Sources: Activision CEO failed to inform the board about allegations an employee had been raped by her supervisor in 2016 and 2017, even after a settlement
new accusations reveal it's much, much worse Kellen Browning / New York Times : A group of Activision workers say their C.E.O. should step down. Imogen Beckhelling / Rock, Paper, Shotgun : Activision Blizzard employees stage walkout, demand CEO's removal Chris Wallace / MCV/DEVELOP : Activision Blizzard employees stage walkout, calling for the removal of Bobby Kotick as CEO Shubhankar Parijat / GamingBolt : Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick Protected Abusers, Made Death Threat Against Employee, New Report Claims Evann Gastaldo / Newser : Activision Blizzard Employees Walk Out After Damning Report Alex Calvin / PC Games Insider : Report: Kotick knew about sexual misconduct at Activision Blizzard Kyle Orland / Ars Technica : After bombshell report, Activision employees walk out, demand CEO resign NBC News : Activision Blizzard employees walk out amid report CEO knew of rape allegation Bloomberg : Activision's CEO Is Embattled by Staff and Investors Samantha Subin / CNBC : Activision Blizzard shares drop after report CEO allegedly knew about sexual misconduct Tweets: @abetterabk : We have instituted our own Zero Tolerance Policy. We will not be silenced until Bobby Kotick has been replaced as CEO, and continue to hold our original demand for Third-Party review by an employee-chosen source. We are staging a Walkout today. We welcome you to join us. Ben Fritz / @benfritz : Two colleagues and I spent months reporting on allegations of sexual misconduct at Activision and what CEO Bobby Kotick knew and did about them. I hope you'll read the story we just published. I'll also thread key findings... https://www.wsj.com/... Jason Schreier / @jasonschreier : BREAKING: Activision Blizzard employees say they're launching a walkout today in the wake of the Wall Street Journal article detailing CEO Bobby Kotick's knowledge of sexual misconduct and harassment at the company. They're demanding that Kotick be replaced Ben Fritz / @benfritz : In August, Activision named Jen ONeal the first female co-head of World of Warcraft studio Blizzard. The next month, she sent an internal email criticizing the company's top management and recounting her own experiences of harassment. https://twitter.com/... Alyssa Sweetman / @alykkat : This is gaslighting right? “anyone who doubts my conviction to be the most welcoming, inclusive workplace doesn't really appreciate how important this is to me.” https://www.activisionblizzard.com/ ... Ben Fritz / @benfritz : Bobby Kotick has himself been accused of mistreating women who worked for him, including telling a former assistant in a voicemail that he would have her killed. https://twitter.com/... @abetterabk : This is unacceptable; we are more than a revenue machine. We are people, and it is clear that Bobby Kotick is not conducive to the health and safety of any human element. https://investor.activision.com/ ... Jason Schreier / @jasonschreier : Bobby Kotick is doubling down. In a video to employees this morning, passed along to me, he attacked the WSJ article and defended Activision. “Anyone who doubts my conviction to be the most welcoming and inclusive workplace doesn't really appreciate how important this is to me.” Kirsten Grind / @kirstengrind : Activision CEO Bobby Kotick told an employee he would have her killed. He kept an exec from being fired after a sexual harassment claim. He didn't tell his board of alleged rapes and other misconduct. Our @WSJ investigation @benfritz @saraheneedleman : https://www.wsj.com/... Ben Fritz / @benfritz : Polygon, one of the top gamer websites, calls for Bobby Kotick to resign as CEO of Activision Blizzard after our report on what he knew about allegations of sexual misconduct at the company. https://www.polygon.com/... Ryan K. Rigney / @rkrigney : For those without a WSJ subscription, Bobby Kotick lied to everyone, including his own board of directors, about how much he knew about rape allegations against employees Source: https://www.wsj.com/... https://twitter.com/... Patrick Klepek / @patrickklepek : Polygon explicitly calling for Kotick to resign. The role of a good press is beyond providing raw information, it's context and guidance. This is a really important moment in games media, I think, and it's (correctly) the top story on Polygon. https://www.polygon.com/... Nic / @tetraninja : It's increasing difficult to be a misogynist pig in any industry. As it should. #actiblizzwalkout https://twitter.com/... Paul Scott Canavan / @abigbat : Fuck. Awful stuff here - sending love to Blizzard friends. CW for sexual assault. https://twitter.com/... Ben Fritz / @benfritz : After the co-head of Activision's Treyarch studio was accused of sexual harassment, HR recommended he be fired, but Bobby Kotick intervened to keep him. https://twitter.com/... Stephen Totilo / @stephentotilo : “The Board remains confident in Bobby Kotick's leadership, commitment and ability to achieve these goals."" https://investor.activision.com/ ... John Walker / @botherer : What fetid depth of horror must lie within the Activision Blizzard board of directors, that this is their response to the WSJ article reporting that Kotick lied about, covered up, and joined in with his company's harassment culture? https://investor.activision.com/ ... Brianna Wu / @briannawu : Here's @Activision's board, in a new statement. “[We] remain confident Bobby Kotick appropriately addressed workplace issues brought to his attention.” Those issues involve Kotick personally threatening to murder women. The whole company is rotten. https://investor.activision.com/ ... https://twitter.com/... Mikki Kendall / @karnythia : How Activision hasn't been sued out of existence continues to astonish me https://twitter.com/... Jeff Hamilton / @jeffahamilton : Please read the thread and the article. Kotick should resign if this reporting is all accurate, and I believe them when they say it is. https://twitter.com/... Ben Prunty / @benprunty : Solidarity with ABK Workers Alliance https://twitter.com/... @abetterubisoft : Solidarity forever with our colleagues at @ABetterABK ✊ https://twitter.com/...Avani Jain / @avvjain : I will be participating in the walkout today and call for Bobby's resignation https://twitter.com/... Fazuh Sam / @sammuelvv : Solidarity with all the devs who have been blindsided by this shitty company 💙 https://twitter.com/... Ryan Brown / @toadsanime : Activision-Blizzard employees are staging a walkout today, demanding the resignation of CEO Bobby Kotick following WSJ's damning report: https://twitter.com/...
Related coverage shows the issue did not remain confined to employee protest. Regulators later [[a:976123|widened their examination of the CEO and board's handling of workplace-misconduct allegations]], and Activision Blizzard subsequently reported dismissals, departures, and discipline tied to the broader allegations.
First-order effects
Activision Blizzard employees escalate pressure on Kotick and the board through a walkout and a direct demand for a CEO change, while the board's stated confidence makes the leadership conflict explicit.
The report immediately raises investor-facing governance risk for Activision Blizzard; related coverage records a drop in the company's shares after the allegations became public.
Second-order effects
The disclosure allegations give the existing SEC inquiry a sharper focus on what senior leadership and directors knew, a pattern later reflected in broader federal and state regulatory scrutiny.
For Activision Blizzard's board, workplace-misconduct handling becomes a test of disclosure controls and director oversight rather than solely an internal human-resources matter.
If regulators continue treating alleged failures to escalate misconduct as governance conduct, public-game-company boards will face stronger pressure to document how such allegations reach directors and investors.
The trend: Workplace-misconduct allegations are increasingly becoming corporate-governance and disclosure issues, drawing employees, investors, boards, and regulators into the same conflict.
Activision Blizzard Employees Are Staging A Walkout Following Allegations CEO Bobby Kotick Hid Sexual Misconduct And Threatened To Have An Employee Killed
We have instituted our own Zero Tolerance Policy. We will not be silenced until Bobby Kotick has been replaced as CEO, and continue to hold our original demand for Third-Party review by an employee-chosen source. We are staging a Walkout today. We welcome you to join us.
Two colleagues and I spent months reporting on allegations of sexual misconduct at Activision and what CEO Bobby Kotick knew and did about them. I hope you'll read the story we just published. I'll also thread key findings... https://www.wsj.com/...
BREAKING: Activision Blizzard employees say they're launching a walkout today in the wake of the Wall Street Journal article detailing CEO Bobby Kotick's knowledge of sexual misconduct and harassment at the company. They're demanding that Kotick be replaced
In August, Activision named Jen ONeal the first female co-head of World of Warcraft studio Blizzard. The next month, she sent an internal email criticizing the company's top management and recounting her own experiences of harassment. https://twitter.com/...
This is gaslighting right? “anyone who doubts my conviction to be the most welcoming, inclusive workplace doesn't really appreciate how important this is to me.” https://www.activisionblizzard.com/ ...
Bobby Kotick is doubling down. In a video to employees this morning, passed along to me, he attacked the WSJ article and defended Activision. “Anyone who doubts my conviction to be the most welcoming and inclusive workplace doesn't really appreciate how important this is to me.”
Activision CEO Bobby Kotick told an employee he would have her killed. He kept an exec from being fired after a sexual harassment claim. He didn't tell his board of alleged rapes and other misconduct. Our @WSJ investigation @benfritz @saraheneedleman : https://www.wsj.com/...
Bobby Kotick has himself been accused of mistreating women who worked for him, including telling a former assistant in a voicemail that he would have her killed. https://twitter.com/...
This is unacceptable; we are more than a revenue machine. We are people, and it is clear that Bobby Kotick is not conducive to the health and safety of any human element. https://investor.activision.com/ ...
Polygon explicitly calling for Kotick to resign. The role of a good press is beyond providing raw information, it's context and guidance. This is a really important moment in games media, I think, and it's (correctly) the top story on Polygon. https://www.polygon.com/...
Polygon, one of the top gamer websites, calls for Bobby Kotick to resign as CEO of Activision Blizzard after our report on what he knew about allegations of sexual misconduct at the company. https://www.polygon.com/...
What fetid depth of horror must lie within the Activision Blizzard board of directors, that this is their response to the WSJ article reporting that Kotick lied about, covered up, and joined in with his company's harassment culture? https://investor.activision.com/ ...
For those without a WSJ subscription, Bobby Kotick lied to everyone, including his own board of directors, about how much he knew about rape allegations against employees Source: https://www.wsj.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Here's @Activision's board, in a new statement. “[We] remain confident Bobby Kotick appropriately addressed workplace issues brought to his attention.” Those issues involve Kotick personally threatening to murder women. The whole company is rotten. https://investor.activision.com…
After the co-head of Activision's Treyarch studio was accused of sexual harassment, HR recommended he be fired, but Bobby Kotick intervened to keep him. https://twitter.com/...
Please read the thread and the article. Kotick should resign if this reporting is all accurate, and I believe them when they say it is. https://twitter.com/...
Activision Blizzard workers say they're walking out following WSJ's massive report — they're calling for Bobby Kotick's resignation https://twitter.com/...
Activision-Blizzard employees are staging a walkout today, demanding the resignation of CEO Bobby Kotick following WSJ's damning report: https://twitter.com/...
Activision employees are staging a walkout & demanding Bobby Kotick step down as CEO following a @WSJ investigation into sexual assault, harassment, pay disparities & other misconduct at the company. https://www.wsj.com/... https://twitter.com/...
I realize it's a process, but Kotick has got to go. Let him have his payout, fine, but the industry will be vastly better off without him at the top. This statement from him is gag-inducing. https://www.activisionblizzard.com/ ...
Bobby Kotick to ABK workers: “In fact, there's an article today that paints an inaccurate and misleading view of our company, of me personally, and my leadership.” Wow. https://www.activisionblizzard.com/ ...
kotick's response to the wsj article feels like a flashback to activision blizzard's initial response to... everything https://www.activisionblizzard.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
The company posted a transcript of Kotick's video remarks to employees this morning following the publication of the WSJ piece. https://www.activisionblizzard.com/ ...
The WSJ report also details multiple men at Activision studios who were accused of sexual harassment or assault, or both. In many cases, no charges were brought. In the case of Treyarch's co-head, Dan Bunting, Kotick allegedly intervened to keep him.
“I have been tokenized, marginalized, and discriminated against,” Jen Oneal wrote. She is queer and Asian American. In the same email, she also described attending a 2007 Activision party with CEO Bobby Kotick and strippers. Activision says Kotick doesn't remember attending.
Kotick told his board of directors that cultural issues mentioned in the California state agency lawsuit happened at Blizzard Entertainment and had been resolved years ago, sources told WSJ.
Jen Oneal, who had been Blizzard's female co-leader alongside Mike Ybarra, stepped down earlier this month, to employee confusion. In a September email, Oneal said she had been sexually harassed early on at Activision, was getting paid less than Ybarra and wanted to quit.
What should happen next is that Bobby Kotick immediately resigns, but there's a long track record of rich, entitled men hanging on until they are literally forced out the door. https://twitter.com/...
Kotick should immediately resign. He will not voluntarily. That said, with Allen Brack already out, there are fewer heads to offer to appease shareholders. Kotick may finally be pushed out. But: never put it past shareholders to simply wait out the storm if finances stabilize htt…
Appalled. I had hoped there was something good in the commitments he made in the letter to employees, but this report of what went before is hugely disheartening and, unfortunately, feels typical for the industry. https://twitter.com/...
Bobby Kotick, CEO of one of the world's top video game companies, said he knew little of sexual misconduct at his company. The documents say otherwise. Great reporting from @KirstenGrind @benfritz @saraheneedleman https://www.wsj.com/...
We've looked at dozens of internal documents and spoken to many, many people over these months. A story like this isn't possible without incredible sources. We can't thank you enough for your bravery.
Last year, about 30 women who worked in Activision's esports division sent a letter to their supervisors saying female employees had experienced numerous instances of harassment. https://twitter.com/...
“Over the years, Mr. Kotick himself has been accused by several women of mistreatment both inside and outside the workplace, and in some instances has worked to settle the complaints quickly and quietly, according to people familiar with the incidents and documents”
Employees pointed to two reasons for the misconduct at Activision: Workplace drinking and a culture in which game studios long operated with little interference in their operations, including HR, in the belief it would help them make hits. https://twitter.com/...
A woman who worked at Call of Duty studio Sledgehammer said she was raped twice by her supervisor after she was pressured to drink heavily. She reported the incidents to HR, but the company took no action. https://twitter.com/...
Soon after being appointed to co-head one of Activision's most successful units, Blizzard, longtime exec Jen Oneal sent a scathing internal email, saying she didn't think leadership could fix the culture problems. She said she had been sexually harassed and wanted to resign.
Under Kotick, Activision's game studios were allowed to operate on their own, creating cultures that a spokeswoman told us led to some employees conducting themselves in “truly regrettable ways.” Employees were told to keep quiet, even as execs sent out laudatory farewell notes.
Since CA filed suit against Activision Blizzard in July, the company has received more than 500 internal reports of sexual harassment, assault and other issues. It's been facing an EEOC investigation and a new SEC investigation, as we reported https://www.wsj.com/...
Bombshell story from the Wall Street Journal this morning that lays out how much CEO Bobby Kotick knew about sexual harassment and misconduct at Activision Blizzard https://www.wsj.com/... https://twitter.com/...
In response to an explosive story reporting that Activision Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick knew about various sexual misconduct and harassment allegations and was himself a perpetrator, and an employee walkout today demanding Kotick's resignation, the board says it is standing by him …
Now is a reminder of the incredible power that membership in the Executive 1% Club affords, a life without accountability, ethics, or any need to demonstrate merit to remain successful. When the only people who can take you to task are just as vapid as you are, nothing changes. h…
Did I read correctly that in response to recent allegations Bobby Kotick said people don't “appreciate” his commitment to creating welcoming conditions enough and subsequently refereed to misconduct whistle-blowing as “an uncomfortable spotlight”? https://www.activisionblizzard.c…
We are committed to making this company welcoming to all, which includes Bobby Kotick. Our door is always open - please close it when you leave https://twitter.com/...
Following a Wall Street Journal report detailing CEO Bobby Kotick's knowledge of sexual misconduct allegations at Activision Blizzard, employees are staging a walkout demanding that Kotick resign or be replaced. https://www.ign.com/... https://twitter.com/...
The man literally threatened to murder employees, and they're still going to defend him? If you weren't already boycotting all Activision-Blizzard products, you all better start doing so now. https://twitter.com/...
Activision's Bobby Kotick: That article is totally inaccurate and misleading. Also we are changing our policies to fix the problems exposed in that article. https://www.activisionblizzard.com/ ...
in case anyone is curious which human beings are “confident in Bobby Kotick's leadership”, here is a list of the ATVI Board of Directors https://www.activisionblizzard.com/ ... https://twitter.com/...
The Wall Street Journal has responded to Activision Blizzard's characterization of their report as “misleading.” “Nothing in Activision Blizzard's statement challenges the facts in our reporting.” https://www.washingtonpost.com/ ...
Is “The EEOC & threat of class action lawsuits are forcing our hands after years of highly publicized misconduct” the same as industry leading? Because... https://twitter.com/...
Overwatch was the love of my life for five amazing years. But I didn't know that something so meaningful to myself & others was built on a foundation of abuse & assault. I will always cherish the friends I've made & look fondly on OW's role in my career, but it's time to move on.…