I’m using “business” here as a general word, you can think of it for any field: physical stores, indie developers, startups, etc…
How many times did this happen before? Every big company was once a small one. Google used to be the good guys at the beginning.
We’re currently seeing the old praised Proton starts its small pseudo-monopoly business in the privacy focused services field.
You might think you’re helping the world by putting your money in the “morally correct” place, but at the end you might be just helping a new greedy company to arise.
I had this thought after seeing the page of a indie game on Steam, it’s been a few months I’m pirating everything related to digital media, but then I saw this game from an indie developer that I wish listed in 2023, it got launched oct., 2025. As I decided to pirate everything I had a second thought on this one, “maybe I should pay for this one, it’s a good cause, this guy put some effort on it, why not?!”, the game currently has 802 reviews, which isn’t bad for a indie game.
But then WHAT IF? What if the game becomes popular? What if people start demanding more and buying a lot? What if the developer decide to start a small company to attend the people demand? And what if this company become the new average modern company adding paywalls, DLCs, cosmetics? What if they start abusing AI use to “boost productivity” and ship faster?
What have I done with my money?
Now I face this moral dilemma, should I pay for it or just pirate it like I usually do?
By supporting small companies you make sure alternatives to the big companies thrive. When the new alternatives become too big, now at least there are two companies instead of a monopoly or you start supporting a third up and coming. The idea is not to make the perfect choice, but to make sure there is a choice.
Like choosing between Apple (Mac, iOS), Google (Android) or Microsoft (Windows)? It still doesn’t feel the right approach.
So, instead of paying for a game, which provides money to that dev, you will instead pirate that game, you’ll steal from them instead, potentially driving them to poverty.
If you pirate it, you are the bad person. If you don’t want to risk it, don’t buy it, and don’t pirate it either.
It’s simply rewarding good behavior with your wallet. This goes for anything in life. I will never shop at Wal-mart, Amazon, Ebay, Microsoft or anyone else who actively hurts society by playing financial and legal games to get their way. (E: Which is damaging everyone’s wallet in the end because the products are shit)
I’ll take a hit to my bank account for paying a slightly higher price to reward good companies.
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Honestly why i prefer cooperative over small buisness. Small coop my vote matters more buy big coop i still have a vote.
Opensource or otherwise contributes to public good also helps mitigate this too. So if Proton goes off the deep end the qurstion is what forks exists and not “how do i learn a new product and convince everyone i know to do the same?”
Again best case is i can vote to keep the coop sane/aligned with my interests AND I can fork/self-host/etc.
