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Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event as It Tries To Contain Backlash (bloomberg.com) 126

Posted by msmash from the tough-luck,-blizzard dept.
Activision Blizzard, reeling from harsh reactions after it punished a tournament player for backing Hong Kong's anti-Beijing protesters, canceled a New York launch event for an edition of its Overwatch game. From a report: The event, scheduled for Wednesday at Nintendo's store in Rockefeller Center, was planned to support the release of Overwatch: Legendary Edition for the Nintendo Switch portable game machine. Nintendo tweeted Tuesday that Blizzard had canceled the promotion. Blizzard, which didn't immediately respond to a request for comment, has been struggling to contain a backlash after it punished the gamer Chung Ng Wai, known as Blitzchung. The player wore a gas mask and chanted a pro-Hong Kong slogan in a post-tournament interview, leading Blizzard to ban him from events for a year and strip him of $10,000 in prize money.
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Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event as It Tries To Contain Backlash More

Blizzard Cancels Overwatch Event as It Tries To Contain Backlash

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  • Or you know... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Austerity Empowers ( 669817 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @03:54PM (#59311406)

    ...just stop being tools.

    • Money better than ethics.

      • This is the USA. Money is better than everything. Or people wouldn't hoard as much as they do. Like some god damned dragon.

        • And that is why the most cost effective labor force, slavery, is still legal in the US.

          • I'm curious, do you honestly believe that?

            • The only thing that the US Constitution banned was slavery without due process under the law. In other words, involuntary servitude and slavery are still legal if you were convicted for a criminal offense.

        • "Like some god damned dragon."

          Well, I have heard some theories about lizard people running things, so, uh, maybe.......dragon descendants?
        • No one is hoarding money. Doing so would be stupid since inflation would erode the value considerably after only a few decades. Rich people do the same thing that you do with your money (at least if you're intelligent) which is invest it. So everyone's money is getting loaned to everyone else or being used to buy up small ownership stakes into existing businesses for a share of their profits. Even if you just park you money in a bank, they're lending it to other borrowers that are spending it.

      • Until such time as poor ethics deprive you of money. It needs to be mercurial and harsh, no "bare minimum". You do bad, maybe you get slapped, maybe you go bankrupt kind of thing.

  • Free Hong Kong (Score:5, Insightful)

    by sheph ( 955019 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @03:59PM (#59311428)
    What's going on in Hong Kong is way more important than Overwatch.

    • Re: (Score:2, Offtopic)

      by 110010001000 ( 697113 )

      Exactly. And fuck LeBron James. He needs to just shut up and leave.

      • Re:Free Hong Kong (Score:5, Interesting)

        by lgw ( 121541 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @04:44PM (#59311652) Journal

        And fuck LeBron James. He needs to just shut up and leave.

        He's just a loyal employee of Nike, looking after their best interests. I find it hard to get too upset with him.

        It's telling, though, just how many corporations are China's little bitches.

        • Here in the rest of the world, we had this problem for decades ... with our businesses and even governments being the USA's little bitches. I mean it is basically the point of the NATO. Or Russia's little bitches, aka the second world.

          So now getting to see it happen to you, even if China's leaders are a bunch of major league assholes too, is sweet, sweet, sweet Schadenfreude.
          (It won't be funny for long, though.)

          • Re:Funny though, as a Unamerican. (Score:4, Insightful)

            by DrMrLordX ( 559371 ) on Wednesday October 16, 2019 @07:05AM (#59313658)

            You must be mad. People bashed American policy decisions constantly throughout the Cold War. It's not like they were silenced from afar by American apparatchiks. But then Twitter didn't exist back then, either, so if someone working for Deutsche Bank or a player for Real Madrid criticized American intervention in Vietnam (or whatever), it's not like everyone around the world would know instantly if the only outlet carrying the remark were a local or even nationally-circulated paper (or some random AP/Reuters story on a back page of the Wall Street Journal).

            Also, in the United States, when some foreigner criticizes our national policies, many Americans a). agree with the foreigners and b). are "allowed" to agree by the government. Because the government can't stop them!

        • The crazy thing is the corporations seem to be anti USA and pro China. I say seem to be but can you imagine them doing the same to a protestor in the US say ANTIFA?

        • It's telling, though, just how many corporations are China's little bitches.

          When you have a billion plus potential customers you can pull that kind of shit.

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by lgw ( 121541 )

            It's an illusion, though. China won't let that kind of money flow outwards. There's may be factories in China with "Nike" on them making shoes for China, but the profits, one way or another, won't leave.

    • Or anything (Score:5, Insightful)

      by SuperKendall ( 25149 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @04:06PM (#59311464)

      It's nice to see the world finally waking up to what China really is these days. And sad to see so many corporate interests who are so beholden they literally cannot step back from supporting China. :-(

      But make no mistake, a great unwinding has begun and over time companies will reduce that painful dependance in any way they can.

      Good luck people of Hong Kong, you have an amazing city that is worth fighting to keep free.

      • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

        by slycyberguy ( 2006094 )

        But make no mistake, a great unwinding has begun and over time companies will reduce that painful dependance in any way they can.

        Reduce their dependence on what? Revenue? Because that's what China's citizens (20% of the world's population) represent to corporations. What you're saying is akin to waiting for people to reduce their dependence on oxygen. Sorry it will never happen and this shit will continue.

        • Re: (Score:3)

          by DavenH ( 1065780 )
          To answer your first question, supply chains and investors. Most businesses entangled with China don't actually sell to its citizens.

        • Re:Or anything (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Dutch Gun ( 899105 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @06:59PM (#59312082)

          Here's the thing: the Chinese market, at least for US companies, is a complete illusion. As soon as there's a Chinese company with a similar product, whether created legitimately or via stolen IP, the original company is simply shut out of the market. As China gains technological parity with the West, you'll start seeing this more and more.

          China may have embraced capitalism, but it's not really a free market - for the outside world, at least. China's government will never allow US companies to reap the benefits of its huge markets. Not for the long-term, at least. And in the meantime, Chinese companies can simply buy an interest in those companies to "advise" them on how to make "correct" decisions for the Chinese market.

          • China may have embraced capitalism, but it's not really a free market - for the outside world, at least.

            That's what China, and other countries, also think about the US's subsidies for its own industries. Free markets don't exist. Everyone wants the other guy to play by the rules, but "we're special, so we don't have to".

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

            As soon as there's a Chinese company with a similar product, whether created legitimately or via stolen IP, the original company is simply shut out of the market.

            Easy to prove that one is a lie: Apple. Their products sell well in China, in fact it's where most of their growth is these days, and yet there are many similar or even better Chinese smartphones on the market from companies like Xaomi, Huwawi, OnePlus, OPPO and more.

            Same with cars, there are plenty of Chinese brands and many of them are now as good as the foreign makes, especially since the export models that reach China are usually lower spec to hit a lower price point. Yet foreign brands like Toyota, Nis

            • Same with cars, there are plenty of Chinese brands and many of them are now as good as the foreign makes, especially since the export models that reach China are usually lower spec to hit a lower price point. Yet foreign brands like Toyota, Nissan, GM, Jaguar, Audi and more are popular there.

              Daimler and GM build cars in China. VWs are built there too, last I looked they had some fucked over model that was built out of two different generations of Jetta but I presume they've moved on since. Honda, Toyota, and Nissan are all working on creating capacity there. JLR is in a joint venture with GM and BMW is investing 3 million euros in manufacturing.

              So right now China is moving from the "embrace" phase to the "Extend" phase. What comes next? Ecstasy? Enjoyment? No, something else...

            • Easy to prove that one is a lie

              Don't start. A lie (a.k.a.: a trumpery) is a deliberate deception. This was at worst hyperbole, or a misperception.

              There are people who are trying to cloud that issue, but being incorrect is not lying.

          • China may have embraced capitalism, but it's not really a free market - for the outside world, at least.

            It's not a free market inside China, either. Any corporation of any size has embedded party members telling them what they can or can't say. This has been documented in any number of reports, we discussed one of them not so long ago here on Slashdot.

      • But make no mistake, a great unwinding has begun and over time companies will reduce that painful dependance in any way they can.

        What kind of a statement is that. a) there's been nothing unwound that hasn't been the result of the pitiful trade war or rising cost of labour in China. Corporations don't care for government policy beyond the law and most companies will simply follow their local government policy on China (e.g. listing not Taiwan as a separate country).

        The second part of your statement is even more silly. Corporations have a "painful dependence"? You mean a dependence in making money and increasing their market right? Wha

      • Yeah, *everybody* outside the US knows what I'm talking about. :)

        (The other Four Eyes might be blind on their other eye though.)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by rtb61 ( 674572 )

      Nahh, it just a FAD thing. Overwatch is a for profit FAD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]. They created to serve nothing but greed, all that corporate main stream media bullshit hype and its nothing more that Inception levels of marketing, marketing on top of marketing on top of marketing, to sell product of all sorts and manipulation of children, snatching their pocket money to feed the insatiable greed of the corporate over lords.

      When it comes to Fads when it starts being over, the end can be really sha

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Cederic ( 9623 )

        While you could describe Overwatch as a fad it's also an entertainment brand in which Blizzard has made a substantial investment and seeks to exploit for ongoing revenue and profit.

        Damaging the value of that brand and reducing future revenues is a viable means of causing Blizzard to re-evaluate their business practices, including how they should be accommodating complex international differences in culture and politics.

        However the reason the brand has value isn't the marketing. It's because people perceive

      • Nahh, it just a FAD thing. Overwatch is a for profit FAD

        I think you just described nearly all computer games.

  • Bad Behavior And Bootlicking... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by IonOtter ( 629215 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @04:06PM (#59311470) Homepage

    ...comes with consequences.

    Who knew????

    Oh, and it's so delicious to see Blizzard and Activision finding out, first hand, about the Streisand Effect. [wikipedia.org]

    • Meh. Its just a bit of bad press. It will blow over soon enough, be forgotten, and it will be back to business as usual.
      I doubt they even lost a 1000 users over this.

      • No, but it might harm sales of the Switch release of Overwatch, which is the only thing that could really teach them a lesson at this point.

      • Re:Bad Behavior And Bootlicking... (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Retired ICS ( 6159680 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @04:36PM (#59311624)

        "Meh. Its just a bit of bad press. It will blow over soon enough, be forgotten, and it will be back to business as usual."

        Indeed. Sort of like Sony deliberately planting malicious software on millions of computers. News for 15 minutes, then back to business as usual. Not a single Executive or Director at Sony put in jail or executed for their crimes. And then later Sony is hacked. Oh poo poo! I guess they didn't understand that what is good for the goose is good for the gander. Couldn't have happened to a nicer bunch of criminals.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by DavenH ( 1065780 )
          Anecdotal, but I haven't heard anything about Sony, nor seen any of their products since their colossal data breach. I'm guessing their misteps have cost their brand dearly.
        • I think that the average person didn't really care about the Sony rootkit fiasco because they didn't really understand it if they even heard about it at all, given that occurred before social media came into prominence. But this is something that almost everyone has heard about and it's not very difficult to understand. It's also the kind of thing that appeals to people on every side of the political spectrum and most gamers don't really like Activision or what's happened to Blizzard since they were acquire

        • like Sony deliberately planting malicious software on millions of computers

          I have never forgotten, never will. Since Sony revealed themselves to be root rapists, I have bought literally NOTHING from them. It's starting to be a lot of years.

          • Same.

            They got a corporate death sentence from me. And I've prevented a lot of people buying their stuff, too.

            Sam

    • Re:Bad Behavior And Bootlicking... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by _xeno_ ( 155264 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @04:32PM (#59311598) Homepage Journal

      I think this event is acting as a catalyst, and has almost nothing to do with China and bootlicking. As Apple continues to prove, people are quite happy to continue to buy products from companies that go out of their way to appease China (in the past week we learned that Apple TV+ programs will be censored world-wide to be China-friendly, and that Apple turns over everyone's browser information to the Chinese government).

      No, I think Blizzard players are upset with Blizzard specifically. People seem to be mad at the way Overwatch is being developed, at the recent World of Warcraft expansion (to the point where the Classic servers seem to be more an effort of appeasement than anything else), at the announcement of a mobile version of Diablo - at pretty much everything Blizzard has done recently. A lot of people who are deleting their accounts are doing it because they simply don't care - they don't think Blizzard will ever offer them anything they care about in the future anyway so might as well use this as an excuse to officially cut the cord.

      People have been mad at Blizzard in general, and this just happened to act as a convenient catalyst to amp that anger up.

      • Counter point:
        I thought the Mobile Diablo was a great idea. I don't ever play WoW and I was happy playing Overwatch every day.

        Now, no thanks.

        • You must be the only one. It was about 2 years after the peak of mobile gaming craze, meanwhile Diablo proper dying on the vine.

          • I donâ(TM)t think mobile gaming is close to over. We saw a mild implosion of the most egregious abusers (good) combined with games that cost a couple bucks being passed over for free adware shit (not so good).

            My take- a lot of players are waiting for games that are worth playing, instead of being fun for three months, then going full casher just long enough to exploit whales the most, then shutting down completely.

            I donâ(TM)t think mobile is anything close to over.

            • The limiting factor is that people are leaving the house less and less, which puts a dent in mobile gaming since PC or console are available.

          • You must be the only one. It was about 2 years after the peak of mobile gaming craze, meanwhile Diablo proper dying on the vine.

            The Diablo Immortal thing came about since Blizzard had been developing Diablo 4 internally for some time (at one point it looked similar to Dark Souls) and expected to announce it at Blizzcon. Everyone was anticipating this, but then Diablo 4 suffered some serious setbacks and it had to go through a redesign. Unfortunately, Blizzcon tickets had already been sold, convention space was booked, so they didn't have the option of just announcing.. nothing. They figured they could announce the Diablo mobile game

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        Apple TV is a great example of how brands have to think globally now. They could release censored episodes in China but people would notice and get upset. That happened with Game of Thrones, it aired in China but heavily censored and fans got very annoyed. Pirate copies of the uncensored version with fan-made subtitles circulated quickly.

        The days where you could launch different versions of a product in different regions are coming to an end. People even see it with things like cars - they get pissed that K

      • I think this event is acting as a catalyst, and has almost nothing to do with China and bootlicking.

        You're wrong. The event was pure bootlicking, so clearly it has something to do with it.

        People have been mad at Blizzard in general, and this just happened to act as a convenient catalyst to amp that anger up.

        I think people are legitimately upset that another country has infected their homegrown games company. People have strong feelings about Blizzard, because for many people Blizzard games were their introduction to network gaming. I think all the people with strong feelings about Activision have aged into relative mellowness, though. :)

    • I would be surprised if this is anything more than a tiny blip for them. Gamers care primarily about games and will forgive a company anything as long as they get their next hit. It is like expecting a drug dealer because of one bad hit will suddenly lose all his business as the druggies will go elsewhere, the world doesn't work that way.

  • Streisand (Score:3)

    by grumpy_old_grandpa ( 2634187 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @04:17PM (#59311524)

    And through the Streisand effect, his chants received far more attention than he otherwise would have gotten.

    You'd think that was common knowledge by now. Yet time and again somebody gets burnt by attempting to suppress speech.

    • The honest truth is that quite often the Streisand effect does not work. Often lawyers manage to keep their obnoxious court orders quiet and no one hears about them.

      It takes either a really persistent complainer, counter-claiming and making noise or a very good journalist to publicize the abusive behaviour.

      Once it goes viral, it is too late to stop, but before then a good, strike that, EFFECTIVE fixer can keep things quiet.

      • I don't even doubt that it might be true ... But how the hell do you think we believe you have collected or access to actual data on this? And then would not even link to it? ...

        I think it is far less true than you say, even if you had such data, and you're just one of those, who have an obsession with a deluded downplaying mindset, comparable to a fearmongering conspiracy theorist, but of opposite polarity.

  • Comment removed (Score:3, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @04:32PM (#59311604)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • NBA and Activision Blizzard (Score:5, Informative)

    by oldgraybeard ( 2939809 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @04:33PM (#59311608)
    China Certified! China Compliant!

    Just my 2 cents ;)

  • Give me Freedom or Death (Score:5, Insightful)

    by XArtur0 ( 5079833 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @04:45PM (#59311658)

    I was looking forward to Warcraft 3 Reforged

    But what the Chinese government is doing (and has done before) is unacceptable.
    I can live without games, but I would not allow myself to live without some basic freedom.

    The people of Hong Kong does not want a murderous dictatorship, and I stand with them.

    • But what the Chinese government is doing (and has done before) is unacceptable. I can live without games, but I would not allow myself to live without some basic freedom.

      I've been trying to avoid Made in China for several years now (it's hard, few things have a 'made in' label).

      Last week a Chinese company bought local furniture store Mor. Be assured, next time I need furniture I won't be going to Mor.

    • Don't go around asking people to give you death that easily, you might end up finding one who'll comply.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Truth in Virtue Signaling (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Vandil X ( 636030 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @05:15PM (#59311758)
    Everyone who lives in the US would love to see freedom flourish for those in other lands who seek it. However, as wonderful is it to post messages, tweets, and memes in support of that, those all really accomplish nothing except to virtue signal and make people feel better about themselves.

    But if you do something like boycott businesses doing things you disagree with, that's a financial impact felt pretty hard if enough people do it.

    Sadly, I'll bet the servers for Overwatch are still filled with players who DGAF and players who posted their tweet, and logged onto Overwatch anyway.

    • I find it interesting that at first both right and left wing were united behind this. This type of agreement is rare as both sides (at the extremes) are basically contrarians so I assumed one side would veer off just to disagree with the other.

      The nearest I've seen seems to be some on the left barking up the "racism against China!" tree, but that seems to be very uncommon. So I'm watching the whole thing to see how they splinter over this issue because agreement is impossible long term on pretty much anythi

      • Comment removed based on user account deletion
        • That's probably taking it a bit far. Yes the Chinese government are rounding up people and putting them into camps, but they're making them eat bacon, not gassing the Uyghers by the millions. I'm sure if it could be objectively measured, China is quite a bit better today than it was under Mao. Not saints by any means, but the Nazis were on a whole different level of evil.
      • It's only surprising if you buy into the right's whole "the left hates freedom" thing. What righties don't get is that their guns are completely useless in this situation, and their free-market-but-not-actually-more-like-anti-social-deregulation is what gets us to this situation in the first place.

  • Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Tuesday October 15, 2019 @05:54PM (#59311874)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Right? Right? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by AndyKron ( 937105 )
    Nobody here on /. still has a membership with Blizzard, right? I think everyone here is for free speech, right?

    • I don's support the organized crime and their robbery schemes. Aka imaginary property.

  • Thanks for mentioning it! On this tech expert site. Otherwise nobody would have known! /s

  • people have the freedom to support Hong Kong and Taiwan.
    Not everyone has to say Communist China is great.
    Once a brand goes full Communist China, expect that change to become part of the way the brand is seen.
    People in the free West has the freedom to mention and comment on a brands support for Communist China.

  • Nobody actually seems to give a shit. Business as usual. Just look at the comps.

    Evil corporation does more evil shit: Apple!? Blizzard? Alphabet? Sprint? Verizon? T-mobile? Sony? .. ...on and on and on.... PROFIT!

    Evil Communist country does some evil communist shit. OOOOOhhhhh China. Russia Venezuela Cuba...on and on and on..

    Evil corporation does shit for evil government ...Apple!? Blizzard? Alphabet? Sprint? Verizon? T-mobile? Palantir... on and on and on.... PROFIT!

    Is "Outrage Fatigue" a thing? Cuz I'm s

  • Nice. Like it. A lot! Both Activision and Blizzard are a husk of what they used to be, all because of cynical corporate overlords sucking up to greed, exploitation and oppressive totalitarian governments. Give them what they deserve I say!

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