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Activision Blizzard employees walk out over harassment and ‘frat boy’ culture

theguardian.com

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Re: Activision Blizzard employees walk out over harassment and ‘frat boy’ culture

#11
post #3

Wouldn't forming a union help them better negotiate as a group? FTA: "Activision Blizzard employees are also calling for an end to mandatory arbitration in employee contracts, which prevent workers from taking conflicts with their employer to court, policies to improve representation of women and marginalized groups, the publication of salary data, and an audit of the company by a diversity, equity and inclusion task…

It sure as hell would accelerate the outsourcing of game development, which has rapidly growing capacity outside of the US & Western Europe. We're already very near the tipping point where non-Western studios will produce >50% of global industry revenue.

There’s a whole line of discussion to be had around the realities of outsourcing to be had, but I’d like to focus on discussing employee rights.

Are we OK with employees being treated like this? Are we willing to make concessions on our relationships with our employer under threat of losing our jobs (outsourcing is just one of the many ways a job can be taken away).

I’m of the thinking that companies should not be able to abuse the inherent power they hold as employers to deny some pretty basic rights like the ability to sue from individual employees.

Re: Activision Blizzard employees walk out over harassment and ‘frat boy’ culture

#12
Is there a VC out there that can just throw a few tens of millions of dollars at these employees and literally just teleport them from Blizzard to NewBlizzard in the same roles in a new company with a culture they prefer?

I'm actually surprised this isn't "a thing". If a large percentage of a well known, profitable company doesn't agree with a direction it's taking... why doesn't a VC or private equity just help finance a new company and absorb those people into it? If the people have anything to do with the products they create, they should be able to compete with their former employer as relative equals, and possibly even with an advantage because their former employer has lost a significant amount of staff.

Re: Activision Blizzard employees walk out over harassment and ‘frat boy’ culture

#13

Is there a VC out there that can just throw a few tens of millions of dollars at these employees and literally just teleport them from Blizzard to NewBlizzard in the same roles in a new company with a culture they prefer? I'm actually surprised this isn't "a thing". If a large percentage of a well known, profitable company doesn't agree with a direction it's taking... why doesn't a VC or private equity just help fina…

That VC would need a lot of confidence in the team to be willing to fully fund them with no revenue, clients, or IP.

Re: Activision Blizzard employees walk out over harassment and ‘frat boy’ culture

#14
post #6

Did the walkouts at Google change anything? Not only did Sundar enable the disgusting, predatory behavior of Vic Gundotra and Andy Rubin, but as far as I can tell, he’s still a darling of the press. Even on HN Sundar and Google get the kid gloves despite the abhorrence of the culture they created. Walkouts are pointless. True Employee organization and collective bargaining is the only answer to holding execs accounta…

Walkouts are an easy way to get more attention to an issue and it costs an employer real money. A single action doesn't need to solve everything.

Re: Activision Blizzard employees walk out over harassment and ‘frat boy’ culture

#15
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It sure as hell would accelerate the outsourcing of game development, which has rapidly growing capacity outside of the US & Western Europe. We're already very near the tipping point where non-Western studios will produce >50% of global industry revenue.

There’s a whole line of discussion to be had around the realities of outsourcing to be had, but I’d like to focus on discussing employee rights. Are we OK with employees being treated like this? Are we willing to make concessions on our relationships with our employer under threat of losing our jobs (outsourcing is just one of the many ways a job can be taken away). I’m of the thinking that companies should not be ab…

Unions do this, they negotiate agreements that are fair and equitable for the members. I grew up with unions and have seen them go out of favour, and the practices that caused the unions in the first place are rising again. The part I find surprising/despicable is how much money is put towards denigrating unions so that the workers think they're bad - the recent amazon vote comes to mind.

Re: Activision Blizzard employees walk out over harassment and ‘frat boy’ culture

#16

Is there a VC out there that can just throw a few tens of millions of dollars at these employees and literally just teleport them from Blizzard to NewBlizzard in the same roles in a new company with a culture they prefer? I'm actually surprised this isn't "a thing". If a large percentage of a well known, profitable company doesn't agree with a direction it's taking... why doesn't a VC or private equity just help fina…

Several senior employees left the company to form new studios, taking several people with them. Ben Brode and Mike Morheim for example.

Re: Activision Blizzard employees walk out over harassment and ‘frat boy’ culture

#17

eSports teams and streamers didn’t post on social media for the duration of the walk out. Am I missing something? Was this supposed to do literally anything to support it? I’m genuinely puzzled. That’s like saying I stopped writing in my journal for the duration of women’s suffrage “in solidarity”. Aren’t you supposed to do something people will notice?

Withholding content in solidarity sort of hurts Blizzard's attempts to keep interest in their E-sport franchises.

I'd prefer they didn't actually stream either, but they make their living from Blizzard products in a more precarious way than the direct employees do.

Re: Activision Blizzard employees walk out over harassment and ‘frat boy’ culture

#18

Is there a VC out there that can just throw a few tens of millions of dollars at these employees and literally just teleport them from Blizzard to NewBlizzard in the same roles in a new company with a culture they prefer? I'm actually surprised this isn't "a thing". If a large percentage of a well known, profitable company doesn't agree with a direction it's taking... why doesn't a VC or private equity just help fina…

That VC would need a lot of confidence in the team to be willing to fully fund them with no revenue, clients, or IP.

Sure, but to whatever extent the human resources are the engine that drives creation of revenue, clients, and IP, it would seem that taking a large chunk of an existing working machine would have better odds than some other startup, right?

Re: Activision Blizzard employees walk out over harassment and ‘frat boy’ culture

#19
post #6

Did the walkouts at Google change anything? Not only did Sundar enable the disgusting, predatory behavior of Vic Gundotra and Andy Rubin, but as far as I can tell, he’s still a darling of the press. Even on HN Sundar and Google get the kid gloves despite the abhorrence of the culture they created. Walkouts are pointless. True Employee organization and collective bargaining is the only answer to holding execs accounta…

> Did the walkouts at Google change anything?

I was a "TVC" at Google several times. One of those times was during the walkout period. Even though I had no way of finding out about it until a lucky "right now in 3 minutes" time period, I participated.

Whilst the walkouts may not have changed much on corporate or the outsourced "side-corporates" [the contract companies], it did change myself.

For decades I've heard of strikes, read about walkouts ... stuff in history books ... documentaries on the History Channel back when the History Channel was the History Channel ...

Seeing it live, participating in it live and in person -- added new color to the understanding. The live speakers, the live news cameramen right there, the whole deal.

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