The bulk of their ‘asian profits’ don’t come from China. Only 4% does, out of the 12% that they get from the region.
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Well can’t say I’d vote for you but you’re certainly stirring up nonsense at an A grade politician level by the end there. Never mind the fact that Blizzard trading in China would see more money leaving China to the majority US owned Blizzard than in the hands of China.
Some paid to trade levies sure but when I buy a product I don’t tend to expect to get more money back, you dig?
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Except most don’t care. They realize all they were doing is enforcing their rules, much like they did when this game was first released. You can keep spouting this, fact remains a rule was broken and a punishment came about. It no different than if you break a law, there is a consequence.
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Funny thing is Blizzard didn’t rush to punish that american hearthstone team in fact they only did anything only AFTER being called out for thierhypocrisy on social media for thier inactions
Blizzard found themselves in a tight spot they could either admit the truth that the ban of Blitz was politically motivated by the chinese or ban the american team in halfway attempt to main their so called neutral stance
So of course they werent going to dare offend the chinese and THATS why players in the states are upset not because Blizzard enforced the rules its the manner in how they did it
Its clearly obvious Blizzard is allowing the chinese politics to dictate their American office
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Oh i dont because after all Blizzard lost all thier morals and ethics the day Activision took over
The American team wasn’t competing at the time firstly. Secondly, they held a sign in the audience which is much different than speaking out, they did eventually get a temp ban as well, however they were not as proactive as Blitz was. He had the choice to not answer that question, he chose to do it and accepted his consequences. Since he has no issue with his punishment, why do you?
Neither of those things are true. They held the sign after losing a match.
Did they hold it while playing? That’s what I am getting at. I support their suspension as well though, should have come sooner however.
Or… maybe they were simply waiting until they decided what to do with Blitzchung, before passing on the same punishment to the AU team.
These decisions take time, nothing like this happens in a bubble.
Occam’s Razor friend, the simplest explanation is often the best explanation.
They aren’t going to think about that because:
Okay now we have something we CAN discuss. Their rules. Did you READ their rules? I did. This is the rule that the decision to punish was based on:
2019 HEARTHSTONE GRANDMASTERS OFFICIAL COMPETITION RULES v1.4
Section 6.1
Engaging in any act that, in Blizzard’s sole discretion, brings you into public disrepute, offends a portion or group of the public, or otherwise damages Blizzard image will result in removal from Grandmaster’s and reduction of the player’s prize total to $0 USD, in addition to other remedies which may be provided for under the Handbook and Blizzard’'s Website Terms.
Now, the first problem I see in these rules is that they are intentionally vague. Yes other sports league rules exist that look similar to these however, all of them that I have been privy to (NFL, NBA, MLB PGA among others), all have something else in common. Players associations or unions that exist to prevent unilateral action against players by the league or by the owners of the teams like firing, or suspensions without ability to appeal or loss of prize money without compulsory process to bring both sides to some form of arbitration where neither side can gain an unfair advantage over the other in terms of the presenting of evidence. In the case of these other sports leagues the league rules can be intentionally vague because they will be contested at arbitration or in an administrative proceeding.
The second problem I see is that this rule in particular provides language that would be unacceptable to any adjudicating body under normal circumstances as the interpretation of certain terms (notably player’s prize total and Blizzard’s Website Terms) is not clear enough for any court to render a decision that would not be challenge-able down the road. Does the last term refer to the Terms of Use of the Website? Does it refer to the Hearthstone Terms of Service? (the two are not the same thing in a legal sense) and player’s prize total is also as fraught with error as it could be interpreted as during that particular championship or act as a claw back for previous winnings if any. Again vague. Unenforceably vague. Also intentionally vague agreements of adhesion usually do not stand up under scrutiny because such vagueness lends itself to the prospect of causing the second party to the agreement to always be in danger of waiving unwaivable rights or may imply that the second party must perform some morally disagreeable unethical or illegal activity in order to honor the agreement. (I don’t actually seeing that last part happening but the vagueness does lend itself to such interpretation).
The third problem and this is the biggest one of all. Blizzard Entertainment as a US Company has a moral duty (forget duty to shareholders, corporations in the US have a duty to the country that supersedes any duty to shareholder or consumer or bystander) to obey the all of the laws of this country (before honoring the laws of any other country) and at all times to be a representative to the rest of the world of the principles that the Unites States was founded on.
When any company goes beyond that line and either actively or through inaction causes those principles to be trampled upon it should be reminded by whatever means become necessary that the corporation exists at the pleasure of the citizens and for their convenience and that crossing that line is a step that corporations should fear to take for the reprisals and boycotts that will surely be their reward for such bad behavior.
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Which proves the point i was making the only reason Blizzard even gave them a ban was because they had simply ignored them at first and once social media provided proof of thier double standard surfaced it revealed thier own hypocrisy
So of course in order to do damage control they then handed down a suspension in an attempt to try and dispel any claims of impropriety sadly it only further proved the fact Blizzard was inconvenienced by thier own inactions given the overzealous response to sanctioning Blitz in the first place
Do you have a source for that because I can provide sources that cover the legality of fiduciary duty. While you are correct in that they may not violate the laws, the rest is feel-good stuff.
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Or they didn’t jump the gun. You do realize they went back on their original punishment for Blitz. Reality is in the rules he should have got zero winnings. Most people don’t watch the people in the stands while attending a sporting event, they watch those on the field of play. It is quite possible they did not even see it, ever factor that in?
This was the first time it ever happened. They were harsh, they pulled back. Blitz himself admitted wrong doing and even made a public appeal for people to not blame Blizzard for this. Yet here we are discussing it still.
Since you brought it up then you can be the one to explain it to Blizzard why the shareholders are all seing their stocks plummet due to the customers no longer buying any Blizzard product
Blizzard needs to remember they NEED us other wise WoW and all their games will end up in the bargain bin of the closest used game shop or just completely shut down and all because of trying to honor fiduciary duty
That doesn’t mean what you think it means.
https://finance.yahoo.com/quote/ATVI
Click YTD and tell me where the plummet is.
Your failure to adhere to the terms of this Handbook, the Blizzard End User License
Agreement, or other Website Terms which govern the use of your Battlenet account and/or the
Hearthstone game client may subject you to game or match forfeitures, disqualifications from
Tournaments, prize forfeitures, other disciplinary action, and legal claims, as explained below.
From the handbook as well, it also alludes to ToS of games being applicable here too, so the discussion of political, inflammatory comments is addressed by that as a whole. I won’t pretend to speak or read Chinese, they do have their own book for rules as a whole. Google translate is not doing so well with it and I won’t attempt to link it.
You can try running in circles with legalese all you want. Fact is that the rules extend beyond the handbook itself, that is listed in Section 2.2 subsection d. They gave him his money back, which they didn’t have to do at all. I am happy they did and am happy they took a stand on bringing politics into a game that a lot of people use as an escape from the real world.
edit: Sorry it took so long on the reply, I just wanted to have the rules at the ready for you.
You should probably watch the video before talking about it.
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I’d like to add…that even though the ‘rules’ could be considered ‘broken’. Blizz’s rules of contract were so broad and loose that if they chose they could have easily just given him a slap on the wrist and no punishment at all. For me the fact that they went completely overboard to begin with showed that china was involved and now to save face they still couldn’t roll back the punishment completely and didn’t even offer an apology.
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Yep and I didn’t notice it the first time, being honest, I was focused on the card play not the people. Never stated that they didn’t deserve it, had I been able to hear them say something about it proactively I might have noticed. But again stating my views, not everyone saw the same thing.
They all deserved to be punished, it was doled out eventually.