Mike Ybarra - Blizzard Trust and Culture Efforts Update

[Edward Wu]

90% of this is woke propaganda, barely anything to people actually concerned about the quality of games.

[Goat7]

All I read was

BLAH BLAH BLAH microsoft please dont fire my ass when the deal closes nobody is gonna hire my army crawlin, puss grabbin, shitty game making butt.

[Garretdejiko]

I’m humbled to be part of Blizzard Entertainment–the rich history, the incredible talent,

They are all gone

the best player communities

<Mod Edit: Please do not post images that contain character/server names by which other players may be identified. Thanks>

and of course, the amazing games we’re so fortunate to create.

A patch per year.

And is only the first sentence lmao. People love corpotalk

[RaoBurning]

I wish you were right. Unfortunately, that is not how it works. Quite to the contrary. Workplace diversity looks like this:

- If you recommend a person for hire, you get $2500 kickback. If that person is a "diversity" hire, you get a $8500 kickback. The kickback scales with the position.
- If you have a corporate board and you're headquartered in California, you must have a certain percentage of diversity representation on your board. Or you face fines. Other cities and states are following suit.
- Complete diversity training, or face a pay cut. Or termination.
- Use inclusive language. Or face a pay cut or termination if you don't.
- Use prefered pronouns. Or face a pay cut or termination if you don't.

How do I know this? Because I work at a large, global tech company where these very policies are in effect. I would happily take a job at place that holds the policies you describe as workplace diversity. In a heartbeat.

Do you boobs think companies just do diversity hire of random Joes off the street or something? You're still getting qualified people. Like holy shit this is literally a line from the end of American History X where we see that the protagonists' father is the one who started the neo nazi stuff.

[october breeze]

What a load of BS, buzz words of current social trends. I bet he would have written about Nazism and Jews, if it was 1940 or Vietnam and Communism, if it was 1970s.

He is just saying things he doesn't really believe, thinking or imagining that those lines will appease the community. While the community doesn't give a flying fart about your inclusive bs, and just want to know will this really result in a better product for customers?

[Wadrak]

Only thing we care is the games in the end.

Edit: ok sorry we care about culture.
But just leave politics out of it pls.

[baseballfan]

get my trust back? make WoW good again

[Grimoires]

that isn't how diversity works.

That's not how it's supposed to work. Believe me when I say that's absolutely how some companies work. How do I know this? Because that's exactly what they do at mine. And how do I know they do it at mine? Because I work in a management role and I've seen it and experienced it more than I care to.

The whole reason diversity is a priority is because hiring processes used to definitely favour a certain section of the community (white men) - to the point where more qualified people missed out on jobs because they weren't white men.

I'm sure this happened but I think it's more that the "majority" of applicants at video game companies used to be white men.

Like if they have 4 applicants for a position and they have to choose two of them. A is a white male with loads of experience and qualifications, more than anyone else who applied then yeah they are going to get the job (provided they don't bomb the interview). But having different perspectives is good too, so if the other three have similar experience and qualifications then yeah you might go for the so called "diversity hire" because that person brings something different to the team.

So if all things were equal you'd choose someone based on their skin color. That's racism even if your intentions are good. You're excluding the white, equally experienced and worthy, candidate because he's white and not a protected POC.

Race should NEVER be the deciding factor. EVER.

[Sanguinerd]

Great.. now start making decent games again.

You can start by making WoW for everyone and not just top players. Thx!

[NuclearPenetration]

More diversity and inclusion always makes better games yay!

[Wadrak]

Great.. now start making decent games again.

You can start by making WoW for everyone and not just top players. Thx!

How is wow not for everyone ?
You got 40 renown for free.
Now you will get 80 renown as catch up mechanic.

I dont get you ... there is LFR for everyone.

How is WoW not for everyone ?

[taliey]

Posters here acting like they own the companies they are fans of.

[SinR]

First course of action for earning my Trust back?

Fire Danuser

[varren]

Nobody cares. Make some good games please. Last thing resembling any sort of quality was Legion over half a decade ago.

[Super Kami Dende]

a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DE&I) leader

Well, it seems they aren't trying to actually make their company better.

[Spicymemer]

I find it very amusing that this left wing woke bullshit has utterly crushed the soul of blizzard, and is taking its toll on the playerbase. I played my last moments of WoW back in December, to be quite frank the only reason i stayed on this long was because of Classic and playing with a good fun and reliable guild.

Diversity hiring and inclusive language are not the problems blizzard thinks it has.
The problem blizzard has is GAMERS, to spell it out for you... where do you think game developers came from? THEY PLAYED THESE GAMES.
If Blizzard refuse to police their game, then 5-10 years down the track, those are the people that work at your company.

I hope this company fucking burns itself into ashes, it does not deserve to exist, not just because of this insane agenda they are chasing, but frankly they are absolutely bankrupt or creativity, innovation and unable to deliver a product worthy of a $60 pricetag, subscription, authorised rmt and cosmetics store.
Money is their agenda, not making a good product.

[Super Kami Dende]

that isn't how diversity works. The whole reason diversity is a priority is because hiring processes used to definitely favour a certain section of the community (white men) - to the point where more qualified people missed out on jobs because they weren't white men.

That sounds like one of those things that People think if they say enough will eventually make it true.

[Alipeve]

I'm seeing so many comments that say "We don't care about any of this, just make the games better." You're all so far off the mark.

Making games is work, and having a functioning, welcoming, workplace at blizzard will result in better games. The passion and reverence that used to make blizzard games so great has been gone as a result of these corporate nightmares.

Mend Blizzard's culture, and the good games will result from hard working employees that love what they do.

I hope Microsoft's meddling is limited besides getting leadership on the right track (Removing Kotich for starters). It might be a long shot, but I hope Blizzard can become the game studio it was pretending to be for all these years.

[Grimoires]

Like 95% of the replies to this show why the culture around Blizzard (and gaming in general) will just never change. It is inhabited by some of the most awful people. People too stupid to even understand what the hiring stuff actually is, but won't check it out or their hate can't be posted.

We are customers. We pay money for products. We want good products.

That said, as humans we also value humans and we'd like to hope that the company creating the products we pay for are upstanding companies and treating their employees well. However, many of us have first hand experience working for companies that claim "inclusivity" and "diversity" but end up silencing one group to appease another.

If some of us are "the most awful people" then what are the upstanding folks like yourself actually doing to make things better?

[Sanguinerd]

How is wow not for everyone ?
You got 40 renown for free.
Now you will get 80 renown as catch up mechanic.

I dont get you ... there is LFR for everyone.

How is WoW not for everyone ?

Oh right... getting free renown and doing LFR means the game is for everyone.

Is that really all your limited mind can think of when someone wants the game to be fun again for everyone?