Valve: "93% of Steam Users Born on January 1st"

Valve's head honcho Gabe Newell revealed in an odds-defying statement today that 93% of Steam users were born on January 1st.

[wallis]

Unless they're taking data from payment details then I'm sorry valve but I now know what's happened to episode 3 and it's that you all broke up the single physical disk it was stored on and each inserted a bit of it into your fucking frontal lobe.

Hint: January 1st is the default date that pops up on the little box that asks you.

[GrieverSoul]

I guess Gabe forgot to put the /s in the end.

;)

He was joking about it Im sure.

[RememberThe357]

Wow...

You think he was being serious?

Hahahahah!

[Eddie20101]

I'm pretty sure he is joking about the age gate for mature games, most people just change the the year of birth and leave the month and day at there default, which is January 1st.

[Kazu0 Hirai]

thats the only reason why. if i can change just the year why would i waste my time entering the date and month? my bday has been jan 1st for every store page/video ive seen on steam

are they really that dumb? no wonder its taking so long for EP3. must be a bunch of monkeys working at valve

[stevenhiggster]

Me too, it is really annoying though that when I'm logged into my account I still have to enter my d.o.b to watch vids, when my flippin account knows what age I am!

[hassi94]

They're kidding. Loads of websites/companies have joked about this before.

[Kran]

Hahaha. I feel proud to be the remaining 7% :D

March 13th for me :P

[AGamerOfConsoles]

I should wish you happy birthday in 3 days ;)

[BryanBegins]

It seems some people disagree with the fact that your birthday is March 13th (or that we should wish you a happy bday)! lol

[Perjoss]

ROFL

[undercovrr]

Reported for trolling. Somewhere in your writing I think you are anti-ps3.

[Kran]

What? Where the heck did you get that conclusion from? All I was implying is that im one of the 7% of them steam users who actually changed his DOB on my profile...

I even own a PC so how the heck am I Anti-PS3?

[despair]

@Kran

I think undercovrr was joking lol. Oh and happy future birthday.

[digitalivan]

Wow, there is just no hope for some people. It's a joke, for god sake.

[hassi94]

Yeah Kran undercovrr was joking :P

[AGamerOfConsoles]

I'm guessing they aren't entering the correct birth date. Either that or a lot more people than I thought were born on January 1st.

[evrfighter]

WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHH HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

[plb]

Lol. I'm in that 93% :) it asks you age when watching m rated videos.

[distorted_reality]

Lol @ all above replies other than Kran. Way to miss the point completely.

edit - damn ninja's. Post directed at first two posts.

[wallis]

Please, enlighten us.

[WhiteNoise]

Is this article serious?

It's clearly because when they enter their birth date when they start their account that they leave it on the default day and month.

I do it for every account, I usually just fling the mouse wheel so it puts me on some random year that makes me older than 18 so I can see a sites content etc. I never both to select the exact year, just scroll down, hit 1974 on 1/1 and bam, that's my age.

[Electroshocked]

The say most gamers are from the age 18 to 35, that's wrong, it's 12 to 16 year olds putting in fake birth dates.

[Picnic]

No it's not serious. 93% of people choose the easiest option. They're not heroes, they're not beating the system, they're just choosing the easiest option. They prefer to lie than to choose the correct number from a drop down box. It makes me wonder what else they are prepared to do for an easy life rather than a truthful one.

[LycanSoldier]

Gabe be trollin'

[Dac2u]

It's funny, every time I choose my birthdate on Steam I'll always wonder what the ratio is of people choosing Jan 1 because it's already selected vs the number of people actually selecting their own date.

It gets old pretty quickly, having to choose your birthdate for most games you look at.

[kesvalk]

damn, i am one of the 7% that put the right birth date
correctly....

[Theonetheonly]

ME too not on videos tho just on the account so i never have any trouble regaining access to my 40 or so games on steam

[kesvalk]

yeah.

[Galvanise_]

You've all been trolled. Click the link. Its just clever Dragon Age 2 marketing.

[Troll-without-Bridge]

It just means they dont bother putting their actual age.

[floetry101]

Thanks sherlock. You really brought to light this enigma of an article. They should make you a mystery solving consultant on CSI.

Rofl.

[undercovrr]

WOW REALLY? How on earth did you come up with that conclusion? I mean...you must be some kind of GENIUS. Dude seriously you have to take a government issued IQ test, who knows, they might recruit you for an Intelligence Agency.

[Troll-without-Bridge]

Well judging from the article im more of a genius than anyone at Valve, seen how they actually think this is some kind of phenomenon.

Also bit my green ass.

[ccmclaugh]

Haha. I always wondered if they track such things. These age verification things are a joke; An annoying one, especially for me. I'm 42. Just take me straight to the "bad" stuff! I'm sure the 12-year-old boys that play video games can handle whatever virtual sex or violence is presented. A hundred years ago they would have grown up on a farm and seen plenty by age 8. Why do we let a minority of prudish morons make us jump through hoops because THEY can't handle a little cartoon sex and violence?

[g-nome]

We all respawn on 1 Jan.

[Faelan]

Whoever wrote that article clearly has a sense of humor.

It begs the question though - why on earth do we have to be so specific about our date of birth when wanting to watch a video on Steam that someone has deemed inappropriate for people below a certain age? Do they really think they fall for that and are incapable of lying and applying some creative subtraction?

Kids can be surprisingly smart and crafty at times ya know... or maybe this is all aimed at the adults who have reached the point where they've forgotten their age but can at least still remember their date of birth ;)

[newn4gguy]

Lol. Valve is always so full of win.

[Winkle92]

Haha wow I can't believe some people are taking this seriously. You find all types on N4G...

[OdinFallen]

People don't care to change the date of birth from the default, just the year, same for when people on websites.

[tV]

I instantly knew Gabe wasn't being serious.

I feel sorry for some of you people..

[Saryk]

I was born on Jan 1 1901 ( or whatever is at the bottom)

[hassi94]

Lmao at people who don't realise they're fooling.

Mine's the correct birth date on my account but when I watch videos or whatever it's always January 1st. I can't be bothered to change 3 columns every time I want to watch an m rated game trailer.