Blizzard bans player for supporting Hong Kong protests: all the latest updates – The Verge

Team Hong Kong’s unlikely journey to the Overwatch World Cup

2019-11-05T11:41:50-05:00

It was a warm day in Hong Kong in early October, and Derek Kwok was in the midst of talking to his seven-man Overwatch roster about the future.

The team was attempting to raise enough funds in order to make a 7,200-mile journey across the globe to BlizzCon at the Anaheim Convention Center in California where the Overwatch World Cup would take place in early November. Blizzard had changed the format of the tournament so there would be no regional qualifiers and no way to compete outside of actually traveling to Anaheim. That came with steep costs.

Kwok, who is the general manager of the Fire Dragons, Hong Kong's Overwatch World Cup team, …

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Blizzard says ‘we failed in our purpose’ after Hearthstone Hong Kong controversy

2019-11-01T14:12:05-04:00

Blizzard Entertainment kicked off its annual BlizzCon fan expo today with a direct apology from president J. Allen Brack regarding the explosive Hong Kong controversy that's engulfed the company for the past month.

"Blizzard had the opportunity to bring the world together in a tough Hearthstone e-sports moment about a month ago. We did not. We moved too quickly in our decision-making and then to make matters worse, we were too slow to talk to all of you," Brack said onstage during the beginning of the BlizzCon opening ceremony. "When I think about how most unhappy I am, I think about two things. We didn't live up to the higher standards we …

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Blizzard lost a big sponsor after the Hong Kong outcry: Mitsubishi

2019-10-29T20:42:45-04:00

Blizzard Entertainment may be feeling the effects of its controversial ban of Hong Kong Hearthstone player Ng "Blitzchung" Wai Chung for quite some time. The company not only faced a widespread player boycott, condemnations from US lawmakers, and numerous employee walkouts over the decision, but it also lost a key sponsor of its international gaming competitions.

According to The Daily Beast, Mitsubishi decided to pull sponsorships of Blizzard e-sports events after the company banned Wai Chung for voicing support for the Hong Kong protesters in a televised post-game interview earlier this month. Reddit users first noticed the disappearance …

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Gamers for Freedom is a new group pressuring Blizzard and other publishers about Hong Kong

2019-10-24T17:51:28-04:00

Gaming and politics do mix, as the recent furor over Blizzard's censorship of pro-Hong Kong voices has shown: it hasn't blown over, and the conflict shows no signs of stopping. Today, a new challenger appeared: the nonprofit organization Fight for the Future, which has spun up a campaign called Gamers for Freedom to put pressure on Blizzard to reevaluate its stances on China and Hong Kong.

Fight for the Future organizes online (and in-person) campaigns to, as they write in their mission statement, "ensure that the web continues to hold freedom of expression and creativity at its core." (They were the ones who mobilized basically the entire …

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Blizzard is banning people in its Hearthstone Twitch chat for spamming pro-Hong Kong statements

2019-10-18T16:25:17-04:00

In February, Blizzard announced a new Hearthstone e-sports program, called the Masters Tour, to pit the game's best players against each other for a chance to win the acclaim of the internet (and potentially a lot of money). A European leg of the tour is currently happening in Bucharest, and you can catch the action over on Twitch.

But there's a catch: anybody who posts anything pro-Hong Kong seems to be earning an automatic 24-hour chat ban, as reported by Dot Esports. (On Twitch, a chat ban means that you can't post anything in a channel's chat for a certain amount of time; offenses and ban lengths are both specified by moderators.)

That …

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AOC and Ted Cruz call out Apple for dropping Hong Kong app in joint letter

2019-10-18T15:45:11-04:00

In two letters, a bipartisan group of lawmakers sharply criticized Apple and Blizzard over their recent actions in China.

"Strong concern" over Apple's decision

The first, addressed to Apple CEO Tim Cook, expresses "strong concern" over the company's decision to remove an app used by Hong Kong protesters from its App Store. The app, called HKMap, tracked police presence and was used by pro-democracy activists, but was removed earlier this month after Apple claimed it was being used for criminal activity. The app's developers said there was no evidence of that, and Apple has been slammed for the move.

"Cases like these raise real concern abo …

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Mark Zuckerberg took on China in a speech defending free expression

2019-10-17T14:45:21-04:00

In a speech at Georgetown University on Thursday, Mark Zuckerberg laid out Facebook's approach to moderation in terms of an ongoing commitment to free expression - and in one particular section, drew a sharp contrast with Chinese companies that may not share those values.

As Zuckerberg described it, regulators and technologists face the question of "which nation's values are going to determine what speech is going to be allowed for decades to come," China or the US. As he laid out Facebook's commitment to free expression, he also emphasized that those values were already coming under threat from China.

"If another nation's platform sets th …

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Blizzard bans three college Hearthstone players for Hong Kong protest sign

2019-10-16T13:56:30-04:00

Blizzard has suspended three college Hearthstone players for six months after they held up a sign that read "Free Hong Kong, Boycott Blizz" while participating in an official competition stream.

The ban, which was first reported by VICE Games, comes just over a week after Blizzard suspended a professional Hearthstone player, Ng "Blitzchung" Wai Chung for six months. Chung was suspended for showing support for Hong Kong protesters in an interview after Hearthstone's Grandmaster tournament. The incident led to widespread complaints from the gaming community, as well as within Blizzard itself.

Similar to Blitzchung's ban, the three college pl …

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Blizzard breaks its silence on controversial suspension of pro Hong Kong Hearthstone player

2019-10-11T20:32:05-04:00

Video game developer Blizzard Entertainment has finally broken its silence after banning a professional player of popular virtual card game Hearthstone for voicing support for the Hong Kong protests. In a lengthy statement, the company says it will reduce the one-year suspension of player Ng "Blitzchung" Wai Chung to a six-month one, and it will restore the prize money it withheld from him.

Blizzard claims that its initial decision was not influenced by its relationship with China. "The specific views expressed by blitzchung were not a factor in the decision we made. I want to be clear: our relationships in China had no influence on our dec …

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Riot doesn’t want League of Legends broadcasters discussing ‘sensitive topics’ on the air

2019-10-11T13:47:53-04:00

On Friday, Riot Games said that League of Legends broadcasters should "refrain" from discussing "sensitive topics" on the air, following a controversial move from Blizzard to ban a Hearthstone player who voiced support for the Hong Kong protesters over the weekend.

"As a general rule, we want to keep our broadcasts focused on the game, the sport, and the players," John Needham, the global head of League of Legends e-sports said in a statement. "We serve fans from many different countries and cultures, and we believe this opportunity comes with a responsibility to keep personal views on sensitives issues (political, religious, or otherwise) …

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