Happiness doesn't come into it...It is purely a financial decision at that point...is my internet access worth an extra $40 per month, an extra $60 per month, etc etc. At some point the pain of the extra cost will outweigh the pain of no internet.
This is quite different to the decision process which causes me not to buy cable which is not based on financial concerns. I can tolerate the pain of being without cable so I am free to choose not to support that business model.
This hits on one of the concerns people have.... supporting a business model they don't agree with. DLC and DRM being just two aspects of it. Some folks have hinted at concerns over how Steams business model will look going forward. And how Steams growing market share can alter the industry. Some of us have had bad experiences with supporting something which evolved into something very different. Case in point...
My only source of broadband internet will not allow us to upgrade to the next tier unless we also upgrade our cable package. They have a wide range of packages, and all sorts of bundle options. But to get the highest speed net, we MUST buy additional cable channels. Those are two different services. Yet you can't have one premium service without the other. They can get away with this and more because we, the customers, empowered their monopoly with our patronage. Some folks who don't like the direction that DRM is headed with internet validation, are going to attempt to alter that course by not supporting media sold in that way. People who don't like the idea of fragmenting games by
monetizing them with
micro-transaction DLC, are not going to want to support companies that base their business model on this practice. Those who are very concerned about these issues will debate it in public.
At some future point will Steam offer tiered packages tied to other services like comcast does? ...Free service comes with purchase of a game and allows you to play SP and download developer patches (
and is required to validate your purchase). Pay a slight monthly charge and you can add fan created mods. Pay a little more and you can play MP games. They are afterall paying for all that server space, and shelling out mounds of payroll to IT. Rising energy costs, increasing network congestion, new competitors, losses to net neutrality etc will pressure the existing model. How will Steam adapt? Will the games we buy stay bought? Will mods stay free? Will we have the freedom to host our own MP games? Or will mods and MP be monetized to keep Steam afloat?