Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident • Hacker News Board

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#371

Post by balls187 » Wed, Oct 09, 2019, 8:38 PM UTC

celticmusic wrote: post #103

michannne wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Damore was not quieted though. He was punished, but not quieted, as a matter of fact the controversy surrounding his termination bolstered his audience even further, and from the get go, he was never restricted on what he could or could not say by anyone.

And blizzard/China didn't "quiet" either, they just "punished". Because apparently it's not quieting if you've punished someone for saying something. and now let me go grab my eyeballs off the floor because they just rolled out of my head.

The topic thread was in response to the assertion that the "West" engages in suppressing dissent by censoring political speech in a manner that parallels what is happening with China.

The example given does not come close to that, but is an example of someone being censored.

In the US at least, censorship is typically brought on by pressure from sponsors and advertisers in response to public outcry.

In the US, The Freedom of Speech is heavily protected against government interference.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#372

Post by AzzieElbab » Wed, Oct 09, 2019, 9:07 PM UTC

tandr wrote: post #361

AzzieElbab wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since Twitter is blocked in China, I bet it is corpotate regional managers who are flipping out about posts that reach maybe 1 percent of China's population

1% of 1'500'000'000 is 15 million people

True but nevertheless insignificant

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#373

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Oct 09, 2019, 9:10 PM UTC

heyyyouu wrote: post #35

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…

[deleted]

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#374

Post by m-p-3 » Wed, Oct 09, 2019, 9:10 PM UTC

legohead wrote: post #58

heyyyouu wrote: post #35

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…

They could have gotten away with it had they not been so severe. They: Banned the player, fired the casters , and took back the player's winnings . They should have just banned the player for a year and left it at that. (not agreeing with anything that they did, just looking at it from a PR perspective)

Agreed, they went nuclear without anticipating the world to fire back.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#375

Post by yyhhsj0521 » Wed, Oct 09, 2019, 9:15 PM UTC

dirtyid wrote: post #364

shkkmo wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China does not occupy Taiwan, so those points are moot. What security interest is served by censoring discussion of the existence of Taiwan? This is a political issue, not a security issue.

It's both. Politics is a huge part, reunification is #1 CPC policy consideration since founding and her entire legitimacy rests on it. Occupation goal is by 2050. No one is censoring discussion of Taiwan? If you're talking flag emoji that's equivalent to banning confederate flag in Chinese context. People talk about Taiwan in China all the time but under context of reunification. On refusing sovereignty claims. If Ta…

I like to compare it with the Cuban Missile Crisis. Imagine having that Soviet (in this case US) power projection so close to home.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#376

Post by shkkmo » Wed, Oct 09, 2019, 9:38 PM UTC

dirtyid wrote: post #364

shkkmo wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China does not occupy Taiwan, so those points are moot. What security interest is served by censoring discussion of the existence of Taiwan? This is a political issue, not a security issue.

It's both. Politics is a huge part, reunification is #1 CPC policy consideration since founding and her entire legitimacy rests on it. Occupation goal is by 2050. No one is censoring discussion of Taiwan? If you're talking flag emoji that's equivalent to banning confederate flag in Chinese context. People talk about Taiwan in China all the time but under context of reunification. On refusing sovereignty claims. If Ta…

> If Taiwan was sovereign they would be free to host US bases

Taiwan is clearly sovereign, anyone saying otherwise is ignoring reality or avoiding offending China.

The US had military bases in Taiwan for 20 years, the military bases were removed to assist with normalizing relations with China.

I can absolutely see why insisting that the US not place military bases on Taiwan is a security concern, but this has nothing to do with the sovereignty of Taiwan. (Similar to US concerns about Russian military installationa in Cuba which were unrelated to Cuba's sovereignty.)

The institutional double-speak around the sovereignty of Taiwan is purely political and has no impact on actual security issues.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#377

Post by yellowapple » Wed, Oct 09, 2019, 9:57 PM UTC

dvt wrote: post #319

yellowapple wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Side note: what's going on with people believing reddit has some monopoly on puns/trolls/memes and that hacker-types (like the folks who presumably frequent Hacker News) would never find them amusing?

I visit HN because it provides more or less serious and intellectually-stimulating conversation with a diverse group of people that have diverse (and sometimes opposing) viewpoints. It's not that funny stuff isn't amusing, it's that it's counter to what HN might be trying to achieve.

> it's that it's counter to what HN might be trying to achieve.

If HN is trying to achieve a soulless takes-itself-way-too-seriously environment, then I'd agree with you. Hopefully that's not the case (but probably is, per the observations I've accumulated over the years of hanging around here).

> intellectually-stimulating conversation

Humor can be intellectually-stimulating, even in the form of clever puns. Whether or not the pun in question was clever (or at least sufficiently-clever to be amusing) is a different question.

> diverse group of people that have diverse (and sometimes opposing) viewpoints.

Humor happens to be an excellent way to both convey and consume those viewpoints, especially in a way that's actually conducive to all parties actually coming away with a better understanding of one another.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#378

Post by jammygit » Wed, Oct 09, 2019, 10:16 PM UTC

baby wrote: post #243

ericmcer wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only time will tell? Blizzard has not been a hip indie game studio for many years now, and people have incredibly short memories. Will you still be talking about this 3 months from now? Their chinese investors, partners, etc. may have a much longer memory than a bunch of Americans getting outraged at the latest injustice to be outraged about.

French people are outraged too.

What do you mean? Lots of social media activity?

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#379

Post by john_moscow » Wed, Oct 09, 2019, 10:38 PM UTC

RangerScience wrote: post #94

john_moscow wrote: post #21

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...

No, because: 1) Was not done through pressure from a government 2) Was not done to silence JD 3) Just because you have an opposing view does not mean you are being critical But, you presented your case respectfully, so I don't think this should be downvoted.

Ironically, my example of what gets censored in the West, including a Wikipedia link, got, well, censored on HN (as in not visible for the majority of readers). Although yes, it doesn't come from the government, it's our society that is becoming less and less tolerant to points of view outside the accepted ideology.

Re: Fallout from Blizzard Hong Kong Incident

#380

Post by not_a_cop75 » Wed, Oct 09, 2019, 11:03 PM UTC

yifanl wrote: post #303

stereolambda wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the details that you mention wouldn't be so important in the media narrative (although maybe they would in the gamers' perception). The ban alone probably speaks to the imagination the most. I am, for one, moderately optimistic looking at the Western counter-outrage and people ditching Blizzard. We need strong and widely held convictions to defend our basic liberty. Coming from the former Eastern Block, I can…

As a single data point, I've uninstalled all my (2) blizzard games and tried to purge what data I could from my account. I submitted a ticket to delete all my data, but they requested a government photo id... and given that I don't trust Blizzard with my game data, I definitely don't trust them with that.

Well, given their record, they might just sell your ID photo to the Chinese.