Activision Blizzard Hires Notorious Union-Busting Firm WilmerHale • Hacker News Board

Re: Activision Blizzard Hires Notorious Union-Busting Firm WilmerHale

#361

Post by nate_meurer » Fri, Jul 30, 2021, 3:27 PM UTC

user-the-name wrote: post #356

yowlingcat wrote: post #351

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A problem with privileging "good" is that it is socially constructed, and social constructions of good can sometimes reveal themselves rather painfully to be fads of the time which ironically are anything but good, such as Lysenkoism [1]. On the contrary, real insights tend to stand the test of time, which is why Nietzsche continues to remain relevant and timeless. Lysenkoism, not so much. [1] https://en.wikipedia.or…

You are somehow turning a remote possibility into a near-certainty in this argument.

There's more than a remote possibility that anyone you think is worth learning from has done or said things that other people consider awful.

Your logic is exactly the reason many people tell us we shouldn't bother learning too much about, say, the founders of American democracy.

Re: Activision Blizzard Hires Notorious Union-Busting Firm WilmerHale

#362

Post by dogorman » Fri, Jul 30, 2021, 3:59 PM UTC

Gracana wrote: post #308

dogorman wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The decision to only have three sentences about it. The decision to hide those three sentences under the "History" heading so there is no hint of it in the table of contents. The decision to not even have a "Controversies" section to the page. The decision to not have any photographs of the aftermath. Don't be so credulous. Wikipedians have been caught selling their PR services numerous times before, and doubtlessly…

I remain unconvinced. You didn't actually provide any examples of the Exxon article being edited nefariously. And the reason the BP article is better is because their PR people gave up? Nah. They're both awful companies doing terrible things to the earth. I don't need to believe in your wikipedia conspiracy to have a low opinion of them.

The BP and Exxon pages are like night and day. If you don't see a fundamental difference between the two, you have your head buried firmly in the sand.

Re: Activision Blizzard Hires Notorious Union-Busting Firm WilmerHale

#363

Post by aeoleonn » Fri, Jul 30, 2021, 4:07 PM UTC

dimitrios1 wrote: post #61

aeoleonn wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Check out Path of Exile 2 -- it's the spiritual successor to Diablo 2. And it's freemium

It's a great game, but if you are concerned about Freedom in Hong Kong, Grinding Gear Games is owned by Tencent, so you are still sending money to support an authoritarian regime that is still finishing up their latest installment of ethnic cleansing and re-education camps.

Good to know, thanks. Definitely do not want to support communism or the CCP.

Re: Activision Blizzard Hires Notorious Union-Busting Firm WilmerHale

#364

Post by mcguire » Fri, Jul 30, 2021, 9:19 PM UTC

PeterisP wrote: post #321

mcguire wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From a rational standpoint, buying and playing games is a waste of time and money.

Definitely not - rationality is about a realistic view on the world and effective, perhaps even optimal, acts to achieve your goals, but it's completely, absolutely orthogonal to the nature of these goals. The goals, or perhaps "utility function" in formal terminology are essentially arbitrary from the perspective of rationality; it's generally rational to better understanding of your goals is very useful to effectiv…

Exactly my point: if the current behavior of a company reduces the enjoyment you get from products that you previously bought from that company, you are both justified and rational not to want to use those products, and even to say "I do not want to use these products anymore."

No rational argument can change the original non-rational utility function. And no, there's no "virtue signalling" involved.

Re: Activision Blizzard Hires Notorious Union-Busting Firm WilmerHale

#365

Post by whatever_dude » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 1:54 AM UTC

milkytron wrote: post #251

__john wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Blizzrd hasn't had a significant original release in 10+ years A quick search tells me that Overwatch has 6M players, which seems significant.

Haven't played Overwatch myself, but isn't it very similar to the other games that came before it? From a layman's perspective, it seems like a copy of Paladins, TF2, etc. Upon it's release, it didn't seem like something original (at least not to me), but rather something to compete with the unique games other studios had already created.

They perfected and introduced a lot of concepts that are now part of the genre of competitive FPSs. As much as I thought it was just a me-too kind of game before playing it, once I did manage to play it, I had to admit they went beyond what would be expected. They tried a lot of novel things.

I do think Activision-Blizzard is a shell of what it once was, but that game was definitely a positive, not something they just phoned in.

Re: Activision Blizzard Hires Notorious Union-Busting Firm WilmerHale

#366

Post by johnnyanmac » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 7:30 AM UTC

cletus wrote: post #148

The Steve Jobs quote on why Xerox failed [1] strikes again. The finance people have taken over Acti-Blizzard and they've been coasting for 10+ years on their original franchises. All we have is annual CoD releases and Blizzrad coasting on their old properties where Blizzrd hasn't had a significant original release in 10+ years. This effort seems like it's part of the ruthless approach to controlling costs that slowly…

>This latest move tells you the company believes it will blow over and they're looking to do the minimal required to appease the detractors and get back to business as usual without having to pay people more or pay out a bunch of lawsuits.

it doesn't unless you know the exact peopel hired are the union busting ones. It sounds like this is their HR consultants.

People really need to read past their title. This is a century old firm that has been on all sides of the fence for a signifigant part of American history. They don't have an agenda to regress society (no more than the legal system does).

Re: Activision Blizzard Hires Notorious Union-Busting Firm WilmerHale

#367

Post by johnnyanmac » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 7:33 AM UTC

beebmam wrote: post #146

cs702 wrote: post #81

Clickbait title for a highly opinonated piece that would never see the light of day in a respectable publication like the Washington Post, WSJ, NYT, Economist, etc. WilmerHale is a well-known top-100 law firm with a long history -- it's definitely not a "notorious union-busting firm." I'm flagging this story because it doesn't belong on the front page of HN, IMHO.

A quote from the article: '"Wilmerhale’s own site advertises its expertise as "union awareness and avoidance."' Therefore, yes, it is accurate to define them as a "union-busting firm". They fulfill other roles than just that, but they do act as union-busters, and they even describe themselves as such.

It's as accurate as calling Walmart "an expert on firearms", just because SOME stores sell firearms in certain cities.

WilliamHale covers just about every area of law you can think of. Saying they are here to purely union-bust is a huge exaggeration (and outright wrong once you see who they _actually_ hired).

Re: Activision Blizzard Hires Notorious Union-Busting Firm WilmerHale

#368

Post by johnnyanmac » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 7:34 AM UTC

gurleen_s wrote: post #360

pdabbadabba wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it's accurate. But isn't it irrelevant? Based on my read of the article, WilmerHale was almost certainly brought in to review Activision Blizzard's policies relating to sexual harassment and discrimination with a view towards tightening them up. This is a common thing for a big firm like WilmerHale to be hired to do. If so, the headline and the article's description of WilmerHale's "union busting" is just a gra…

It’s out of situations like this that unionization happens. Slim chance that they just happened to hire a union-busting law firm by accident.

It's not a "union busting" law firm tho. They do so much more than that, and it's specified who and what they hired from the firm (it's not the people at amazon).

And no, it's no coincidence when the state sues them that they hire the best firm they can find.

Re: Activision Blizzard Hires Notorious Union-Busting Firm WilmerHale

#369

Post by johnnyanmac » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 7:39 AM UTC

solaceb wrote: post #274

pirate787 wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's nothing "notorious" about a maintstream legal practice representing corporations against unions, and "busting" is pejorative. It's opinion click-bait.

With all due respect, this view is conversely weak willed, and complacently takes the side of Acti-Blizzard. The firm directly states they help companies with "union avoidance." Even charitable interpretations here support "busting" the aims of the union. This isn't an issue where "both sides" are equal in moral standing when one is advocating for better working conditions and the other is legally fighting for more p…

and this view takes the side of someone who hasn't read the article

> Activision has called in the experts to put down the claims of sexual harassment and discrimination and stop the protests by workers. Activision has hired WilmerHale. WilmerHale has been hired to “review” Activision’s policies.

and if you look further

>An email to Bloomberg Law, also revealed that the firm has appointed its anti-discrimination practice chair, Brenda Lee, and special counsel Tania Faransso to work on the probe with the company citing that it has “extensive experience assessing workplace culture and helping organisations strengthen their workplace environments”.

if you care enough to find the people who did the union busting at amazong you'll see they are different people. Trying to compare one lawyer to another is like comparing an anesthesiologist to a cardiologist Just because they are both "doctors" doesn't mean they understand or work on the same stuff.

I'm not sympathetic of Activision, but I don't appreciate yellow journalism full stop.

Re: Activision Blizzard Hires Notorious Union-Busting Firm WilmerHale

#370

Post by johnnyanmac » Sat, Jul 31, 2021, 7:40 AM UTC

fabianhjr wrote: post #283

pirate787 wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's nothing "notorious" about a maintstream legal practice representing corporations against unions, and "busting" is pejorative. It's opinion click-bait.

Union busting is an historic and recognized practice of limiting the freemdom of association of workers and collective action. https://www.wikiwand.com/en/Union_busting

yes... and there's no proof that this is what they were hired for. The people they hired aren't in that sector.

I'm actually starting to doubt how many people here hold jobs in specializations. We should understand already that prgramming isn't equivalent to IT fixing a friend's computer. You're doing the equivalent here with lawyers.