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Comment by fareesh | Hacker News Reader

It's unfortunate that this person had to apologize for playing Diablo just to be able to review it without fear of repercussions.

Coming soon: "Hey everyone here is my review of the iPhone 25. Just so you know, I got the new iPhone but I spent a few hours in prayer and penance thinking about climate change and my consumption and carbon and Chinese slave labor before I clicked buy"

Then again, maybe they genuinely felt that way. I hope that's the case.

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It seems (at least anecdotally) that there are a lot of people in tech who may not game anymore, but nonetheless have a history steeped in Blizzard games like the author. And with the recent Blizzard news, a lot of people are trying to untangle the dissonance expressed by the memories of their adolescence and early adulthood with the recent legal and cultural scrutiny Blizzard is under. The public penance is I think the author's way of wrestling with this dissonance.

Hell I still game and have trouble with that dissonance. I have lovely memories of Diablo 2 and StarCraft, played Diablo 3 and Overwatch, but the recent events convinced me to just not touch Blizzard games for a few years.

I’m out of the loop, what recent events?

Blizzard had a ton of sexual harrassment internally that the company didn't care about.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Department_of_Fair_...

alleged

> It seems (at least anecdotally) that there are a lot of people in tech who may not game anymore

The newest, most popular game is "how outraged can I get".

Isn’t it peer pressure that results in companies that stop acting like assholes? If you just shrug your shoulders and consume their products, do you think they’d change?

Why work for Bezos up until 2020 if you care?

Apologize for paying taxes while you are on it

> Isn’t it peer pressure that results in companies that stop acting like assholes?

I don't have a good theory of what stops people from "acting like assholes" but I am skeptical that opining about potential complicity for playing some video game is a significant factor.

I deleted all my Blizzard games when they banned somebody for being pro-democracy (Hong Kong). That’s just bonkers ethics coming from a company based in California.

I didn't read any "fear of repercussions" in the article, just mostly personal ethical concerns. You're building a strawman here.

>Just so you know, I got the new iPhone but I spent a few hours in prayer and penance thinking about climate change and my consumption and carbon and Chinese slave labor before I clicked buy.

Prayer and penance notwithstanding, is it such a bad idea to pay more attention to these things?

Funny you single out Apple when I would worry about any other producer way more both in terms of climate impact and slave labour.

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