In These Partisan Times, The Only Thing That Gets Bi-Partisan Agreement Is That Blizzard Sucks
from the crossing-aisles dept
We live in partisan times. The left and the right might as well be cats and dogs, mostly incapable of living together and the subject of fascination by the public when they manage to work together in the slightest way. The country needs a rallying cry. Something to bring both sides of the aisle together to demonstrate to all that they can actually agree on things.
Blizzard appears to be that something. In the wake of the backlash against Blizzard for its actions taken to silence and punish eSports competitors that chose to voice support for the ongoing protests in Hong Kong, it seems that everyone from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to Marco Rubio agrees that the company needs to do much, much better.
Today, United States Senators Ron Wyden and Marco Rubio signed a bi-partisan letter with support from Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Mike Gallagher, and Tom Malinowski addressed to Bobby Kotick, CEO of Activision Blizzard, over the recent suspension of professional Hearthstone player Chung “Blitzchung” Ng Wai.
“We write to express our deep concern about Activision Blizzard’s decision to make player Ng Wai Chung forfeit prize money and ban him from participating in tournaments for a year after he voiced support for pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong,” the letter reads. “This decision is particularly concerning in light of the Chinese government’s growing appetite for pressuring American businesses to help stifle free speech.”
Now, it's true that this particular letter is toothless. It's also true that Blizzard has already reduced some of the penalties it levied on Chung, even though such a reduction was entirely besides the point and lowered the temperature on this controversy not at all. Still, what this really should highlight for the reader is that the public backlash against Blizzard has reached a volume that Congress critters are making public statements about it, and in a bi-partisan way. That's no small thing.
There is a great deal for one side or the other of the political aisle to be angry about these days. For Blizzard to unify that anger against itself should really inform the company's assessment as to how beneficial it is to bow to Chinese demands to stifle the speech of its competitors.
Again, this is a toothless letter...for now. But if it changes the calculus on future decisions Blizzard might take, that's a good thing.
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Filed Under: alexandria ocasio-cortez, blitzchung, free speech, hong kong, marco rubio, mike gallagher, ron wyden, tom malinowski, video games
Companies: activision, activision blizzard, blizzard
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I'm not a fan of the Chinese government, but lately the whole 'debate' has entered into full blown panic mode, and I dare say even racism.
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Racism? Huh?
Please elaborate your thoughts on that.
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Re: Re:
"Rocky", you a woeful "unconscious racist", as only a racist questions the charge whenever it's made.
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The slimy coward slithers..
..into the light for all to see his grotesque countenance of lies.
Now, slither back under your slimy rock before someone manages to soil their shoes on your back.
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Some ignorant assholes are using the Blizzard shitstorm as cover for expressing anti-Chinese sentiment that lands into “that’s fuckin’ racist, yo” territory instead of “yes, the Chinese government sucks” territory.
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I will agree with you to the extent there are foreign racist chinese.
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Everyone hates corporations except romneys and...
masnicks and other extreme legalists, who believe that legal fictions are "persons" with Rights in the Constitution.
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Re: Everyone hates corporations except romneys and...
Then there's a bunch of loony leftists, as here, who think that corporations will implement their own views, woozy humanism, and are astonished when money/power is the sole concern of corporations.
Now "Gary", Timmy's sock-puppet, can pop in and say that I'M a corporatist. That's how idiotic "partisanship" has gotten.
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I’m not a sockpuppet. But you are a corporatist, and I say that because of your unabashed and unashamed support of copyright extremism, a view which benefits only corporations such as Disney. By the by, how do you feel about corporations using copyright to censor speech?
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Re: Re: Everyone hates Blue Balls
So wait, now the neo-nazi form the mid-west, "Blue Balls" wants to call everyone Else a racist? Cool!
Heya Blue -
Per you, Corporations have no rights. So how can they hold a Copyright? Just asking, cornfed!
Also - How many times have I called you "Cornfed"? Kinda curious why you keep track.
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Re: Re:
You sir, are a moron.
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Re: Everyone hates ignorant motherfuckers
Sup liar. Why don’t you just admit you lied about leaving forever.
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This is an article about everyone calling Blizzard, a corporation, an idiot. Including Masnick.
It's clear that nothing short of Masnick getting castrated with a nuke will satisfy you.
Have an Article 13 vote.
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I just made my own little statement to Blizzard
I just uninstalled Wow, Wow Classic and Battle.net. Will my single action mean anything? No, but if enough people uninstalled their Bliz games and their launcher they will notice.
On a side note, WTF happened in this thread? The argument about this whole anti-china 'thing' is racist is by far the most insane thing I have read in a while.
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Re: I just made my own little statement to Blizzard
Well, I was a bit flabbergasted at the racist 'thing' - but as has been proven over and over again, racist assholes will always try to hijack anything in their effort to spread their shit.
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Re: Re: I just made my own little statement to Blizzard
That is the standard policy of the current administration. "I'm not a crook - look at all the crooked allegations I can make up about Crooked Hillary! Biden is the REAL crook, look at his server in the Ukraine!!"
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The sad thing is is that as far as AAA game studios go, Blizzard is one of the least crappy. As opposed to say EA.
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EA is one of the only major game studios not owned in whole or in part by a Chinese company/government actor.
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So what you're saying is Chinese money is better at making video games and providing customer service than US money. Got it.
I think at this point the only possibly more hated studio than EA is Epic for their storefront shenanigans.
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WoW Classic
It was already clear that Blizzard had gone the way of the suck the moment they announced WoW Classic.
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I don't follow.
The only reason they announced WoW Classic was because the fans were demanding it. So much so that they re-engineered the original game server to play on. It was only after the major fan backlash when Blizzard sent them a cease-and-desist letter that Blizzard relented and spun up a classic server.
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Re: WoW Classic
[Citation needed]
WoW Classic is about the only thing Blizzard has done right in a very long time.
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What would Blizzard do if someone wore a shirt that said "Free Everyone" or just "Freedom"? They'd sure be in a pickle then!
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I disagree
I disagree. I think Blizzard blows!
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Congratulations.
Now, if only you had bothered to learn what the word actually means, so you wouldn't have revealed yourself to be an unthinking moron with that wall of drivel.
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Well, it looks like you don't consider yourself to belong in the "other"-group which makes you a hypocrite. Just like Blizzard.
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It's nice that you are expanding your vocabulary. Another term I recommend learning is "chilling effect". Understanding how it works should greatly aid you in future discussions of censorship.
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Such as?
Because it has to do with freedom of speech. Blizzard's terms were not super clear on those particular forms of speech. And, while the restrictions are completely valid, it does smack of bending to political pressure. The fact that involves tech, gaming, and freedom of speech are absolutely something that would be a "Techdirt thing".
He wasn't on their gaming platform, and obviously they do.
Yes and no. Especially when an American company is potentially being pressured by a foreign government.
That's not what is being said. What's being said is the contract may be wrong to begin with. Learn to read.
30 year old gamer here.
Not what is happening but you are free to be delusional.
Actually, yes. As evidenced by the anonymous comment sections on this very site.
Uh, yes.
That would be great if they actually understood games and technology and you could get them to agree on more than just one thing once in a blue moon.
Whose? The senate? Uh, news briefings, letters, email, social media, this site, etc....
Yes. If a company commits murder just to protect their money and their interests, would you support that too? At some point there is a moral line that must be drawn.
That's not what is being said at all.
What kind of nonsense is this? His speech is free speech.
Yeah, let me know how that works out for you when you are living on the street butt-naked because practically everything is made in, or has components made in, China.
No, it's mostly because you can't avoid buying the necessities and those are all at least partially made in China. And even if it there was a more expensive option, not everybody can afford that. Actually most people can't.
You mean like the one you just wrote that post from? News for you dude, most electronics (or their components) are made in China. I can almost guarantee you what you used to write that post was fully or partially made in China. Let's see, what was that word you just learned? Ah yes...hypocrite.
And obviously not you either. Hypocrite.
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Hi, Hamilton.
Wasn't Richard Liebowitz supposed to win instead of getting his ass handed back to him in copyright court?
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I never experienced Vanilla and only became a regular player a few months before Legion fell. The opportunity to play Classic has given me an equally exciting world to play in. I prefer the Build options, social networking, and gear options from Classic as it feels more like an RPG than choosing a pre-made character like in retail. And thanks to https://www.ssegold.com/wowclassic-gold help me saving a lot of time for grinding gold.
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Now whilst I say all of these positive things, there are issues. The levelling is SLOW. Now this isn't entirely bad, as whilst It's taken me 4 days of playing to reach level 16. During that time I've had time to do my professions and do a fair amount of exploring. It's also given me time to appreciate the size and scale of the world when there are no mounts until level 40. Yet the slowness of the game for me at least does tend to drag after a few hours at which I find I need a break. But again I think that works to the games benefit as I don't end up playing for 8 hours non-stop and don't become burnt out. And thinking ahead I could easily see myself playing 3 hours a day making progress and enjoying myself, even with the slower progress.
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