How a Nephew's CD Burner Inspired Early Valve To Embrace DRM

Valve's early anti-piracy efforts, which eventually led to the Steam platform, were sparked by co-founder Monica Harrington's nephew using her money to buy a CD burner for copying games, she revealed at last week's Game Developers Conference. Harrington said her nephew's 'lovely thank you note' about sharing games with friends represented a 'generational shift' in piracy attitudes that could 'put our entire business model at risk.'

Half-Life subsequently launched with CD key verification in 1998. When players complained about authentication failures, co-founder Mike Harrington discovered 'none of them had actually bought the game,' confirming the system worked. Although easily bypassed, this early protection influenced Steam's more robust DRM implemented with Half-Life 2 in 2004, which became the industry standard for PC game distribution.

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