im not sure i made that clear enough

Valve circumvents piracy with Steam. They do it by making it almost as easy to go legit. Click a button and the download begins, it's just about that simple. And they throw additional features into the bargain.

Also i believe the Steam service is free. It costs money to buy games of course but measure that against having to go out into the real world to a game store, buy a physical media, come back, install the game, update drivers, and play the game.

The downside is not having a physical media for the game. i can see that being a big deal for some people. it's completely virtual. You don't 'have' anything. Which is true.

But the upside to that downside is that it's not constrained to any one computer anymore. You can go to another computer, download Steam, install it, give it your password, and have access to all your games, with the correct drivers to work on the new computer.

This is really pretty cool and a true shift in the way we do things.