did it behind the scenes, but that's not what a survey is for this is just to get a general idea.
Linux users typically shy away from any form of DRM, so you can bet there is a large bunch of Linux users who just simply refuse to use Steam.
Final Note: Look at it this way, Steam has around 100 million active users, 1% of 100 million is about 1,000,000 (1 million) people. What developer wouldn't want to hook into a market that big? Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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Some you may have missed, popular articles from the last month:
The comments on this article are closed.
Quoting: subWe can safely assume those 0.1 % "raise" is close to the uncertainty bounds.
It makes no sense to interpret it as a trend.
+1
The numbers have been going down a bit, the numbers now have gone up a bit, ...
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thelimeydragon Oct 2, 2014
I also got a survey for the first time 3 days ago.. was quite surprised.
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As someone else pointed out, since the overall user count continues to rise, perhaps the percentages going up or down from month to month really are not the best gauge of how Linux is doing. Maybe instead of saying Linux rises or Linux falls, we should look at the actual estimated user count every month, and base the fall / rise on the percentage of that. It seems plausible to me, without doing any math, that we may have been rising all along.
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Quoting: adolsonMaybe instead of saying Linux rises or Linux falls, we should look at the actual estimated user count every month, and base the fall / rise on the percentage of that.
Sounds good, but AFAIR, they don't publish the total number of users monthly.
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philip550c Oct 2, 2014
havent gotten a survey in a long time on linux. Signed on to my mac for the first time in months and I got the survey.
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Quoting: EikeAlso there is probably a difference between the total number of users and the total number of active users (I think you need to be an active user to have the survey).Quoting: adolsonMaybe instead of saying Linux rises or Linux falls, we should look at the actual estimated user count every month, and base the fall / rise on the percentage of that.Sounds good, but AFAIR, they don't publish the total number of users monthly.
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The thing that will take Linux to the top of these charts is if Valve markets the Steam Machine as a console. It has to be more than just a free OS; it needs to be something that you buy for serious console gaming. They should not write drivers for the valve controller for any platform but Linux, they should release some exclusive titles. I'm not even saying that for Linux's sake, I'm just saying that for Valve's sake; their Steam Machine will die if they just add it to the market without any exclusive features.
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Quoting: sevThe thing that will take Linux to the top of these charts is if Valve markets the Steam Machine as a console. It has to be more than just a free OS; it needs to be something that you buy for serious console gaming. They should not write drivers for the valve controller for any platform but Linux, they should release some exclusive titles. I'm not even saying that for Linux's sake, I'm just saying that for Valve's sake; their Steam Machine will die if they just add it to the market without any exclusive features.
I've been thinking. Gabe said HL3 will NOT be SteamOS-exclusive. But he never said that it will be released for all platforms on day one. I think releasing HL3 for SteamOS a month or two before Windows and Mac, could really kick-start the Steam Machines.
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Quoting: psyminLinux users are also potentially more privacy conscious than the general population so they might refuse to send data to Valve. In my humble opinion anyway ..
Not sure I agree there. I feel like Linux users who would care more about sending anonymous info for the survey than growing the number of visible Linux users probably aren't using Steam in the first place.
edit: Also, in the past 2 years I've been using Linux (and Steam), I've only seen the survey once.
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Quoting: pbI've been thinking. Gabe said HL3 will NOT be SteamOS-exclusive. But he never said that it will be released for all platforms on day one. I think releasing HL3 for SteamOS a month or two before Windows and Mac, could really kick-start the Steam Machines.
Part of me wants to see something like this happen due to xbox and PS exclusives over the years and the fact that us penguins are still largely treated as second class citizens. But.. the other part of me has always felt exclusives were dumb, it only hurts the games sales. Plus, I can't see it affecting hardware sales THAT much, though I wouldn't mind sifting through data or reading a GOOD article on the subject.
Neither myself nor anyone else I know personally (that I know of) has ever bought any console/pc just to play a specific game. Now if a developer only wants to develop for a single platform then that is their decision. It seems more often then not though it's not the developers making the decisions.. it's MS, Sony or Nintendo inking back room deals with publishers, where the publishers tend to be paid hefty chucks of casholla to agree to making a title exclusive. How much of that tends to end up in a developers pocket I have no idea. I'm guessing not enough.
From a purely business standpoint though, I think it could go one of two ways if they were to release HL3 or some other HUGELY popular game on SteamOS/Linux first when steam machines arrive. On one hand it could greatly help the sales of steam machines because lets face it... many people can't even handle reinstalling windows from an OEM supplied recovery partition much less install even the simplest of linux distros to install in order to play it on their own computer.
I think for this to work though they need to forget about giving (by default) people a desktop to play with as well. It needs to be locked to steamOS "big picture mode" (BPM) and have the functionality of say local media, netflix, youtube, facebook etc built into BPM more along the lines of how the current consoles offer those services. Personally, I would like to see them really integrate XBMC/Kodi into steam OS to serve those functions. Many a noob has borked their linux install unintentionally and without real knowledge of how to fix it... hell i've been there done that. That would be horrible press when enough people have it happen to them. If an advanced user wants a full fledged desktop.. they will know how to add it, it's basically debian after all. It needs to be put behind a warning/eula that tampering with steamOS, while not forbidden is "dangerous and not suggested" and it is completely on the user if they screw something up. I obviously don't want a locked down platform like current consoles.. but again.. lets face it. Some people are just dumb and even going by a "step by step" how-to will still manage to even copy/paste wrong and screw something up.
EDIT* basically the average steam machine owner doesn't even need to be aware that their console is running linux, just like most PS3/4 owners don't know theirs is running modified FreeBSD and most Xbox One owners don't know it's running a modified windows OS. *END EDIT*
On the other hand.. the world might not quite be ready for steamOS/linux and exclusive or not.. will just wait for it to come to windows or xbox/ps and the initial sales #'s of the game for those first months would not be very good (which is NOT good) and steam machines tank.
I think tt will be interesting to see how Valve plays this.. their prototypes and the steamOS beta is obviously pretty open, I wonder just how blatantly open the consumer models are/will be.
OH! and just to be on topic.. I have NEVER seen the survey for steam on linux. I tend to jump back and forth between desktop environments multiple times a day, so steam is restarted multiple times a day and I still have not had it pop up. I've seen it many times on windows.
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