Recently, many people have been upset by the direction some video games have been taking in regard to certain ideas like loot boxes. One proposed solution is to boycott the offending games. However, there is a fundamental problem with boycotting that makes this very difficult to pull off.
Participating in a boycott is generally not worth it to an individual. A good way to observe this is to use marginal analysis. The marginal cost of participating in a boycott is pretty easy to identify, since it’s simply being unable to purchase and play the game targeted by the boycott. However, identifying the marginal benefit is a bit more complicated.
One way to think of the marginal benefit is to assume that there is a single threshold at which it becomes more profitable for the game developer to give in to the boycott than to continue on with whatever activity is being boycotted. Below this threshold, the revenue lost to the boycotters is less than that gained by continuing the boycotted activity. At and above this threshold, continuing the activity will cost the firm more than it earns them. Thus, the firm will cease the activity if and only if the boycott meets the threshold.