What is Steam? DRM?

Steam is DRM. Steam is also DRM done right.

When you "own" a game through the service, you (normally) get to install it on all of your computers for no additional fee. No questions asked. No licenses. No CD keys. Zero click installs.

Steam does many offers and offers a number of free demos. Steam also brings an actually useful in-game overlay (which, e.g., even lets you open YouTube or this site without tabbing out!). Steam finally has important social features like notifying that your friend has joined a game (and for supported games, there's a feature to one-click-join them as well). etc.

Mind you, Steam does have some points where it doesn't shine. My main pet peeve is offline gaming does not work if the Steam client thinks there is an update it should download and install; typically you only find out when it's too late. A second point where Steam is less than great is that you need to own a non-free game to enable most of the social features, and they are a large part of the appeal.

Here's what Steam offers:

• Access Anywhere - Access your game library from any computer with ease so setup of a new machine with all your games is simple.
• Achievements - Track your progress in games.
• Activity - Not only does Steam have a Friend's list through which you can easily chat and invite friends to play with you or trade with you, but it also has an activity stream so you can see what your friends or groups are up to. If you are in-game, your friends can see this so they'll know what you are playing and will know not to disturb you or they might get the idea to join you.
• Automatic Updates - Steam will keep your game up to date if you let it.
• Big Picture - Easy full-screen for you TV.
• Central Library - All your games in one place for easy access.
• Cloud Saves - When the game allows, your game saves are backed up to the cloud so that you can continue your game anywhere.
• Community - Access to a player communities for games. These include discussions, guides, forums, fan-art, screen shots and other community content.
• Cross-platform Ownership - buy it once and own it on all platforms that the game supports that can run Steam (Windows, Mac, Linux).
• Day One Digital - Pre-orders are available to you immediately upon release.
• Demos - There are demos on steam too.
• Disk-free - Install and play without needing a disk in the disk drive. Save a tree, go disk-free. Likewise, manuals are also digital so you don't have clutter to haul with you wherever you go.
• DLC Management - Purchasing and keeping track of your DLC is simple.
• DRM - Steam is DRM, which means you don't often have to enter any serial codes or cd keys for any of your games. Your stuff just installs and runs.
• Early Access - Start playing games that are still in development.
• Exclusives - Some games are only on Steam.
• File Management - Steam takes care of most of the game files and setup, including install dependencies, so you don't have to.
• Friends - Steam has chat and a friends list. Moreover, it makes it easy to find people to play with.
• Gifts - Simple and easy to buy games for your friends and family or for them to buy games for you. No shipping. Instant delivery.
• Green Light - You have some say, however minor, on what indie games make it onto Steam.
• Indie Games - Steam has Indie Games that you probably won't find on a Disk in a store.
• Inventory - Steam has an inventory system for games that use it and for Steam itself so that you can manage, trade, and sell game assets and non-game assets alike without even having to start the game up.
• Library - Steam has a huge library of games available for sale, including free-to-play and MMOs. There is even a selection of game development tools for sale. The items available are easily sortable and searchable based on a huge array of criteria.
• Marketplace - Sell and trade things on Steam for Steam credit.
• Metrics - Keep track of the time you've spent in your games and likewise view the metrics of others. Compare scores, achievements and general progress.
• Mobile App - Do pretty much everything that Steam does, except play games, from the convenience of your portable device.
• News - Keep up to date with what's happening with your games.
• Overlay - Almost all of these ancillary features are quickly and easily accessible from an in-game dashboard.
• Profile - Show off your information, achievements and activity to others, if you like, on your customizable profile.
• Recommendations - Steam users write recommendations which you can use to evaluate whether you want the game or not.
• Sales - Steam has amazing sales renowned for their remarkable discounts.
• Screenshots - From the in-game interface, you can easily capture, manage and share screenshots of your games.
• Support - Easy access to technical support for your games.
• Tools - Get access not just to the games but several of their toolsets, including editors, server applications, and development kits.
• Trading Cards - Steam has fun perks like trading cards that reward you for playing and if you don't want them, you can sell them to make some Steam credit on the marketplace and you can use that to buy more games.
• Wishlist - Add any games you want to the wishlist. Be notified when things on your wishlist go on sale. Share your wishlist with others so that they can buy you the things on it. Order the wishlist however you like.
• Workshop - Create and share custom content that you've created for your games and maybe even get a share of the profit (real money) for items that get sold. Likewise, buy custom community content for your games.

Certainly, many of these can be setup or accessed without Steam in some form or another. The biggest advantage is that it is all in one simple package.

The cost is:

• Account bound - Once a game is associated with your account, it cannot be given away under most circumstances.
• Bloat - Steam uses system resources to do all that stuff. Moreover, to do a lot of it requires a persistent internet connection.
• Noise - With all the games, news, community activity and everything else, it is easy to miss stuff because there's so much of it, but that would still be a problem even without Steam.
• Trust - You are trusting Steam with all of your stuff - you games, your information, etc. - and that is only as secure as your Steam account. There are security measures to protect your account, such as Steam Guard that make it much harder for unauthorized parties to access your stuff, but not impossible.

It's a distribution system. It allows you to buy games once and then play them on any computer. It also keeps your games up-to-date without having to hunt for patches.

It also has a great community feature which allows you to socialise with friends even while playing, meet up with them and see what games they play.

To answer your other question, it can be a form of DRM, but it doesn't impede you in any way. You can put Steam in offline mode and you will be able to continue playing.

For more information, see its Wikipedia page or the official site.