Blizzard President J. Allen Brack said in an interview with PC Gamer this weekend that the company will not be reversing a six-month suspension for Ng "Blitzchung" Wai Chung and two Hearthstone casters that were involved in Hong Kong-related protests on a live esports stream last month.
In explaining that decision,Brack reiterated the message that Blizzard supports free speech and encourages employees and players to say what they want in "all kinds of ways and all kinds of places." The one exception to that, he said, is "official broadcasts," including Blizzard-sponsored esports events, which the company wants to be "focused on the games."
"Again, it's not about the content of Blitzchung's message,"Brack said, echoing previous comments from Blizzard. "It's about the fact that it was not around the games. If we hadn't taken action, if we hadn't done something, you can imagine the trail that would be in our future around doing interviews. They would become times for people to make a statement about whatever they wanted to, on whatever issue. That's just a path that we don't want to go down. We really want the content of those official broadcasts to be focused on the games, and keep that focus."
Brack added that Blizzard employees, including "esports athletes, our Grandmasters, or anyone who is participating in esports [are] free to say and do whatever they want on their social channels." That seems to directly contradict the reported experience of Justin "Jayne" Conroy, assistant coach for the Dallas Fuel pro Overwatch team, who told the Dallas Morning News last month that Blizzard asked him to remove a tweet criticizing the Blitzchung decision.
Brack's interview comes after he issued a vague apology from the Blizzcon stage Friday, in which he accepted "accountability" for the Blitzchung decision and said the company would "do better" in the future. The decision to keep the suspension in place comes despite pressure from Blizzcon protesters, pro Hearthstone players, Blizzard employees, Read More – Source
