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Game Workers Unite

gameworkersunite.org

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Re: Game Workers Unite

#31

Post by giantsloth »

driverdan wrote: post #11
canthonytucci wrote: post #7

Why only game workers? Why not software workers/codewriters in general? I'd prefer something closer to SAG than the auto workers union personally.

Why do "software workers/codewriters" need a union? It's an employee's market.

In NYC you expected to be at work at most companies for 9-10 hours a day, you are expected to go to all their social events, and you are expected to act like a logic lording startup bro (even when the company is far past the startup stage). Sure, they give you free treats, sure it's not hard to come by a job, but you are still ultimately expected to give up your autonomy to become a startup stooge.

Re: Game Workers Unite

#32

Post by leadingthenet »

ttoinou wrote: post #24

I have read the whole website and failed to see one concrete example of action that the union could take to make game-industry employees' life better Game Workers Unite is a broad-reaching organization that seeks to connect pro-union activists, exploited workers, and allies across borders and across ideologies in the name of building a unionized game industry. Even compatible with the libertarian ideology :p ?

Sure, if it's of the left-wing type (ie. the original one before Americans twisted the meaning of this word, just like liberal).

Re: Game Workers Unite

#33

Post by bgirard »

ginko wrote: post #27
humanrebar wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But be ready to prove it. How do you prove that an employee took two weeks to find a bug that should have taken one day to find? How do you prove that writing a domain-specific language was a bad decision compared to defining a complex XML schema? How do you prove that an engineer is bad at explaining technical concepts?

Which side are you on?

Discussing both sides of an idea is acceptable. Picking a side is not a requirement.

Re: Game Workers Unite

#34

Post by checkyoursudo »

horsecaptin wrote: post #8
131012 wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Workers in the game industry are not only devs. There are also artists, testers, IT techs, marketers. I'm not sure the biggest issue is about the salary, but the (unpaid) overtime, precarity, sudden lay-offs, etc.

Okay, let's call it compensation. That is a good umbrella term that includes salary, overtime and benefits. The compensation for game workers sucks compared to their counterparts in other software fields. This is probably because it is sexier to be a game dev than, say, working at Salesforce. It is a good idea for game industry workers to form a union or guild.

Sexier seems like an odd choice of word. I assume you mean, being a video game designer is sexier to the person doing the job?

Low pay. Low prestige. Long hours.

I mean, give me two of those and maybe I'll consider the sexiness.

Don't you think it's that a lot of young future-Salesforce-developers think that making games will be a lot more like playing games than it really is?

(PSA: Making games usually is not at all like playing games, unless you're really into grindfests.)

Re: Game Workers Unite

#35

Post by theyinwhy »

humanrebar wrote: post #15
ugh123 wrote: post #12

Consider some of the negative affects of unions when working alongside low and high performers in technology: - Protection for under performers alongside high performers. Difficult or darn near impossible to terminate employment. Ability to enforce performance evaluation and plans could be killed by the union. Common in teacher unions. - Without being able to measure performance, pay may be solely based on tenure, no…

Unions are reactionary organizations. They tend to create and enforce rules around how things work now . Unions don't like it if new technology lets two workers do the work of forty.

I don't think it is about technology. In general, unions don't like people to get fired (without proper compensation). If new tech does more work for the company but no one gets fired I see no reason why unions would have anything against it.

However, the whole firing topic is really only filling up a fraction of unions' time. Unions' main tasks are overwatching safety regulations, crunch times, etc... so that the actual time spent at/for the company is better quality whise. This leads to happier, healthier programmers which should be in their employer's interest as well, see e.g. negative press and lack of battle proven personel at telltale.

Re: Game Workers Unite

#36

Post by cmalloc »

ginko wrote: post #27
humanrebar wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But be ready to prove it. How do you prove that an employee took two weeks to find a bug that should have taken one day to find? How do you prove that writing a domain-specific language was a bad decision compared to defining a complex XML schema? How do you prove that an engineer is bad at explaining technical concepts?

Which side are you on?

I don't think the grandparent's point is an issue of sides. It's more of a problem of gathering a useful heuristic of an engineer's performance. Given a variety of every day engineering tasks, how can you know exactly the difficultly of a person's work short of having done it yourself? I believe that experience is the answer in some cases, but others it is not. As another poster stated, it could also be done by working with the engineer through it all.

Re: Game Workers Unite

#37

Post by [deleted] »

ugh123 wrote: post #12

Consider some of the negative affects of unions when working alongside low and high performers in technology: - Protection for under performers alongside high performers. Difficult or darn near impossible to terminate employment. Ability to enforce performance evaluation and plans could be killed by the union. Common in teacher unions. - Without being able to measure performance, pay may be solely based on tenure, no…

[deleted]

Re: Game Workers Unite

#38

Post by ramy_d »

skybrian wrote: post #26
ramy_d wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the way film making unions are organized is something to look into but my impression is that the problem space is more familiar when you look at what industrial worker unions deal with. That is: careers under a single employer instead of gigs where you go from employer to employer and have to basically get re-hired.

Hmm, but why shouldn't games work like a Hollywood-style gig economy, since the need for labor varies depending on a game's lifecycle?

that's true. I think something really unique in game dev is that parts of the team can fluctuate while another part has a larger commitment across several projects.

EDIT: I'll also add, although obvious to some but worth mentioning, that an effective game-dev union needs to help both those people equally.

Re: Game Workers Unite

#39

Post by robbomacrae »

I've seen first hand how terrible dev environments such as EA are compared to startups and tech giants in SV. But that said.. in an industry where the barrier of entry for new games companies is so low, why is this even necessary? Any group of disgruntled employees with some ideas for games can say enough is enough and go start their own games company where they treat people better and subsequently attract talent (whilst raising the bar for everyone else).

Re: Game Workers Unite

#40

Post by giantsloth »

robbomacrae wrote: post #39

I've seen first hand how terrible dev environments such as EA are compared to startups and tech giants in SV. But that said.. in an industry where the barrier of entry for new games companies is so low, why is this even necessary? Any group of disgruntled employees with some ideas for games can say enough is enough and go start their own games company where they treat people better and subsequently attract talent (wh…

The idea that it’s simple to build, design, audio engineer, graphic design, run a company, market the product, do accounting/taxes, figure out your legal stuff, etc is patently absurd
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