• Light/Dark

CEO of world’s largest e-sports firm ESL warns staff not to discuss Hong Kong protests

Bufbaf

Bufbaf

Don't F5!
Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,855
Hamburg, Germany
Not sure if posted, but Search gave me nothing:

https://www.hongkongfp.com/2019/10/...l-warns-staff-not-discuss-hong-kong-protests/

In a message sent to more than 700 employees, the co-CEO of Germany-based e-sports company ESL has told employees not to discuss Hong Kong amid ongoing protests in the city.

"All of you might have heard [about] the political discussions and strikes surrounding the situation in Hong Kong, China," wrote ESL co-CEO and co-founder Ralf Reichert, according to an October 9 Slack message viewed by HKFP. "As a global company being active in many countries around the globe, we naturally do abstain from political discussions and setting the best example by living our values."


"Therefore, we would like to suggest to not actively engage in the discussion, especially on social media," wrote Reichert.

Founded in 2000, ESL is the world's largest e-sports company. It organises video game competitions and was most recently valued at US$425 million (HK$3.33 billion).



chrome_2019-10-12_13-34-40.jpg
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

More at the link.
 
Corsick

Corsick

Member
Oct 27, 2017
999
Every statement like this, no matter how gutless and milquetoast, is political. That's the funny part about executives around the world thinking they can cleverly tip toe around issues as visible as this one.
 
ArkhamFantasy

ArkhamFantasy

Member
Oct 25, 2017
13,651
It's insane to me how far these corporations are willing to go to appease the chinese government.

What if China required you to publicly endorse communism in order to get your games approved, would you do it? What if they required your executives to personally show up and bow to their dictator, would you do it? At what point do you just say "This is ridiculous, we're not dealing with you".

You've still got 6 billion other people in the world to sell games to.
 
Rhaknar

Rhaknar

Member
Oct 26, 2017
43,385
JamRock7 said:
Does China have the whole world by the balls or something?
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

by their wallet sure. Its not just what they make in China now, its what they will make in China in the FUTURE, as China is considered the largest growing market for videogames atm. Also for box office I believe, but dont quote me on that.
 
poklane

poklane

Member
Oct 25, 2017
28,991
the Netherlands
"we naturally do abstain from political discussions and setting the best example by living our values."
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Or in other words: "if you exercise your right of free speech regarding human rights abuse by a country from which we make significant money I'll fucking fire you".
What these companies are doing is nothing short of punishing their employees (and in Blizzard's case competitors) for exercising their rights when it comes to free speech, and that should be fucking illegal. People should be free to exercise their rights without having to worry about their employer punishing them for it.
 
Theswweet

Theswweet

RPG Site
Verified
Oct 25, 2017
6,519
California
It's been obvious that China could really dictate a lot of what goes into popular media for more than a decade now, and its always been concerning. I'm glad that folks are finally starting to realize how that can be such a bad thing.
 
kpaadet

kpaadet

Banned
Oct 30, 2017
1,741
Was watching some esl pro league yesterday and noticed that every time someone wrote something about Hong Kong in chat it immediately got removed, so I'm not at all surprised to see their cowardice stance here.
 
melodiousmowl

melodiousmowl

Member
Jan 14, 2018
3,789
CT
I am happy people are realizing that a lot of media is self-censored

but

it has been this way forever. In the US, its advertisers, politicians, groups that go for censorship, and on and on. MPAA has been censoring media since 1968. Advertisers buy good press and keep channels from talking bad about them. Do you hear politics talked about on sports-center?

I am not trying to make excuses, just point out that this is not some new thing that china is doing, though it is particularly egregious.
 
ArkhamFantasy

ArkhamFantasy

Member
Oct 25, 2017
13,651
Stygr said:
That's not how things work, China is the 1st market for mobile and online PC games and 2nd market WW behind the US iirc.

You can't ignore China at all lol
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

My point is, how far are you willing to go to sell games in China? Just to give a hyperbolic example, what if in order to sell games in China, you have to perform a satanic ritual publicly where you're naked executives have to sacrifice a live goat and drink it's blood. Would Blizzard do that? I would guess they wouldn't, right?

So by acknowledging that Blizzard executives wouldn't do that, that would mean there is a line, somewhere. My question is, where is that line? I think China is taking such an extreme stance here that it's not worth pursuing, if they're going to get so offended by something one of your FANS said (Note, not blizzard) then at some point you have to ask yourself "Is this worth it?"

I'm just asking how far these corporations are willing to go to appease such an incredibly sensitive government who uses the nuclear option at the slightest of offenses.
 
OP
OP
Bufbaf

Bufbaf

Don't F5!
Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,855
Hamburg, Germany
melodiousmowl said:
I am happy people are realizing that a lot of media is self-censored

but

it has been this way forever. In the US, its advertisers, politicians, groups that go for censorship, and on and on. MPAA has been censoring media since 1968. Advertisers buy good press and keep channels from talking bad about them. Do you hear politics talked about on sports-center?

I am not trying to make excuses, just point out that this is not some new thing that china is doing, though it is particularly egregious.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Which is why it's good people are now being aware of this and speak up. If this keeps going, companies will have a hard time explaining their self-censorship for $$$ in the future.
There's always a point people will notice, and it feels like the point for that issue might have been brought up by Blizzard and literally everyone in their wake. Which is, for all it's worth, a good thing imo.

Shy said:
Because they'd have the power to walk out in protest.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Also because it'd be really fucking hard for employers to fire them over this.
 
Calibro

Calibro

Member
Oct 27, 2017
1,822
Belarus
Supporting basic human rights shouldn't be "political".

At this point I'm not giving my money to any gaming company with direct ties to the chinese government. Plenty of great indies to last me a few lifetimes.
 
melodiousmowl

melodiousmowl

Member
Jan 14, 2018
3,789
CT
Bufbaf said:
Which is why it's good people are now being aware of this and speak up. If this keeps going, companies will have a hard time explaining their self-censorship for $$$ in the future.
There's always a point people will notice, and it feels like the point for that issue might have been brought up by Blizzard and literally everyone in their wake. Which is, for all it's worth, a good thing imo.


Also because it'd be really fucking hard for employers to fire them over this.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Well, it's not the biggest wake up in history, just hits this particular group of people (that is, aware gamers) directly so they pay attention. And to be real, it's not a lot of people.

I would /love/ for it to change, but it's a long way off.

I enjoy my iphones, androids, googles, cisco routers powering internets, entertainment supported by advertisements.

It would require many presidencies of sanders/warrens types, majorities of congress and the house of sanders/warren types, and more JUST to start moving the needle,and are willing to put a thumb on unchecked capitalism (like it was originally designed).
 

Deleted member 8196

Banned
Oct 26, 2017
9,859
RPGam3r said:
I mean you can ignore China and still be very profitable. There is no "period" on this discussion.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

Publishers don't want to be only profitable, they want as much as money as possible, everyone of them.
That's why they can't ignore China easily.

All western publishers have deals with Tencent, Netease and Perfect World to publish and in some cases even make their games for the chinese market.
 
Shy

Shy

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
18,520
melodiousmowl

melodiousmowl

Member
Jan 14, 2018
3,789
CT
Stygr said:
Publishers don't want to be only profitable, they want as much as money as possible, everyone of them.
That's why they can't ignore China easily.

All western publishers have deals with Tencent, Netease and Perfect World to publish and in some cases even make their games for the chinese market.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...

It's not just want - it's literally the main goal of how capitalism with publicly traded companies works. Profits, and the means to gain them, are literally the only goals of every board and C level set.

Doing things that /seem/ nice, are always weighted against not doing those things.

We can try to hold them accountable, but it's got to be worth more than doing business in china. And for all these companies, at this point in time, I don't think anyone would be happy with who wins.
 
saenima

saenima

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
11,892
Some poster here told me the other day that capitalism is ok because it doesn't care who you fuck. As in, it's not discriminatory by itself.

How quaint.

The fact that capitalism is completely amoral is one of its worst shortcomings. When supporting fascism is more profitable than supporting human rights, this (and much worse) is the result. As long as fascist states have enough money to spend, corporations will trip over themselves to appease them. At the detriment of everything else.

Today is silencing dissent. Tomorrow is active persecution. Next thing we know, we're discussing the merits of gas chambers automation.
 
N.Domixis

N.Domixis

Banned
Oct 28, 2017
9,208
companies should just ignore this fucking government. We just going to let some other country control how we act?
 
melodiousmowl

melodiousmowl

Member
Jan 14, 2018
3,789
CT
saenima said:
Some poster here told me the other day that capitalism is ok because it doesn't care who you fuck. As in, it's not discriminatory by itself.

How quaint.

The fact that capitalism is completely amoral is one of its worst shortcomings. When supporting fascism is more profitable than supporting human rights, this (and much worse) is the result. As long as fascist states have enough money to spend, corporations will trip over themselves to appease them. At the detriment of everything else.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...


I think this WHOLE conversation should be moved into a book club, where everyone reads some Thom Hartmann, John Perkins, Noam Chompsky, etc, etc, etc, then has a better informed discussion recognizing the almost debilitating scale of the problem.
 
Lausebub

Lausebub

Member
Nov 4, 2017
3,172
Can they then talk about Uyghur contentration camps or the situation in Tibet and Inner Mongolia?
 
Etrian Oddity

Etrian Oddity

Member
Oct 26, 2017
3,429
Someone here on ERA posted that the west thought capitalism would be communist China's undoing; but communist China is currently western capitalism's undoing.

Hard to argue.
 

Deleted member 11413

User requested account closure
Banned
Oct 27, 2017
22,961
poklane said:
Or in other words: "if you exercise your right of free speech regarding human rights abuse by a country from which we make significant money I'll fucking fire you".
What these companies are doing is nothing short of punishing their employees (and in Blizzard's case competitors) for exercising their rights when it comes to free speech, and that should be fucking illegal. People should be free to exercise their rights without having to worry about their employer punishing them for it.
Click to expand...
Click to shrink...
Eh....that's not really the problem here. The entire point of free speech is to protect citizens from the government regarding their speech, because the government can easily abuse that power (as you see in China). As far as private companies go, the fact that private companies can fire you or take you off of their platform for speech is the entire basis of deplatforming, which is extremely important for, say, getting white supremacists off of mainstream platforms or conspiracy theorists, etc. What you are suggesting would prevent the deplatforming of people like Richard Spencer and Alex Jones.

The real solution is unionization, which gives workers far more power to stand up to employers and corporations when they try to silence speech in favor of profit. A union could much more easily protect workers in this situation and prevent them from being fired for something like this.
 
Hey Please

Hey Please

Avenger
Oct 31, 2017
22,824
Not America
I hope people remember these moments the next time a brand tries to sell by advertising as being woke.
Hbomber's video pertaining to woke brands is a must watch.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.