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Blizzard Suspends Professional Hearthstone Player for Hong Kong Comments

(playhearthstone.com)
2525 points hownottowrite | 3 comments | 08 Oct 19 09:23 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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freeflight ◴[08 Oct 19 12:10 UTC] No.21191318[source]▶
I really don't like how this is made out as "China clamping down on Blizzard", just like it was framed when Ubisoft tried to get a lower age-rating for Rainbow Six Siege and claimed that was what China demanded for their market.

Blizzard has been suspending plenty of pro players in plenty of their games for all kinds of questionable, and not so questionable reasons.

And because Blizzard is a private company, offering a service they maintain, they have the house right, they have the final say about who can partake and who can't.

To that end, they don't need the Chinese government to pressure them because they will already do it themselves to make their product as uncontroversial as possible. In that context politics is just not something that Blizzard, or any of the big publishers, want to be as a part of their "e-sport scene".

What they want is the least controversy possible and the lowest ages ratings possible, so they can sell their products to as many people as possible. That's their main and only motivation here, not "pleasing the CCP!".

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1. humanrebar ◴[08 Oct 19 12:21 UTC] No.21191413[source]▶
> And because Blizzard is a private company, offering a service they maintain, they have the house right, they have the final say about who can partake and who can't.

Except it's not a matter of some Chinese customers taking their business elsewhere. They don't have "the house right" if they are facing consequences from the Chinese government for exercising their freedom of association.

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2. luckylion ◴[08 Oct 19 12:50 UTC] No.21191659[source]▶
"They are a private company" is quite literally always the argument for why Facebook, Twitter, Google, Cloudflare etc should be able to ban anyone, any time for any arbitrary reason.

I get why people are upset at Blizzard's behavior, but the outcry looks a bit fake. It looks more like there's a lot of anger because it hit somebody they agree with. Had the player said something supporting China, and Blizzard banned him, there would be congratulatory comments and "their game, their rules" arguments.

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3. freeflight ◴[08 Oct 19 13:02 UTC] No.21191778[source]▶
> "They are a private company" is quite literally always the argument for why Facebook, Twitter, Google, Cloudflare etc should be able to ban anyone, any time for any arbitrary reason.

Exactly, and usually, that's also the consensus on HN on any such issues: It's the companies infrastructure and ecosystem.

There is no "human right to service", if they don't want you there then they can just kick you out and usually wouldn't even need much of a justification, that's what hundreds of pages of ToS, EULA, and whatnot are there for.