World of Warcraft Developers Form Blizzard's Largest and Most Inclusive Union (theverge.com) 37
Ash Parrish reports via The Verge: More than 500 developers at Blizzard Entertainment who work on World of Warcraft have voted to form a union. The World of Warcraft GameMakers Guild, formed with the assistance of the Communication Workers of America (CWA), is composed of employees across every department, including designers, engineers, artists, producers, and more. Together, they have formed the largest wall-to-wall union -- or a union inclusive of multiple departments and disciplines -- at Microsoft. This news comes less than a week after the formation of the Bethesda Game Studios union, which, at the time of the announcement, was itself the largest wall-to-wall Microsoft union. [...]
The World of Warcraft GameMakers Guild is made up of over 500 members across Blizzard offices in California and Massachusetts. Despite its size -- it is the second largest union at Microsoft overall behind Activision's 600-member QA union -- [Paul Cox, senior quest designer and Blizzard veteran] said that Microsoft's labor neutrality agreement helped get the organization ball rolling. In a statement to The Verge, Microsoft spokesperson Delaney Simmons said, "We continue to support our employees' right to choose how they are represented in the workplace, and we will engage in good faith negotiations with the CWA as we work towards a collective bargaining agreement."
The World of Warcraft GameMakers Guild is made up of over 500 members across Blizzard offices in California and Massachusetts. Despite its size -- it is the second largest union at Microsoft overall behind Activision's 600-member QA union -- [Paul Cox, senior quest designer and Blizzard veteran] said that Microsoft's labor neutrality agreement helped get the organization ball rolling. In a statement to The Verge, Microsoft spokesperson Delaney Simmons said, "We continue to support our employees' right to choose how they are represented in the workplace, and we will engage in good faith negotiations with the CWA as we work towards a collective bargaining agreement."
Re:Congratulations (Score:4, Funny)
What a waste of a fp. Not funny; not insightful; not even practical. Sigh.
What else would you expect from such a low-id account?
Re: (Score:3)
What a great use of a first post. Funny, insightful, and practical.
Exactly what you'd expect from a low-id account.
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Pretty obvious why that probably won't happen here right?
Good idea to center the union around the entire game team rather than a type of employee.
They claim "well over 50%" union vote in every department so that speaks to the issue itself, out we out here thinking hundreds of people form a union just out of spite or greed rather than the workplace conditions? Like knowing what we know about Valve do we ever expect a union to form there?
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I'd work there 5 years to get a "Sword of 1000 Sharts"
Re: Congratulations (Score:3)
Are Unions the WoW Killer? (Score:3, Informative)
Sad, but true. Until we get a government for the working class, we will continue to see bad actors destroying lives. To be clear, the bad actors are the corporations, and the lives they destroy are everyone who has enjoyed the product or worked on the product.
lol troll (Score:1, Troll)
TFG, Cult 45, wants to be a dictator starting on day one.
Trump has repeatedly praised foreign dictators and has been consistently buddy-buddy with them. He gushes like a schoolgirl when he gets a letter from one of them.
Trump was well-known for his racism and lies before he even ran for president, and those things endeared him to the people who would become his base. That is, indeed, deplorable.
I'm *very* white collar (Score:4, Informative)
I set my own hours, have wide latitude on how I get my work done, and kinda get to pick what I work on.
There's some ways to go past that to total creative and business control of an organization, but there's a lot farther to go the other way to specified hours, specified tasks, and specified methods to perform those tasks.
But the point is that there *is* a continuum. I get interchangeable cogs unionizing, cause all they got if they don't something is collective bargaining. But what about the engineers ans the artists and the everyone in between in a place like that? How's a union that's about solidarity going to unify people with drastically different job responsibilities and working styles?
Unless of course the only thing that unifies them is they hate their boss's guts. In which case, I would have quit or transferred long before...
Re:I'm *very* white collar (Score:4, Insightful)
People always say this until they get replaced by someone working for $5/hour overseas. Then they realize that H-1Bs are not a good thing, especially when their IT department is completely offshored, their tickets are just closed without anyone looking at them, and their environment always becomes more and more hostile, not just returning to work, but having to deal with $50/day parking fees, as the place has no parking (the lot they had was sold off), too many people, too few desks and chars, no paper towels, coffee, or TP, and other low quality of life stuff.
Just because it happens to Bob down the hall doesn't mean it will not happen to you. Pretty much anyone reading this, who isn't working for themselves or a C-level likely has a boss thinking they can be replaced by ChatGPT or "Peggy" from Lower Elbonia.
Re: I'm *very* white collar (Score:1)
Re: I'm *very* white collar (Score:3)
My unscientific sample of one guy who's been in a white collar union shop (Boeing Seattle) says the union politics and seniority system chokes off opportunities for organic career growth. Which is why he now works where I work.
Hence my question: how do you have a "wall-to-wall" union without taking your workplace politics and codifying it into a contract?
Re: I'm *very* white collar (Score:1)
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My unscientific sample of one guy who's been in a white collar union shop (Boeing Seattle) says the union politics[...]
Right. Boeing. No other problems there.
Re: I'm *very* white collar (Score:2)
So...you're saying forming a union didn't make it a better place to work.
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So, your saying you have no understanding of unions and the massive, persistent problems with Boeings upper management since the McDD takeover, which have now put the entire company at risk.
Re: I'm *very* white collar (Score:2)
Ah the classic lefty smokescreen.
"Communism is the future, and it works" turns into "real communism has never been tried" upon evidence of its abject failure.
"Unions make us stronger" becomes "it was all management's fault" when a 20+ year old white collar union just codifies the mediocrity.
Now they're doing "Harris was never the border czar, it's all Biden's fault."
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Poes law strikes again.
Are you a parody account or for real?
Re: I'm *very* white collar (Score:2)
Life itself is a parody account.
How else am I to understand the sum total of current events?
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Oh dear, your got real aren't you?
Re: I'm *very* white collar (Score:2)
En Ingles, por favor
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s/got/for
Re: I'm *very* white collar (Score:2)
The mundane explanation usually suffices. No elaborate conspiracy theories necessary most of the time.
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Right so you aren't doing a send up, you are genuinely very stupid?
Re: I'm *very* white collar (Score:2)
No, I genuinely don't think the way you do about life, the universe, and everything.
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No, I genuinely don't think the way you do about life, the universe, and everything.
I think you mean: "yes, I genuinely don't think the way yo do [...etc...]".
Just because you think it doesn't mean it isn't (a) wrong and (b) foolish. In fact one might think it implies those.
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My unscientific sample of one guy who's been in a white collar union shop (Boeing Seattle) says the union politics and seniority system chokes off opportunities for organic career growth.
Unions have issues; the ones you describe are prominent examples (making it extremely difficult to fire genuinely bad employees being another example, 'cost of living raises for everyone' rewards mediocrity but makes performance-based pay bumps less likely, the list goes on and on). It's why the place the two of you work now is an employer who doesn't have a union, and both of you prefer it.
The thing is that Activision Blizzard was the sort of workplace that was so terrible, that a union is undoubtedly the
Are you employed in the gaming industry? (Score:2)
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What are you doing here? This is "news for nerds", and you're no nerd, you're a useless racist, sexist, INCOMPETENT troll.
Are you getting paid for this, incel?
Coming soon, World of Warcraft developers.... (Score:2)