JD, read that carefully and explain to me where any of it makes it clear that this OS won't be intimately, to the point of being crippled without it, tied to Steam the service. You can't, because they haven't said it. I doubt we'll hear it, because I doubt that's the type of openness they want.
XBOX, PS3, your regular console is a closed system - fine and dandy, you know what you're getting into when you buy it. The problem with Steam OS - and I very much hope this isn't true - is that it, by all accounts, seems built to be a delivery system for the Steam service. To Valve's credit, they are open with who works on the Steam service, and make it to work with gads of hardware varieties. The thing is, if a program is available on Steam, Valve has it DRM'd up and they get a cut.
My post is not meant to say "oh, Steam is closed, SteamOS will probably not be as open as we might hope - buy an XBOX instead!" No, that's counterintuitive to say the least. What I'm saying is... Steam, as a service, controls everything on it. What's to make you think they won't take measure to prevent other software from running on SteamOS? All it takes is a set of update parameters that will prevent Steam the service from operating on a modified SteamOS and you've got an "open" OS that they will advertise as such that will, functionally
If there is one thing that is true of Valve with Steam since day one - they control the software that goes on it. Period. Why does everyone assume that SteamOS is going to be some wonderfully open flavour of Linux when a company like that is running it?
And keep in mind, Linux is great. Valve, with Steam the service, has previously adopted an *extremely* controlled policy concerning how software is distributed on their platform. Nothing in your quote suggests that they're going to let anything happen on SteamOS that they don't give a green light to - and, let's face it, that is *exactly* what Linux is all about.
Here's the question that I want answered which will alleviate 95% of my concerns over SteamOS... If some upstart company wants to make a game for SteamOS that will run without being involved with the Steam service, will that be possible? Or will Valve take measures to make it so that SteamOS is inherently hostile to software for SteamOS that doesn't run through Steam? I haven't seen evidence of that not being the case and, with Valve's "we are big brother - but a friendly one" approach to software distribution previously, I do not trust them to have all of gaming under their watch. Everything your quote says is all within the realm of the Steam service, which Valve controls. Currently, even Windows doesn't lay that kind of draconian one-ring-to-rule-them-all standardization, as there is no overarching service or DRM required to make games for Windows. Will SteamOS offer the same? And more specifically, what about Valve's history with the Steam service makes you think they won't be hostile to "free" programs running loose on their OS which is named after their service in which *everything* is controlled by them?