61–70 of 128 posts
Employee ownership is a very old concept. All studies have shown that they are risk averse and have poor growth. I’d love for this to work, but you can’t fantasize your way to results.
You say this like it's a bad thing?
Lord and Sproxton have no plans for retiring anytime soon, but they wanted to shift their priorities at the company. Lord said, “We’ve spent so much time building this company up and being so profoundly attached to it. It’s not a business to us, it’s everything, it’s our statement to the world. Having done that for so many years, the last thing we wanted to do was to just flog it off to someone.”
Sproxton added, “And we wanted to make sure they are all engaged in this employee ownership as well,” assuring their team that they won’t be in danger of a big studio buyout. Both men are committed to keeping Aardman’s uniquely close-knit culture. “There’s no real concern about the culture of the people, it’s just an asset that can be sold on in years to come,” he said of a corporate acquisition.
The studio is located in Bristol, U.K., where a team of 130 staffers run the beloved stop-motion animation company. During production, that number can swell to nearly three times that size for a feature-length film. Aardman is currently in production on Farmageddon: A Shaun the Sheep Movie, which will be followed by the long-awaited Chicken Run 2. Sproxton and Lord will join director Nick Park on Aardman’s new executive board of directors. Park, who has been with the company since its early days, directed the Oscar winning Wallace & Gromit shorts, which include The Wrong Trousers, A Close Shave and the film The Curse of The Were-Rabbit, which won Best Animated Feature in 2005. Park and Lord co-directed 2000’s Chicken Run, which remains the highest-grossing stop motion animated film of all time. Lord said of his and Sproxton’s future with the company, “We’re not quitting yet, we are doing this because we love the company and because we love it we think this will be the best things for it. This is not about David and I leaving. It is a continuity deal. We always believed that independence was our strong suit. We didn’t have to dance to anybody else’s tune and could make our own decisions.” This move towards continued independence and self reliance follows Aardman’s carefully hand-made approach their projects. Their films are beloved for their handcrafted aesthetic and their commitment to British humor and culture. Their latest move to share ownership ensures that Aardman will remain as charming and unique as they always have been. [1] href="https://www.theguardian.com/film/2018/nov/10/wallace-gromit-...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In this case I think the primary reason is to protect the company. Aardman is probably a fairly hot company right now. Probably prime for a purchase by one of the big studios. But then it would most likely just get broken up and turned into a mill for churning out look-a-like content. Or possibly even just a logo stamped on contracted out content. I believe the founders have been fairly clear in the past about not be…
Either it's hard to create the content, or it is not. If it's not hard, the studios don't need to buy Aardman. The IP they have is negligible, and no one watches a movie because it's made by Aardman (99% of the people would not know who they are anyway). If it is hard, the studios would need to keep the employees who manage to do this hard thing, and it would be in the purchaser's best interest to manage it as if it…
> it would be in the purchaser's best interest to manage it as if it were a butterfly.
Maybe so, but there is no guarantee they will do that. Remember that Disney fired the whole hand-animation department, despite the whole company being build on hand-drawn animation.
Sorry to be offtopic, but how can you link a website that imposes literally thousands of marketing and "unclassified" cookies on you? And they only have the option to "Accept all cookies".. FUCK OFF with this bullshit! [shit!] https://imgur.com/a/RddlgcR
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In this case I think the primary reason is to protect the company. Aardman is probably a fairly hot company right now. Probably prime for a purchase by one of the big studios. But then it would most likely just get broken up and turned into a mill for churning out look-a-like content. Or possibly even just a logo stamped on contracted out content. I believe the founders have been fairly clear in the past about not be…
Either it's hard to create the content, or it is not. If it's not hard, the studios don't need to buy Aardman. The IP they have is negligible, and no one watches a movie because it's made by Aardman (99% of the people would not know who they are anyway). If it is hard, the studios would need to keep the employees who manage to do this hard thing, and it would be in the purchaser's best interest to manage it as if it…
First the IP is not negligible, for a company like this the IP is their company.
Second Even if this mythical company buys them and has ever intention of "keeping the employees" and "allowing the company to run as before" a company that is consumed by a larger organization will over time loses its identity, it does not matter if both parties desire to "keep the magic" it never works. EVER. HR polices, Legal, management style etc from the larger parent ALWAYS makes it way to a subsidiary.
Sorry to be offtopic, but how can you link a website that imposes literally thousands of marketing and "unclassified" cookies on you? And they only have the option to "Accept all cookies".. FUCK OFF with this bullshit! [shit!] https://imgur.com/a/RddlgcR
Sorry to be offtopic, but how can you link a website that imposes literally thousands of marketing and "unclassified" cookies on you? And they only have the option to "Accept all cookies".. FUCK OFF with this bullshit! [shit!] https://imgur.com/a/RddlgcR
You can usually just open the developer console and delete the modal element, however this site also disables scrolling somewhere it seems. Couldn't figure out where quickly, so I just read the article in the element inspector. Web 2018, everyone. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
document.body.style = ''
document.body.removeChild(CybotCookiebotDialog)
document.body.removeChild(CybotCookiebotDialogBodyUnderlay)Earlier quoted context omitted.
Both of those things sound very good. Corporate growth for the sake of growth is what got us to an atmospheric carbon dioxide level of 400PPM. If your idea of a company's success is how much profit it accrues, maybe it's time to question why it is you think that's a good thing.
Market failure got us to 400PPM. The externalities of carbon and methane pollution have not been properly priced in. That can be resolved with a market mechanism - a carbon tax. The free market has also brought us widespread electric cars, solar panels, gas power plants. The very things with which we will combat climate change. Socialism has brought us expanding populations globally, by offering free food to people w…
Sorry for the naive question, but how does this work? So let's say the employees now are part of this trust which owns 75% of the shares. What is the benefit? The trust owns the shares legally correct? Is it some sort of profit sharing scheme? I assume you don't hold on to the shares when you leave the company (as they are with the trust)? Does every new hire dilute the ownership? How does this actually impact the da…
Setting up an EBT is a common way that worker coops are set up - for a worker coop its one member one vote and the equity is split equally between th emembers / cooperators
Its not clear if they are converting to a worker coop or not unless the workers control the trust its not a coop.
One of the benefits of an EBT is tax advantages especially if the coop gets taken over - preferably not mondraggon :-)
Sorry for the naive question, but how does this work? So let's say the employees now are part of this trust which owns 75% of the shares. What is the benefit? The trust owns the shares legally correct? Is it some sort of profit sharing scheme? I assume you don't hold on to the shares when you leave the company (as they are with the trust)? Does every new hire dilute the ownership? How does this actually impact the da…
Hey, essentially this means that stakeholders are now the shareholders. In other words, they now became a worker-cooperative; they are the 1 in 8 worldwide that don't sell their time and surplus value. Union-Cooperative Strategy: https://newsyndicalist.org/2017/09/30/union-cooperative-stra... International Cooperative Alliance: https://www.ica.coop/en Mondragon Cooperative: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mwwq3ujkfkU