crosspost from: https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/43675346

Alt text

The “Bro visited his friend” meme template. In panel one, a character says “hi GOG any new deals tod-” and another character, labeled with the GOG.com logo, replies with the screenshot of a mail header titled “Slavic adventures 𖥞 ꥟ ϟϟ”. In the second panel, the first character looks at the second one with a worried look on their face.

    • gnufuu@infosec.pubEnglish
      191·
      8 days ago

      Oh wow, that GOG representative trying to justify it makes even worse:

      spoiler

      I want to briefly address the discussion as a GOG representative. The Sowilo rune is part of my cultural and historical heritage. As a Pole, I am fully aware of both its history and the sensitivities surrounding it. Its use in this promotion was intended solely as a reference to the sun, which is central to the game being promoted.

      What was displayed in several devices as doppelrune is out of our control. ᛋ was displayed as ϟ on several devices. We should pay more attention to checking it on a different systems and devices. I also recognize that placing two such runes next to each other could create an unfortunate association with symbols used by the Nazi regime. This was noticed before distribution, and out of respect for local sensitivities, the material was not sent to the German community.

      At the same time, I do not believe that symbols with a history spanning more than a thousand years should be defined solely by their misuse in the modern history. Allowing that would mean accepting that those who corrupted these symbols now own their meaning.

      As a Pole, I have every reason to treat this history with seriousness and respect. Precisely because of that, I reject any suggestion that this promotion carried an extremist message. It did not. It was a reference to the historical symbol of the sun, nothing more.

      That is some weapons-grade apologetic bs. Thanks for the heads-up OP

      • unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
        22·
        8 days ago

        This was noticed before distribution, and out of respect for local sensitivities, the material was not sent to the German community.

        LMAOOOOO well thats a fucking insane thing to admit that casually
        So they notice that it totally, unmistakably looks like an SS symbol and then they just send it out anyways

        They couldve just said “It was an automated thing” or “It was AI generated” or whatever but no, they say “we knew and we didnt give a fuck”

        At least honest i guess?

      • ajikeshi@lemmy.worldEnglish
        32·
        8 days ago

        german here… i too received that exact email… so sadly the rep is talking out of his ass

        • Štěpán@lemmy.cafeEnglish
          2·
          8 days ago

          @[email protected] commented GOG’s response claiming the symbols just displayed like that on some devices. Like it’s just some bug in how they are rendered, which sounds like bullshit… When you have time, could you please try to copy them from the email and paste to some web unicode explorer or something to be sure it really is that symbol used in the email?

          • ajikeshi@lemmy.worldEnglish
            62·
            8 days ago

            that is the result for the unicode symbols from the mail topic “Slavic adventure 𖥞 ꥟ ϟϟ”

            U+03DF ϟ GREEK SMALL LETTER KOPPA

            U+1695E 𖥞 BAMUM LETTER PHASE-D MVOP

            U+A95F ꥟ REJANG SECTION MARK

            imo the problematic part is not the existance of each individual symbol in the mail… the problem is the combination of all of em together

            • Štěpán@lemmy.cafeEnglish
              1·
              6 days ago

              Thanks, that confirms the claim about the symbols just displaying incorrectly being an utter bullshit.

              I agree the existence of the symbols is not an issue by itself. We even have 卐 in unicode.

              Removing those symbols would be problematic, because fascist were always so unoriginal they stole most of the symbolism from different cultures.

      • Štěpán@lemmy.cafeEnglish
        11·
        8 days ago

        I wonder how realistic the one rune being displayed as the other on several devices is. Like, they are both unicode, and the screenshots seem to be from regular web browsers which should be pretty good at displaying it. It sounds like bullshit honestly…

        • Dultas@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          8 days ago

          Might depend on the default font the device uses? That’s the only thing that would impact it to my knowledge.

    • Kilgore Trout@feddit.itEnglish
      4·
      7 days ago

      They omitted the symbols from the German-language newsletter. German users using English still received it.