I Will Be Boycotting All Future Paradox Games

[Troy]

So, I bet that title got your attention. Let me lay out my reasons.

Paradox is taking a HUGE and probably frightening step of becoming a public company. If you don't understand what that is, it means they're going to start selling stock in their company. It's a big deal, and will certainly inject vast amounts of cash into a very professional company. I bet their games, in the short term, will be even better than they have been in the past. I'm happy for them in that respect. Going public is not the problem. The problem, for me, is the side effects.

First, and foremost, is that Paradox is selling 10% of its company to a Chinese company called Tencent. You can read about it here: http://www.polygon.com/2016/5/27/11797712/chinas-tencent-just-bought-a-piece-of-paradox

Tencent is probably best known in these parts as the owner of Riot games that makes League of Legends. Now, for those of you who don't realize, Tencent might just be the most evil corporation in the world. I know Microsoft and Google and Wal-Mart and Apple have all been accused of being the most evil, but really, all those companies ever did was try to control the market. What Tencent is doing is trying to control PEOPLE.

It's very complicated, but due to China's economic explosion over the last two decades, they have a lot of people with a lot of money, but no idea how to judge how "credit worthy" their citizens are because credit cards are not used as widely in China and free market ideas those of us in the West take as bedrock principles are only now being experimented with in the Middle Kingdom. So what the government of China has done is turn to its internet companies to create a "social score" based on what people buy and say over the internet. From that score, citizens earn a value that gets them discounts on purchases and loans from Chinese banks and stores like Alibaba and Tencent.

The problems with Tencent's scoring system is, that Tencent monitors everyone's social media posts and social network relationships. If a person says something bad about Tencent or the economy or the government, they'll lose points. If someone has a friend online with a low score, they lose points. Basically, Tencent's rating system forces people to fall in line with the government and ostracize anyone who doesn't do likewise. This is the opposite of freedom and liberty. It is vile, disgusting, and altogether EVIL.

You can learn more about it here:

https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/2015/10/in-china-your-credit-score-is-now-affected-by-your-political-opinions-and-your-friends-political-opinions/

https://www.destructoid.com/we-investigated-riot-games-new-owner-and-its-chinese-social-credit-system-330544.phtml

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lHcTKWiZ8sI

This brings me to my second reason. It's clear that Paradox is already being influenced by its outside investors and is wary of transparency. Just a few days ago, Paradox demanded that SteamSpy (http://steamspy.com/) remove all Paradox titles from its service. Sergey is a nice guy, because he probably doesn't want to risk having a big fight that might shut down all of SteamSpy. But it is VERY WRONG of Paradox to ask him to do this.

First, all of the information SteamSpy collects is publically available. For those who don't know, Steam Spy scrapes a selection of public Steam profiles each day and uses an algorithm to guess how many people own a particular title. It's very useful to guys like me that write articles for websites like eXplorminate, and it gives companies all over good information when it comes to devising their business model. SteamSpy provides a great, free service using well-known technology. There is nothing to stop any other person from writing a program like SteamSpy's that scrapes this kind of data. It's not easy but very doable.

Second, Paradox hasn't made the same request to SteamCharts (http://steamcharts.com/) or Steam itself which publish concurrent players each day. It's not hard, at all, to extrapolate sales from players. Why the double standard?

Third, it this move goes against the ethos of the Internet, IMHO, which has helped to level the playing field between the powerful and the little guy. It is so much easier for regular people to hold big companies and governments accountable now thanks to the ease of sharing information on the 'net. Paradox is quashing public information in order to further its corporate goals. I'm sure SteamSpy's numbers aren't 100% accurate (Sergey never ever claimed they were), so that may cause some people to be suspicious of Paradox's official figures it gives to investors. But that's on Paradox.

You can read more about the SteamSpy thing here: https://twitter.com/Steam_Spy/status/738463579112886272

I call on Paradox to rescind its request to SteamSpy, and even though I know it's impossible, I'd like to see them buy back their stock from Tencent. I can't believe that any Western company would want to be involved with those guys.

Until they do the first thing, I will avoid buying any Paradox games and encourage others to do the same. Until they do the second, I will avoid promoting Paradox games altogether. I cannot, in good conscience, support that kind of devious social manipulation.

[I'm Spartacus]

Troy - I agree the whole way Tencent runs sounds absolutely dreadful and that you must spout the official line or suffer - the only thing is I have trouble seeing the difference between what they do and "political correctness" as we know it - just seems like slightly different versions of exactly the same thing.

Which regrettably seems to have been in vogue and growing since Mcarthyism in the early 50's.

[Troy]

Opprinnelig skrevet av I'm Spartacus:

Troy - I agree the whole way Tencent runs sounds absolutely dreadful and that you must spout the official line or suffer - the only thing is I have trouble seeing the difference between what they do and "political correctness" as we know it - just seems like slightly different versions of exactly the same thing.

Being politically correct or not being politically correct doesn't affect your ability to get a loan, get travel papers, apply for a job, and receive discounts on goods via the internet. Tencent's system informs the Chinese government about all of your activities and the government takes Tencent's score into account when considering all those things. Apple, for instance, doesn't automatically send its users' data to Washington and recently fought the government on encryption. And Apple is a company that prides itself on its Progressiveness. There is a huge difference between social pressure you might feel on Facebook and Tencent's social media outlets that tie into your ability to exchange good and services, petition the government for assistance, or apply for employment.

[Naselus]

See, I watched that Extra Credits episode at the time. The thing is, Credit Rating agencies operate in more or less exactly the same manner in the West as Tencent's system does in China. A company like Experian is really no different in most ways; the only serious difference is that our 'points' system is called money. You aren't allowed it if Experian don't like you enough, and reasons for disliking you include not just your own credit history, but also where you live, who you live with, people you know, where you went to school... and yes, this ALSO effects whether you can get many jobs, which will run a credit check. This is pretty much just the totalitarian version of our own corporatist system.

And I don't condone their points system, but I wouldn't say it's any more evil than, say, Monsanto's efforts to prevent subistance farmers from saving seed, or Nestle's repeated efforts to buy out the entire water supply of various countries. Or IBM providing the computers which orchestrated the holocaust, complete with service contracts that ensured members of staff actually attended death camps on a regular basis. At least Tencent, like IBM, can argue it was compelled to do so because when the dictator comes knocking, you can't easily say no.

This is without even going into the fact that an IPO is a public offering. You don't really get to choose who buys in, so Paradox isn't really 'involving' itself with them anymore than any other company that happens to have been invested in by someone unpleasant (and the Panama Papers reveal that that turns out to be literally every property company in London).


Now, I've no idea why Paradox asked Steamspy to take down all the information about them, but the fact they DIDN'T ask anyone else to suggests that it's more likely to be Steamspy's information being wildly inaccurate than anything else (something Steamspy does not deny - it's line has always been very clear that it's an estimate). And for many studios, particularly those like Paradox and Stardock which are mid-size, fairly niche and use multiple distribution channels, it is indeed very inaccurate. If I were in the process of launching an IPO, I'd probably want people to take down incorrect information which would effect the stock price too. Hell, if the bank handling my IPO didn't advise me to do this, it may be in breach of local laws.


So, all in all, while I respect your objections I really don't see boycotting Paradox as either targeting the right opponent here, OR as a necessary and proportionate reaction to their perceived behaviour.

[Troy]

Good post, Naselus, I'll respond.

First, Experian doesn't take into account your attituteds toward the government when computing your score. Tencent (and other similar systems run by other Chinese companies) does. That's a HUGE problem for me.

Second, Experian isn't sending my data to the government automatically. If the government (or anyone) wants my credit data, they at least have to ask.

Third, there is a lot of information credit agencies do not ask for. For instance, "Your Experian credit report does not contain — and Experian does not collect — data about race, religious preference, medical history, personal lifestyle, political preference, friends, criminal record or any other information unrelated to credit." In fact you can read a lot more about that here: http://www.experian.com/blogs/ask-experian/credit-education/faqs/credit-report-faqs/

Tencent does collect all that kind of information. And then reports it publically and to the government.

Fourth, Tencent's score is shared publically so others can praise or shame people depending on their score. Credit Scores from Experian are kept confidential for the most part.

Fifth, Tencent takes the scores of people you know into account when determining your score. Experian does not - not even your spouse or children. This incentivizes unfriending low score people and friending high score people.

Sixth, Tencent will take into account what you buy. So, if you buy items that the government approves of, you get a higher score. If you buy things the government doesn't like as much, you lose points. For the most part, Experian and the others don't really care what you buy, just as long as you pay your bills.

Your point about Tencent being forced to do this by the government is legitimate, but totally beside the point. Paradox and Tencent organized this sale outside the IPO. Read the Polygon article I linked. Paradox was only too glad to accomodate Tencent. They should have told Tencent that they would be no party to helping to support oppression and to go buy the shares on the open market if they want 10%. Screw them!

As for SteamSpy being innacruate, I don't believe that. Through eXplormiante's contacts with all kinds of developers, we've learned the sales numbers for many 4X games. SteamSpy is pretty dark accurate, especially for the bigger selling games - usually within 2 or 3 percentage points. For a game that sells 400k copies (the last reading I got for Stellaris from SteamSpy was 418,000), that's only 8-12k games. That's a very small varriance from what they might report to an investor. And what would it matter anyway? Were investors really believing SteamSpy over Paradox's internal figures? Are they really that shady of a company that no one believes them? LOL, I doubt it. Their reasoning is totally BS, if there was any reason given at all. It's a pathetic move, IMO, and it pushed me over the top with them. Until they change their corporate habits, I'm done with them.

[Crunchy]

its interesting. People often enough fail to see the difference between law and social acceptance.
You can bet that china will use this data to legally or illegally, what does china care, punish people and not just bar them from positions in government. How long will it be before not being a good citizen is a punishable offense. I am sure it already is its just not PC most likely.

The US does do some crazy shit based on public opinion but rarely is law decided that way. Openly anyway.

China is a pretty horrible government. Horrible.
This is the good part about social acceptance in that without law the public can say "we wont put up with this crap". Whats interesting, and also shows how stupid humanity is, is that people will label stuff PC as a negative term but do basically exactly the same social outrage over issues that they take dear to heart. Generally because whatever it is effects them directly.

I dont know that i can boycott over this though. I dont know. I know i should because i think Chinese government is evil, there goes my loan and chance in Chinese government, but I just dont think it will do any good.

However i will keep it in mind. Thank you troy for bringing it up.

[BlueTemplar]

Ouch, yeah, that's a concern...

Now I have a fourth reason for being annoyed that I caved in and bought Stellaris (too soon?)...
(the other being :

1.) I'm thinking of boycotting Steam again
2.) I don't feel like I got my 30€ worth of it (so far), especially considering PDS isn't a small studio anymore so should be IMHO expected to deliver higher quality software.
3.) It still managed to make me enjoy/waste the time that I should have spent elsewhere, though I think that part of it (enjoy) is a lot thank to the discussion with the eXplorminate community, and part of it (waste) due to the UI issues.

Opprinnelig skrevet av Troy_Costisick:

First, and foremost, is that Paradox is selling 10% of its company to a Chinese company called Tencent. You can read about it here: http://www.polygon.com/2016/5/27/11797712/chinas-tencent-just-bought-a-piece-of-paradox

Isn't it 5%, not 10%?

Opprinnelig skrevet av Naselus:

And for many studios, particularly those like Paradox and Stardock which are mid-size, fairly niche and use multiple distribution channels, it is indeed very inaccurate. If I were in the process of launching an IPO, I'd probably want people to take down incorrect information which would effect the stock price too. Hell, if the bank handling my IPO didn't advise me to do this, it may be in breach of local laws.

Paradox Interactive / Development Studio (?) isn't mid-size (anymore, with this IPO). Also, isn't Stellaris (so far) only distributed trough Steam?

[Naselus]

Part of the thing which really got me about the Extra Credits article at the time is that, for the framework of our dominant ideology, Experian is doing much the same thing though. The details may differ, but that's by-the-by; where Tencent is sharing it with the Chinese government, Experian is sharing it with the dominant socio-economic structures in the West - the banks (another set of institutions which behave far more evilly, in their complicity with everything from money laundering for Mexican drug cartels to international tax avoidance for genocidal dictatorships). Sure, the bank's don't care what you think of the Federal government - hell, they'd prefer it if you hate it - so they don't bother collecting that information because it's not really important in the Western system of ideological domination. But they collect EXACTLY the information which is relevant to our own systems of power.

In the West, the private sector controls these things, and both Facebook and Google's entire business model is based on selling exactly the things you asked about to the highest bidder. They're not even 'just' sharing with the government, they'll literally give it to Serial Killers Incorporated if they have a big enough cheque book. We also have much, much higher levels of distrust in our governments that the Chinese do (like, twice the % of Chinese people trust their government compared to Western scores), so while we're alarmed when the government is spying on us, the Chinese are less concerned about it and even kind of expect it. Culturally, they have a general fear of chaos that the West lacks (just as we have a fear of government that they lack). While some of this is due to communist propaganda, our own distrust of our own government can at least partially be explained by corporate propaganda. Whoever owns the media tends to paint themselves in a good light and destabilize other power structures.

Basically, in my book the only way to draw a difference between the our points system and their points system is to artificially adopt certain value positions which state that some form of spying is more acceptible than the other... despite the fact that, in both cases, the result is people having their agency constrained and their lives ruined. I'm entirely sure there's some forum in China where some guy is saying 'look at how evil Experan is! if only it were like Tencent instead, because I don't mind a system that weeds out political deviancy but they insist on determining people's lives with money-tokens instead!'... and is he wrong and we're right? I'd sooner condemn both forms equally, thank you, but that means we're not really in a position to go lecturing the Chinese about spying on their population.

Besides, with the breadth of Tencent's portfolio (Activision Blizzard, Riot, Epic) you may find yourself running out of games to review if you want to boycott them all. Or is it just Paradox? In which case, we can drop the Tencent angle (because if it doesn't matter for the other companies it shouldn't matter for Paradox) and just focus on the Steamspy thing... which is not really a big deal.



As for the Steamspy thing - it doesn't matter if the figures are a little out or a lot out. They're out. And yes, savvy investors will take that into account in the IPO regardless of how reputible the source appears to be. It influences investor confidence and raises doubt about Paradox's own figures, which is why a good bank or brokerage ought to advise you try and get it taken down, and as I say, in many jurisdictions (probably including Sweden, given it's an EU member) they have a legal obligation to tell you so.

[Mansen]

I'm not sure I see the problem. So a Chinese company owns a minority share. That doesn't mean that paradox will change in the slightest because of it? And it's not like they're allowed to share any kind of personal information outside of the EU (Gotta love EU privacy laws)

[Crunchy]

Nase to say the Chinese trust their government... no. They don't trust it. They fear it. Small but important difference.

I talked with the guy fresh from China who I trained to take my American job for 1/10th my wage. He felt that the government was quite corrupt.

Also the difference between us and China in this system is that I can call my bank a blood sucking monster inside their bank or online and my credit score will stay the same.
Right wing or left wing... makes no difference.

Isn't the tank man's anniversary right about now.
That dude is gone.

[Crunchy]

Opprinnelig skrevet av Mansen:

I'm not sure I see the problem. So a Chinese company owns a minority share. That doesn't mean that paradox will change in the slightest because of it? And it's not like they're allowed to share any kind of personal information outside of the EU (Gotta love EU privacy laws)

Friend of my enemy is my enemy.

[Naselus]

Opprinnelig skrevet av BlueTemplar:

Paradox Interactive / Development Studio (?) isn't mid-size (anymore, with this IPO). Also, isn't Stellaris (so far) only distributed trough Steam?

Blizzard has a market cap of 27 billion dollars. EA has a market cap of 14 billion dollars. PI is currently just under 6 billion. For a publishing group, Paradox are still definitely mid-size (the Dev Studio itself is probably worth something in the low millions, since the back-catalogue belongs to PI); they're just at the upper end of mid-size now (like similarly-valued Take Two, who likewise lack a substantial back-catalogue of licensing rights) rather than the low end (like Stardock - speaking of whom, is anyone wondering whether Brad Wardell is likely to take the money and run following the borderline flop of Ashes?).

And while Stellaris requires Steam to download, it's sold through multiple outlets. This makes using user-data (as in the number of owners, the kind of data Steamspy uses) less useful as a proxy for genuine sales data (as in money earned from that userbase). Taking a rough rule-of-thumb calculation for money (say, 30% of $40 per unit) earned looking at SS can be wildly misleading when a company runs it's own webstore (and Paradox's webstore is more active than most, though still small compared to Steam). So it's feeding potential investors data that may be 5% inaccurate to begin with, and is impossible to accurately value, yet still might be taken as a proxy by unskilled investors - like the fanbase that Paradox also specifically wanted to sell many of it's shares to.

[Naselus]

Opprinnelig skrevet av Crunchy Gremlin:

Nase to say the Chinese trust their government... no. They don't trust it. They fear it. Small but important difference.

No, they actually do trust it. It had 88% trust in government in 2012; 75% in 2013 - and before you say thy were just too terrified to say otherwise, Russia scored 39% and 26% in the same years, and is hardly less likely to kneecap citizens who disagree with Putin.

They don't like their government; they know full well it's oppressive, corrupt and generally despotic. But they do trust that, generally, the Communist Party is doing the right thing for the nation's long-term health in a way that most Western countries would find incomprehensible - Americans in particular, with their borderline obsession over the dangers of the federal government, but most European nations too. China has a cultural terror of disorder (a symptom of the periodic collapses which have overtaken it over the last two millennia), and so even a brutal government is considered better than no government at all.

There's some really good scholarship on this (some of it by one of my old professors), it's not controversial.

[RayFowler]

I'll just add a few related truisms.

1. Money corrupts everything
2. If you're not paying, then you're the product
3. Publicly owned companies serve their shareholders, not their customers

Honestly, I don't understand why Paradox would go public since they are doing so well. Are they cashing out?

[Troy]

Opprinnelig skrevet av Mansen:

I'm not sure I see the problem. So a Chinese company owns a minority share. That doesn't mean that paradox will change in the slightest because of it? And it's not like they're allowed to share any kind of personal information outside of the EU (Gotta love EU privacy laws)

They once owned a minority share of Riot games too.

[Tragic]

What a pathetically paranoid and ignorant over reaction.

Never mind that most large companies will have Chinese investors, never mind that you probably use Facebook, Google, Apple and who knows what other companies that are not only mass data collectors but also have large Chinese investors, never mind that everything from your toothpaste to those shoes you bought are part of the mass data bank.

Good luck to you... don't let the door hit you on the way out and oh yeah... you better not buy 99% of every game ever released form now on.

You are unbelievable.