Quote Originally Posted by Frankie_Says_Relax View Post
Really?

Even with the run-on sentences I can understand his position, and the core of it reflects what I'm trying to get across - that a lot of core gamers feel that major companies deserve some type of punishment/retribution for the mistakes/sins/what-have-you that they've levied on us over the past several console generations.

That instead of diagnosing the symptoms of the problem and fixing the cause, clear-cutting the forest and burning the stumps will be a more effective way for gamers to get what they want (in this case through the dissolving of rights/ownership of IP's apparently, but honestly most times I think it's just to watch them burn and feel some sense of hate-filled personal vengeance satisfied.)

I know you don't think it's a good idea to call for a boycott and I know that you don't think that it will do any legitimate damage, but are we at least somewhere in the same universe in acknowledging that this kind of sentiment has grown amongst "core" gamers over the past 10 years?

I mean, as a point of fact in this thread alone several people in this very community have thrown in those exact two cents.
I think people post all sorts of things I disagree with all over the Internet everyday. I have never disputed that people have made the very posts you have complained about in this thread and will continue to post those and similar things until the day the Internet is shut down and replaced with some other form of mass communication. The argument made by the OP in this thread is about whether or not "hardcore" gamers are ruining the industry and by extension, although primarily through your contributions to the thread, whether the negative things some of them post are harming or damaging to the industry. I have taken the position that they are not ruining the industry because there is no evidence that the industry pays attention to them or that a single company or game has been harmed simply because someone posted on a forum or news site somewhere that a company should be boycotted or destroyed.

Since you seem unable to present any evidence to support your point, let me present some to support mine. I have seen many, many calls to boycott Capcom over the past five years from people complaining about the company releasing too many sequels and minor updates to its fighting games, as well as doing things such as having the DLC already on disc and charging for it. Despite that fact, Capcom had it's best year ever financially in FY 2011. Their numbers were off slightly in FY 2012, but they are again on track for a record FY 2013. Wouldn't you agree that if all this puffery had any impact that their sales and profits would have fallen each year rather than going up and down?

EA itself has followed a similar revenue pattern to Capcom wherein it had positive net revenue in Q4 FY2012 and Q1 FY2013, but losses prior to that and after that period. Don't you think sales and revenue would have continued to fall over time if the negative things being posted by some people on the Internet had any impact?

Ultimately, your position is just one of speculation and opinion which lacks any evidence to back it up. As such, I stand by my position that you are more concerned about wanting to restrain speech you don't agree with rather than acting out of concern for any actual damage said speech could be causing.