Stardock CEO Boycotts UPS Over Fox News

[Oskuro]

Source

'Tis the season for boycotts and the latest combatant to enter the arena is none other than Sins of a Solar Empire publisher Stardock and its CEO Brad Wardell, who are boycotting shipping company UPS over its boycott of Fox News.

It's a complicated story to try to keep up. A few weeks ago, UPS announced that it was pulling its advertising from Fox News because it could no longer tolerate the opinions expressed on the Glenn Beck show. The final straw apparently came when Beck, a conservative radio and television talk show host notorious for his inflammatory statements, said U.S. President Barack Obama is a racist "with a deep-seated hatred for white people."

The decision to pull its advertising from Fox News as a whole didn't sit too well with Wardell, who said Stardock does a "non-trivial amount of shipping with UPS" and that if the report of the boycott was true, he'd switch the company to FedEx instead. It was true, Stardock switched couriers and that was that; except, as we should all know by now, that is never just that.

A lot of people understandably took Wardell's decision to drop UPS as support for Beck and his political views, which didn't sit too well with Wardell either and prompted him to issue a statement clarifying that his reasons for boycotting UPS have nothing at to do with Beck himself.

"My Facebook comment was taken considerably out of context. I could care less about Glenn Beck or whether someone advertises on their show or not," he said. "But UPS is boycotting the entire channel which annoyed me enough to ask my publishing director to look into whether it was true (it was) and have them look into Fed Ex which provided competitive pricing and make use of them for our uses."

"Frankly, I wouldn't have cared if UPS had pulled their ads from Fox if they had done so quietly. But they didn't. They had to 'take a stance'," he explained further on his personal blog at JoeUser.com. "I'm not a huge fan of FOX. But as a conservative, it is nice that there's one station where my values aren't ridiculed. I don't have some 'thing' for Fox. But Fox makes an easy target and it irritated me to see UPS playing such games."

I wonder if he'll get a free trip to UPS headquarters out of this?

(bolding not mine)

Posted without comment, since I don't have first-hand experience with Glenn Beck or all the anti-Obama idiocy to properly mock this.

[Stark]

Fox News is a channel where bad fanfiction isn't ridiculed; it's news.

[Havok]

Ugh. COULDN'T CARE LESS. Man, I fucking hate that.

What 'games' are UPS playing? Not wanting to support or be associated with blatant lies? Well guess what moron, you are playing that game now too, except you have taken the side of blatant lies.

[Brother-Captain Gaius]

Aw man. Stardock sent me some survey a few days ago; if I'd known about this, I could've filled in their "Why aren't you using our shitty Steam-wannabe service?" questions with "Downright silly CEO".

[Stark]

Aw man. Stardock sent me some survey a few days ago; if I'd known about this, I could've filled in their "Why aren't you using our shitty Steam-wannabe service?" questions with "Downright silly CEO".

The urge to troll their forums is rising; I'd previously noticed the massive piles of god-botherers there, but this probably explains it.

[Samuel]

"I'm not a huge fan of FOX. But as a conservative, it is nice that there's one station where my values aren't ridiculed. I don't have some 'thing' for Fox. But Fox makes an easy target and it irritated me to see UPS playing such games."

Maybe if your beliefs weren't pants on heads retarded...

[Nephtys]

Stardock, championing progress.

I guess Sins of a Solar Empire was a 'values' manifesto, when they exiled psychic new-age same-sex couples to planet Crapulon-7 in the intro.

[Zixinus]

But UPS is boycotting the entire channel which annoyed me enough to ask my publishing director to look into whether it was true (it was) and have them look into Fed Ex which provided competitive pricing and make use of them for our uses.

So because of an annoyance, you switched suppliers?

Bullshit. People don't do that sort of thing just because they're annoyed. The guy is seriously backpedalling here.

But as a conservative, it is nice that there's one station where my values aren't ridiculed. I don't have some 'thing' for Fox.

You are a conservative, therefore, you masturbate to the very name of Faox News.

More seriously, notice that at first he distances himself from the thing and now he admits it.

[Zixinus]

Actually I just realised something.

There are probably a few people out there that considered buying any one of Stardock's games. But if they've heard of this, they'll sure as hell not. So, in essence, they're boycutting.

A boycut made because the company is boycatting another company for something that a employer (or am I reading it wrong and its employee?) did?

The irony is like a prism...

[fgalkin]

Oooh, I know!

Let's boycott Stardock!

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Thanas]

^Solidarity with Fox News?

[CaptHawkeye]

Whatever Stardock. Those assholes haven't made a good game since GalCiv II anyway. If they're going to unviel themselves as easily butt hurt conservative retards then fuck em. These are the same people who laugh at the "silliness" of protest and boycotts when them damned liberals is doin it.

[CaptHawkeye]

Aw man. Stardock sent me some survey a few days ago; if I'd known about this, I could've filled in their "Why aren't you using our shitty Steam-wannabe service?" questions with "Downright silly CEO".

The urge to troll their forums is rising; I'd previously noticed the massive piles of god-botherers there, but this probably explains it.

They're even rabid Trekkies too! Didn't you notice their detailed descriptions in the GalCiv games about the "superiority" of Warp Drive over Hyperdrive and Phasers over Blasters? The huge, elaborate tech menus all obviously worshiping Trek tech cliches and shit?

[Themightytom]

This is like hit and fade tactics. You take a stand on something and when someone challenges it you try to handwave your decision off as something else.

[Darth Wong]

A lot of people understandably took Wardell's decision to drop UPS as support for Beck and his political views, which didn't sit too well with Wardell either and prompted him to issue a statement clarifying that his reasons for boycotting UPS have nothing at to do with Beck himself.

"My Facebook comment was taken considerably out of context. I could care less about Glenn Beck or whether someone advertises on their show or not," he said. "But UPS is boycotting the entire channel which annoyed me enough to ask my publishing director to look into whether it was true (it was) and have them look into Fed Ex which provided competitive pricing and make use of them for our uses."

"Glenn Beck or whether someone advertises on their show"?
"I could care less"? (the correct phrase is "I couldn't care less")
"Make use of them for our uses"?

"Frankly, I wouldn't have cared if UPS had pulled their ads from Fox if they had done so quietly. But they didn't. They had to 'take a stance'," he explained further on his personal blog at JoeUser.com.

So says the guy who couldn't just quietly pull his business from UPS, but had to go public with his stance.

"I'm not a huge fan of FOX. But as a conservative, it is nice that there's one station where my values aren't ridiculed. I don't have some 'thing' for Fox. But Fox makes an easy target and it irritated me to see UPS playing such games."

So he's not a huge fan of FOX but FOX is the only news network (or "station" according to him) which doesn't "ridicule" his values? Precisely what values are those, that they would be "ridiculed" on every other network? His views must be extremely conservative if he feels they are being routinely "ridiculed" on CNN and MSNBC.

The guy sounds like a standard knuckle-dragger.

[Bluewolf]

Wow this is a rather pathetic thing if ever there was one and to announce it too, just wow. Then again as it has been mentioned, some CEO's can be total idiots.

[Darth Wong]

The urge to troll their forums is rising; I'd previously noticed the massive piles of god-botherers there, but this probably explains it.

They're even rabid Trekkies too! Didn't you notice their detailed descriptions in the GalCiv games about the "superiority" of Warp Drive over Hyperdrive and Phasers over Blasters? The huge, elaborate tech menus all obviously worshiping Trek tech cliches and shit?

Why are fanatical Trekkies so often fanatical conservatives as well? It's such a bizarre combination, since Star Trek promotes a future socialist utopia. It's almost as bizarre as people who worship a wealth-hating "give away your money" socialist like Jesus Christ also being materialistic money-grubbing hard-line right-wi ... oh.

[Bluewolf]

Personally Wong, I just don't think they put two and two together. I have had a Mormon free market advocate say to me they wanted a society like Star Trek. They probably think that the perfect world of Star Trek could never be anything like the ills of Socialism.

[Covenant]

Actually I just realised something.

There are probably a few people out there that considered buying any one of Stardock's games. But if they've heard of this, they'll sure as hell not. So, in essence, they're boycutting.

A boycut made because the company is boycatting another company for something that a employer (or am I reading it wrong and its employee?) did?

The irony is like a prism...

That would have been me. I get that weekly stardock Impulse Buy! thing and was considering getting one, with a little spare money I could afford to get some little cheapo games... but not now. Not throwing good money after bad, so to speak. Steam, on the other hand...

Really, Stardock sells meh games at alright prices, and their actual products are even more meh. It doesn't take much to push someone from being on the fence to passively opposed to buying Tropico through Stardock if they can do it through steam, and not support Fox supporters.

[Eleas]

"I'm not a huge fan of FOX. But as a conservative, it is nice that there's one station where my values aren't ridiculed.

I'm sorry, but this just leaped out at me. From a strictly facts-centered point of view, there's only "values" stance on which Fox has never ever been accused of budging, and that is self-serving falsehood. Everything else they represent is as negotiable as can be, but as the record shows, they'll fight for the right to lie on air and be proud of that fact.

I don't have some 'thing' for Fox. But Fox makes an easy target and it irritated me to see UPS playing such games."

If Fox is such an easy target, I feel I need to ask how it just happens to be the only channel Wardell can listen to without feeling mocked. Seems like a bit of an odd coincidence to me.

[Stark]

From a 'conservative' stance it doesn't even make sense. This is the free market in action; getting butthurt because a company doesn't like xyz is getting butthurt at capitalism. I don't give a shit that Wardell is a toolbar, but the fact that he describes himself as 'conservative' and then punishes a company for voting with it's wallet amuses me.

[Eleas]

From a 'conservative' stance it doesn't even make sense. This is the free market in action; getting butthurt because a company doesn't like xyz is getting butthurt at capitalism. I don't give a shit that Wardell is a toolbar, but the fact that he describes himself as 'conservative' and then punishes a company for voting with it's wallet amuses me.

Oh no, he described himself perfectly well. He's not a conservative in the sense of actual, meaningful definition. He's a Conservative, as in a person who subscribes to a particular WASP/evangelical school of thought and so stands, as often as not, fiercely at odds with reality.

Really, you can always tell these clowns by simply checking if what they say actually supports their claims.

[Stark]

It's just sad that it's similar to other 'conservative' American ideas. I mean, in business, if someone stops working with someone else due to economc reasons (ESPECIALLY in marketing, which Wardell apparently can't separate from politics), I'd expect cost/benefit analyses, target and outcome examination, etc, and for people to try to change to recover the lost business. Indeed, I'd be surprised if a negotiation between UPS and Fox didn't take place.

And not some free-market capitalist to say OMG U CUNT HOW DARE YOU DO SOMETHING I DON'T LIKE FOR SOUND BUSINESS REASONS.

[Nephtys]

Steam are supporters of UPS, and therefore the leftist marxist obamagenda. Their superior products obviously have nothing to do with me preferring them. Oh no, it's political statements. You know, Valve's main game is about an man with a DOCTORATE fighting against THE MAN. This means clearly they support ivory tower intellectuals in revolt.

I mean. Well, what is Glenn Beck exactly selling? His loudmouthed opinion. UPS goes 'Your product sucks, screw you. We're not buying more ads, that's a waste of our money'. Sounds like sound capitalism to me.

[The Yosemite Bear]

for some reason I've decieded to boycot stardock, even though I liked GCiv, and Sins...