Live data from Hacker News

Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

vice.com

71–80 of 412 posts

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#72

What is really interesting about this is how completely and utterly horrible a job Blizzard did in anticipating and preparing this very obvious possibility, and thus is so poorly handling every single aspect of this.This so obviously was likely to happen that it easily could have been anticipated and planned for to be dealt with in a much, much more professional way, and yet clearly they didn't, and it's beyond inexc…

I think it is called the benefit of hindsight. Everyone is smart after it happens but in reality, nobody anticipated that.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#73

Great Streisand moves by China though, previously gamers or basketball fans might not really care about what's happening in Hong Kong/China in general, but within 2 days they (China) have raised awareness of what a shitty overlord they are.

Streisand effect imo is overrated. We want it to be true that censorship / silencing information doesn't work but it's shown time and time again that it does work by and large and that information is silenced for the vast majority of the population.

You're painting with a broad brush. China has a great firewall, Streisand did not. China can block its own citizens from reading about this, but Blizzard and the NBA can not. So, I'd say the Streisand effect relies on certain internet freedoms that some countries may not provide. It's not overrated here but in China it definitely is.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#74
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The west employs this tactic too but calls it a sanction or embargo.

Can you give an example of free speech being quieted? We push political issues that way, but I’m not aware of censorship being the trigger.

How about the president of the United States demanding that pro sports players be fired for not standing for the anthem?

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most well-known one would be James Damore being fired from Google for criticizing the corporate diversity policies [0]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Google%27s_Ideological_Echo_Ch...

While I agree that Damore's termination was an attempt to punish him for the views he had, I wouldn't put it anywhere in the same class as we are seeing with Chinese censorship. This is an entire country, a state government, deciding what people of other countries should be allowed to say, it is on par with Muslim views on comedic interpretations of Mohammed, and is likely to entice violence in much the same way.

The poster was asked to give an example of free speech being quieted, and gave an example of exactly that.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Propose that a suspended player is a US citizen. Like Colin Kaepernick? That just happened like 3 years ago, has everyone already forgotten?

If I recall correctly, Colin was never suspended or prevented from playing. He suspects he was blacklisted by owners/NFL by not being signed in free agency, but that may be difficult to prove.

Players were, and still are, prevented from kneeling during the Anthem.

EDIT: It seems like official NFL policy has varied drastically over the past few years. But even if its not necessarily by official policy, you can bet that players are intimidated by the calls of the sitting US President to fire them if they kneel out of line.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is so weird about the NBA controversy is that it stems from a tweet. Twitter is banned in China. So how could it have “hurt the Chinese people’s feelings”?

The Chinese government isn't stupid. It knows people circumvent the GFoC. Damage control as usual. I think the US corollary is "all enemies foreign and domestic".

Those people who can circumvent the GFoC, already knows that their leader is pulling down the whole country.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#78
I'm mixed on this. I'm 100% for Chung “Blitzchung” Ng Wai to express his support for Hong Kong. I'm not so sure it's okay for him to do it on Blizzard's show/event.

27 years ago Sinead O'Connor ripped up a picture of the Pope on Saturday Night Live when it was broadcast live. She's was arguably right to critize the Pope but was she right to do it from Saturday Night Live's Live broadcast? IIRC because of that incident SNL added a 5 or 10 second delay so they'd have time to cut if something similar happened again.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sin%C3%A9ad_O%27Connor#Saturda...

Anyway, I'm support of the HK protestors and having written that in public now I wonder if I'm banned from China. I also believe I want US businesses to all stick up for freedom of expression and not sell out to China. I'm just saying in the context of using the Blizzard event I'm not so ready to condemn Blizzard's initial response. In the new context of what's happened since then though I hope they change their direction.

IIRC Sinead O'Connor was pretty much universally condemned even though if I understand correctly she was right.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#79
post #23

I don't think it should be an international incident. The reality is that corporations shouldn't be espousing political viewpoints, and nobody should care what their opinion is on controversial policies. They make and sell products and that's all they should stick too. Why should Blizzard get in the middle of what's happening between China and Hong Kong? And to be clear, it isn't just Chinese government versus Hong K…

>> Why should Blizzard get in the middle of what's happening between China and Hong Kong That's the question. Why did they do it in the first place? They could have not banned the player.

>They could have not banned the player.

But that was the right decision. The player politicized their neutral platform. The NBA fined players that wouldn't stand for the anthem for the same reason.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#80

What is really interesting about this is how completely and utterly horrible a job Blizzard did in anticipating and preparing this very obvious possibility, and thus is so poorly handling every single aspect of this.This so obviously was likely to happen that it easily could have been anticipated and planned for to be dealt with in a much, much more professional way, and yet clearly they didn't, and it's beyond inexc…

I think it is called the benefit of hindsight. Everyone is smart after it happens but in reality, nobody anticipated that.

some things are knowable beforehand.
Post reply on HN