Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2019/10/16/boycott-blizz.html
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“Free Hong Kong”
BB better not ban me.
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I suppose, ultimately, Blizzard will need to choose between its North American clientele and its Chinese clientele.
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Tune in next week for lots of awkward chickens coming home to roost in more industries in the next chapter of “Late Stage Capitalism”! And now, a word from our sponsors!
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as I said in the other thread…they are imposing a ban on players for breaking the rules that expressly state not to do exactly the thing they are doing. So it isn’t really a big shock…the rules are clear and up front.
Blizz’s stance is that when you are in one of their esports competitions that is not the time for discussing or bringing up political standings and protests. Many companies would agree and state “We aren’t paying you to protest…we are paying you to play said game.”
The 12 mo bans and winnings void for Blitzchung was utterly ridiculous as a response…and the subsequent change to 6 month ban only and refunding his winnings was better if still too harsh…at least it matches the same punishment as these guys for doing the same thing.
The issue for Blizz is they don’t want this to be an ongoing thing for their competitions, and doing relatively nothing will not deter it…so there does have to be some consequence.
i’m happy they protested, and i hope it continues. i am sure the players weighed the consequences and are fine with a ban if that’s what it takes for blizzard to realize this is bigger than their bottom line. and blizzcon is in two weeks, whoohoooooooo
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interestingly…this is their piece on code of conduct:
BLIZZCON CODE OF CONDUCT
We want everyone at BlizzCon to feel like they’re part of one big Blizzard family. To help make that happen, we ask that everyone at the show be respectful and courteous to their fellow attendees.If you witness or experience any activity that puts someone’s safety or enjoyment of the show at risk, inform a security guard or Blizzard employee (BlizzCon staff will be wearing “BlizzCon Crew” shirts at this year’s show) and let them know. We have escalation procedures in place to handle these kinds of situations, and we can take the appropriate action from there.
In order to ensure the event provides a safe, enjoyable, and welcoming environment for everyone, Blizzard reserves the right to remove from BlizzCon any person whose conduct is deemed to be disorderly or unbecoming, or who uses vulgar or abusive language.
In short…nothing about signage or actions that are protest in nature so long as they do not endanger anyone or use abusive language.
While their code of conduct for esports competition and broadcasting prohibit the sorts of things we saw…Blizzcon rules do not.
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You missed the best part (maybe they’ve taken it down since?) They explicitly banned Winnie The Pooh cosplay.
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well. I’d argue it has no place there…it’s not one of their IPs, so they have every right to do so…regardless of the obvious reasons I am sure was behind the decisions. That asshole should be embracing his likeness…but small minded dictators rarely have humility.
I had a coworker who grew up in India and at the time they used the strap on students who didn’t follow the rules. This coworker of mine got the strap every day. That is, every day they were punished and they never thought, “Maybe I should change my behaviour to avoid getting punished.” The flip side of that is that every day the administration got the same bad behaviour from the kid and they never thought, “Maybe we should change our behaviour to avoid kids acting like this.”
The whole idea of getting other people to do what you want with carrots and sticks is just too simple to use for real human relationships. Blizzard is not punishing these players any more than these players are punishing Blizzard.
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but they couldn’t do anything about people putting Winnie the Pooh pix on their phones and holding them up during the keynote, could they?
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While I get the point…there is a distinct difference between punishment for kids and adults who are expected to act with professionalism and by whatever rules are set forth.
I do not think the exercise of comparing “corporeal punishment on children” to “repercussions of violating employment policies” is in anyway a fair argument.
I didn’t mean to compare what Blizzard is doing to using corporal punishment on kids. I meant to say that I think Blizzard’s approach is not really a good approach to achieve compliance with their goals. Did their punishment of Blitzchung deter these three players from doing something similar? It sure looks like it caused this incident.
I don’t think “we need to have consequences of people will keep doing it” is a workable mode of stopping undesirable behaviour. Blizzard has declared a war of attrition with their players and decreased the buy-in that the players have with the rules. That buy-in is what determines whether people follow the rules.
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The original:
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And what’s more, now I’m probably going to try out Gods Unchained which I had never heard of before today.
I agree with the rules as stated and don’t have a problem with them enforcing it. That said the problem with Hong Kong is bigger than Blizzard or the NBA, and them standing idly by and remaining neutral still sends a signal. Honestly i wouldn’t want to be in Blizzard’s position because i don’t think there’s a clear way to move forward without inviting criticism and dissent.
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Good side hustle, if you ask me…
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