Nope. The fact that it has other features does not remove the flaming brand of DRM from Steam. The fact that it is mandatory, that you HAVE to run and activate your games through it, even though there is no technical reason for doing so, is what makes it DRM. If Steam was a standalone application that you could use if you wanted to, then I'd agree with you.

Right, "very easy", provided you were an American! Look at these questions, for crying out loud :-(

Note: I didn't say it's not DRM, but that it's significantly different from most DRM schemes - which are what Gabe criticized. Also, you missed its account-based nature as one of its differentiating features. You log in to your account to access a service, not unlike, say, these forums. It's the games-as-a-service vs. games-as-a-product thing in action.
Also, I'd still like for games-as-a-product to be around, but if having an addittional service-based channel around means games at half the price, constant free updgrades, and stronger ties to customers, then I'm for it. It's still quite a way until we get there, but hopefully we will.

What he said.
The problem is that past DRM has let the genie out of the bottle, and taught/forced many people to get their games/music from other sources... now they have that habit its pretty hard to get them back. DRM is a gateway drug.
Its long been proven that people who download the most music/movies are the ones who buy the most cds/dvds. At least until they get sued and can't afford it anymore.

Damn you, Windows!
Why can't I play my games without your completely useless additional software?
;)

While I'm aware you were just joking about, that is a flawed argument - windows is the foundation upon which the games run. Games are written for the windows system. Fear 2 (for example) was not written FOR steam, steam was just the padlock they put around it afterwards.

this is true for fear, however untrue for Source games, and I wouldn't be angry at Valve for the developers of Fear 2's decision to distribute through steam.
That's like being angry at a paint maker, because your painters painted your house the wrong color.

It's also true for Source games. There is no technical reason for Source games to run through Steam either. The mere fact that they can be cracked to run outside of Steam is ample evidence of this.

:D
Does the server browser work on those?

Not in Half-Life 2, no. Wait... There IS no server browser in Half-Life 2, since it's a single player game!

In fear 2's case I'm just pissed off (well not really, but less than impressed) with Monolith for forcing the use of Steam. That said, there's far more things to be pissed off with them about when it comes to Fear 2 - letterboxing, no dedicated servers, no extra mouse button support...

While most folks seem to be focusing on the DRM/piracy aspect of the speech, I think one of the more interesting things in the speech is the information that a weekend sale where Left 4 Dead was discounted 50% resulted in a 3000% increase in sales. I think this is a pretty major indicator that current pricing for games is way off the prices that the supply/demand curve should dictate.

That's the whole irony of the thing, being against DRM and yet being probably the world greatest promoter of DRM in PC games; it's a like hearing a tobacco industry tycoon telling us how smoking is bad and hurting people health, and yet two lines latter bagging about how much proffit he made this year.
He is not the first one, actually nearly all those who use/used DRM have one day or another say how they thought that DRM were bad (like Gates, Jobs or even EA CEA)... but that they will continue to use them no matter what.
I hope that one day Gabe will follow his big word with some action and start releassing some games without DRM. You are not going to make me beleive that GoG is able to release Second Sight (one random example) without DRM and that Steam, probably the number one digital distributor for games, is unable to.

I would take pretty much anything anyone connected to Valve says with a pinch of salt. Lets see, off the top of my head:
Valve: "We want to sell EVERY game on Steam"
Reality: Valve turn away developers and publishers who want to sell games on Steam.
Valve: "We hate regional restrictions"
Reality: Valve take regional restrictions to the furthest extremes, including the regional restrictions of demos. DEMOs for goodness sake!
Valve: "Games are over priced"
Reality: Valve dictate the prices that games on Steam are sold at. They state the developers/publishers set the prices, but at least one developer has confirmed that Valve actually set the price for their game on Steam.
Valve: "Releasing games at different times per region is stupid"
Reality: Valve purposefully withold releasing to some regions longer than they should. Case in point, SR2. Released almost 2 weeks later than it should have been in Japan (this was confirmed after talking to the developers). Valve even went so far to regionally restrict activation of retail CD keys to ensure that such regional delays were enforced.
So yeah, take anything stated in that speech with a pinch of salt. The reality of Valves actions are on the contrary to what they say. And lets not even get into how they treat patching for some games...
Sure I like the Steam platform, but it's not all roses like they'd want us to believe. Valve are certainly not deserving of all the praise that gets heaped on them.

Every rose has its thorns.
For me, there's just too many thorns on this one.