No. As Telika says, what you say goes both ways. It seems we have some level of confusion on the part of those on the list: some that are signed up think it was supposed to be a boycott focused on a small number of specific issues and some seem to think it was intended to be a catch-all list for anyone who is boycotting, for any reason.

We have no way of knowing what the relative numbers of those are, which of those two cases represents the majority. Furthermore, I have no way of directly contacting those who have signed up, except through this forum thread. So, the only practical way I can sort this out is to hold a vote in this thread, to gauge what the majority of the group wants to do.

Whichever way it ends up going, there is going to be a segment of the list that wanted it to go the other way and who may have signed up under the wrong impression. Those people are going to have to make a choice and they can be removed from the list, if they request it.

Imo, it's the fairest way it can be done.

GOG has shown they have little care for DRM-Free, but rather in giving nebulous definitions and vague platitudes, and justifying it by informing people what DRM they're including on the service. It's the confirmation of the biggest step of eroding DRM-Free. We've danced this dance before with the other core values, and I have no intention on fighting an obstinate GOG that is intent on destroying their one remaining redeeming factor. I will still be around the forum, but much less frequently than before. Feel free to PM me if you wish to talk, I will respond within a few days.

Ultimately, though I think I'm checking out of this toxic community and this game store intent on shooting itself in the foot. Most of you won't care, but there it is.

Seconded. As their latest update on their DRM free values goes it's a bunch of hot air platitude but no real action.
Choice, but not a responsibility of the company.
As an example

"We believe you should have freedom of choice and the right to decide how you use, enjoy, and keep the games you bought. It manifests in three points"; but do you GOG?

1. The single-player mode has to be accessible offline.
That's easy games like Starcraft 2 can just cut out single player content (like it's AI skirmish mode) if it seemingly detracts from a core focus of always online esports.

2. Games you bought and downloaded can never be taken from you or altered against your will.
It happened to another country but without having to search it up lets go with the current russia policies going on; with an online drm component (such as galaxy) epic has been able to cut off an entire country from their games.
With that one single point of failure (the matchmaking component) in company hands it means even with offline downloads the fact a small part is 'held' out of your reach or influence your software can and will be able to be taken from you or the experience altered against your will.

3. The GOG GALAXY client is and will remain optional for accessing single-player offline mode.
Wow your saying games that by the will of design don't use multiplayer for the purpose of drm will continue realizing the futility of trying to force DRM on stuff they've elected not to have control over (by not having it phone home through a matchmaking server). I'm sure that will continue to make a huge difference like if you have anything to do with it GOG.

I just love how they say a lot of us have views on what DRM free is and then immediately state they recognize the industry is deliberately integrating it into online components; but don't take a stance against such integration.
Yeah GOG your niche community feels stuff about that ya fuckin douche's; it's bad and you need a less airy hands off approach about it.

As long as you keep proof of purchase, you still have a licence to keep/copy the installers. GOG cannot legally withdraw that without offering compensation, under most jurisdictions.

As to what should happen with this boycott - I would firmly vote option A to keep it focused on the most important issue of encroaching DRM. I for one agree with GOG's refusal to accept further orders from Russia/Belarus (I have more sympathy for Belarussians who made a valiant attempt to remove Lukashenko which would likely have succeeded without Russian intervention, compared to the 50-66% of Russians who apparently support Putin and believe his propaganda machine - Russian cosmonauts have displayed excellent dress sense though) so would probably ask to be removed from the list if option B was chosen.

Here is a quick update on the voting, as it stands:

A 6

B 5

We have had several votes for A in the past couple of days and A is now narrowly in the lead. As I said before, Wednesday 23rd will be 2 weeks since the vote was announced and I will declare the result then.
The voting is razor-thin and could easily go either way - if anyone else who is on the boycott list is still yet to have a say about the future of the thread, the time to do so is now!

As a reminder, these are the two options:

A) This thread should stay focused on the two issues that it was originally set up to highlight, which are DRM and censorship of games on GOG.com. The thread title should also be changed to clarify.

B) This thread should be a 'catch-all' list of people who want to boycott GOG for any reason. It is therefore intended to be 'the boycott thread', where anyone who wants to boycott GOG for any reason should sign up.

Thank you for this update and for wording it in a neutral tone. I know I have criticized previous posts of yours but this one is awesome and I commend you for it!

If I expressed a boycott opinion that resides in B before this debacle, and I did not get notified or could not express it, and I find later that I have been shoved into a category I did not support, it would be fraudulent. This is because this would not be the reason I would boycott GOG and it is false information contrary to the original intent that I would wish to express to GOG.

Those in A category are those informed of your opinion, and voted alongside your opinion.

If A passes, B is phased out. If B passes, A still resides because the petition has broadened.

Simply put. If A passes, and all 113 signatories have not be clarified, it becomes border fradulent.

Thanks rjbuffchix, I appreciate that!

Tbh, whichever way it goes, it's a shame the voting has been so low and it would be a shame to see the future of the thread decided by a margin of 1 or 2 votes, where <10% of posters have voted. I don't know if people aren't seeing it, or many who have signed up aren't around any more, or people just don't care ... ?

In the possible event of a tie, I will probably extend by another week in the hope that we get some deciding votes.

Me vote the A

B then. If this was limited to DRM it should have been put into the title "Boycotting GOG 2021-22".
Your own listed reasons for boycotting GOG is partly political, i.e. Devotion, and why should one political motive be worth more than others, especially that of equating an entire population with evil.

Sorry, but I have made it clear that I will only be taking votes from those who were signed up on the (full boycott) list prior to the vote being called. The purpose of the vote is to gauge what impression existing signers were under when they signed up on the list, as to its purpose.

splitting a boycott is futile.
People who picket will picket and there's nothing you can do about it.
One thread, two; five.
The end result is going to be that each of them has less time it spends being in the limelight causing people to notice it thus harming the boycott.

If you want to expand the number of threads; expand it to different visibility platforms like reddit.

That's an idea.

sorry i meant causing people to not notice it.

How visible a boycott is; ends up being a force multiplier to it's effectiveness.

For example while GOG surely doesn't give a toss about my money having already purchased everything decent of it's catalogue; my impact in sending a new user back to steam represents a massive ongoing loss in revenue and can affect more than one new user.

So keep up the pressure *thumbs up.

Ok, so I said I would call the result of the voting last night, but I'll do it this morning instead. Here are the results:

A 7

B 6

So, option A seems to have won, by the thinnest possible margin. Thanks to everyone who voted, although I don't feel good about the very thin margin, or the low number of votes overall. If I thought we might get a significant number of additional votes, I would propose to extend the voting. But, I doubt that is going to happen, so it is what it is.

So, option A wins. This boycott thread is for the specific issues of DRM and game censorship on GOG. I will request that the thread title be changed to clarify and will edit the first post to make that clear.

If anyone was under a different impression about the nature of the thread, I will be happy to remove them from the list. However, for those that care about opposing the censorship of games and the steady encroachment of DRM on GOG.com: this is the list for you.

Of course, those who want to boycott over other reasons are welcome (as far as I'm concerned) to start their own separate threads for those reasons. The intention of this thread was never to prevent that, but this thread will remain as it had been intended from the beginning, which is to focus on and highlight the two issues stated above.

(also, to be clear: I received a couple of votes via PMs, in case anyone comments that the votes don't add up. Although, I believe they were both for B, so I don't think it it changes anything)

The situation on GOG is very complex, with different users annoyed about many different things and in some cases taking opposite sited on the same issue. I don't see it as 'splitting the boycott', because there is no single boycott.
The GOG community is split in the first place and it makes sense for the boycott structure to reflect that. People seem to want to protest over a range of different reasons, and imo it is important that we make it clear which protest this is and what it is about.

I'm not trying to prevent anyone from protesting about an issue they care about. Anyone is welcome to start a new boycott thread and gather names for a different issue - I'm not stopping them.

Again, there is no 'the boycott', as far as I see it. That oversimplifies the situation. I see no reason why separate boycott threads shouldn't be viable - if they get enough people signing up then they will have visibility, people will link to them from other threads.

I don't use Reddit and I have no interest in the platform. You want to go post on Reddit about boycotting GOG - go ahead, I'm not going to stop you.