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Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event

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Re: Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event

#221

Post by magashna »

saagarjha wrote: post #159
Latty wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All these companies should refuse to self-censor for China. China does want western media and products. The fact that companies capitulate makes that the standard practice, and means China feels safe demanding it (or doesn't even need to because of the chilling effect). They can make a spectacle of any one company that refuses. I'm not saying that China wouldn't just ban them all, but it would at least mean there is…

> China does want western media and products. Does it? It seems like China replicates products that are inconvenient to get otherwise.

Quite a few Hollywood movies have made billions in China. This year alone, 3 US movies are in the top 10 grossing movies there, and they made about 7B

Re: Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event

#222

Post by ican1 »

alasdair_ wrote: post #206
cloakandswagger wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with you completely, but this whole debacle has highlighted what seems to be hypocrisy in the general public's reaction to this. Remember when The Daily Stormer got kicked off CloudFlare and a whole host of other platforms, to the point that no one would take their business and they were effectively censored? The average take on that seemed to be a mix of "Free speech doesn't apply to private companies" and "…

Karl Popper explained in detail why it’s perfectly rational to praise tolerance and still be intolerant of intolerance. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance “if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.”

Karl Popper was talking about intolerance as in a group who resort to violent actions against another group (e.g. killing people for making cartoons). Merely expressing an opinion is never intolerance. Karl Popper, a lifelong supporter of free speech, must be turning over in his grave to know that his opinions are now being used to stifle speech.

Also who gets to define who is intolerant? Chinese government will surely say that the Hong Kong protesters are intolerant. Does it make it okay to censor them?

Re: Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event

#223

Post by not_a_cop75 »

alasdair_ wrote: post #56
cjbprime wrote: post #10

The huge question here is what's going to happen at BlizzCon in two weeks. There'll be 40,000+ attendees, cameras everywhere, there are usually Q&A panels, homemade signs for player support, cosplay, everything. How can you host BlizzCon when you're terrified of political speech?

I, and several friends, all have tickets. We're still deciding what form of protest will be most effective (too overt and the message gets quickly lost when security kicks you out).

You could all wear "Winnie the Pooh China" shirts. If you get kicked out for those, that will really be the shit hitting the fan for them. That's not even protest. That's simple freedom of expression.

Re: Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event

#224

Post by sumedh »

echelon wrote: post #202

We need to impose an 80% repatriation tax on any profits earned in China in order to offset the damages done to our domestic freedom of speech. China should not be able to control society outside of its own walls, yet they have blatantly influenced the behavior of our biggest mass media companies for years. To be fair, they've done an outstanding job of it. They fund a huge number of film productions. They've bought…

> Tax any and all domestic profits coming from China.

What would you do if there are no actual profits?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollywood_accounting

Re: Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event

#225

Post by magashna »

belltaco wrote: post #157
kmonsen wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Chinese version of the Blizzard statement was different: https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/10/10/verified-chinese-bli... It included we will defend the honor of the nation, making it clear exactly what he did wrong.

Posted not by Blizzard but by Net-Ease, a Chinese company that isn't owned by Blizzard.

> NetEase also partners with Blizzard Entertainment to operate local versions of Warcraft III, World of Warcraft, Hearthstone, StarCraft II, Diablo III: Reaper of Souls, Overwatch in China

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NetEase

Re: Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event

#226

Post by falcolas »

jknoepfler wrote: post #219
falcolas wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where, on the internet, do I have a right to free speech? The internet is pivotal to modern communications, yet it is effectively entirely private. If the citizens and their representatives felt strongly enough to create common carrier laws for telegraphs (see a sibling comment for more details), why should we feel differently about speech that travels over channels designed and built for communication across interne…

Did you deliberately ignore the note about government induced oligopolies? You don't have a right to free speech on the comment section of my blog, or my twitch chat stream, or my discord channel. Those platforms enable me to moderate that content. If they lacked that feature, it wouldn't support or undermine anyone's rights, mine or yours.

Unless the government provides internet service, what does it matter who runs the ISPs, whether they are "government induced ogliopolies" or plucky startups? They're still private entities; still not protected by your vision of the right to free speech.

Re: Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event

#227

Post by gruez »

alasdair_ wrote: post #206
cloakandswagger wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with you completely, but this whole debacle has highlighted what seems to be hypocrisy in the general public's reaction to this. Remember when The Daily Stormer got kicked off CloudFlare and a whole host of other platforms, to the point that no one would take their business and they were effectively censored? The average take on that seemed to be a mix of "Free speech doesn't apply to private companies" and "…

Karl Popper explained in detail why it’s perfectly rational to praise tolerance and still be intolerant of intolerance. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance “if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.”

obligatory rebuttal whenever this gets brought up to excuse censorship: https://www.popehat.com/2017/04/18/the-seductive-appeal-of-t...

recent subthread on this topic: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21229775

Re: Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event

#228

Post by euske »

datapunk wrote: post #55
cjbprime wrote: post #10

The huge question here is what's going to happen at BlizzCon in two weeks. There'll be 40,000+ attendees, cameras everywhere, there are usually Q&A panels, homemade signs for player support, cosplay, everything. How can you host BlizzCon when you're terrified of political speech?

How do you respond when a character from your top grossing game is turned into a political meme? This is what Blizzard has been learning this week. How do you handle potentially thousands of attendees, at your organization's biggest annual event, turning it into a platform for political protest agaisnt your biggest growing market? There's three possible events: BlizzCon is canceled. Extremely unlikely but possible. B…

I'd say that video games will be the next social media (if they aren't already). When they created Twitters and Facebooks, they've never imagined that one day their platform will be a highly politicized. Similarly, people haven't imagined that video games are used for politics, but in the end every platform is going to be political. I wouldn't say it's something they have "created" (as others pointed out already), but rather they've only noticed its nature now.

Re: Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event

#229

Post by falcolas »

jknoepfler wrote: post #216
apostacy wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a horrible mischaracterization of free speech. The first telegraph network banned journalists who reported bad things against the telegraph company. They manipulated stock prices and influenced elections. That is why common carriage laws were made, which required communications platforms to provide neutral service to everyone. I'm sure that you would have been there, bravely defending the coal barons right to…

Insofar as radio frequencies, internet domains, cable infrastructure and the like are effectively government induced oligolpolies, they are protected media as well. In general though, yes, you have no right to have a particular editorial published in the new york times on your behalf. What the press deigns to publish is protected. You're also free to start your own paper, or blog, or whatever.

> or blog

That's exactly what this discussion is about - you're not free to start a blog. Running any form of web site on the internet requires the support of multiple private companies, which can and do shut sites down at their whims.

Re: Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event

#230

Post by belltaco »

magashna wrote: post #225
belltaco wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Posted not by Blizzard but by Net-Ease, a Chinese company that isn't owned by Blizzard.

> NetEase also partners with Blizzard Entertainment to operate local versions of Warcraft III, World of Warcraft, Hearthstone, StarCraft II, Diablo III: Reaper of Souls, Overwatch in China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NetEase

They aren't owned by Blizzard.
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