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Wikimedia Foundation refuses union recognition, hires union-busting law firm

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Re: Wikimedia Foundation refuses union recognition, hires union-busting law firm

#41

Post by armchairhacker »

Wikipedia's side

> [W]e believe a secret-ballot election conducted by the National Labor Relations Board is the appropriate path forward. This process protects individual choice and ensures that any outcome reflects the collective will of those eligible to participate.

> [Jimmy Wales:] One of the problems with the process so far is that it was not secret and we have heard from some staff members that they felt pressured because the organizers would know how they decided. That isn't a great process and it goes against our movement's values quite badly to have people in a situation where they are pressured into something one way or the other.

Counter-argument

> The community response to the WMF statement has mostly been one of dismay, with fears that the Foundation will use the time gap between now and the secret ballot to discourage employees from union involvement, using union busting methods as described humorously in an episode of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver

The episode is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gk8dUXRpoy8, a transcript is at https://scrapsfromtheloft.com/tv-series/union-busting-last-w...

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Honestly, I'm on Wikipedia's side: there should be a true secret ballot. It should be soon and I'd be fine seeing the union win. Sure Wikipedia can use threats and propaganda in the meantime (so can Wiki Workers United), but that is less coercive than a public ballot.

Re: Wikimedia Foundation refuses union recognition, hires union-busting law firm

#42

Post by estearum »

inigyou wrote: post #19

[flagged]

The linked article doesn't even come close to suggesting money laundering. It really just argues that Wikimedia is similar to virtually every other successful organization on earth and that its bloat grows with its resources.

Wow insightful.

The mere existence of The Mythical Man-Month or Peopleware does not prevent this behavior. Turns out it's actually super, super hard to avoid. It's pervasive enough to have several books written about it, and several more angry blogs written about specific companies' failure to achieve the allegedly "easy, obvious" thing that very, very few companies actually succeed at doing!

Makes me wonder if it's not so obvious or so easy... hmm... Nah, probably everyone else is malicious and/or stupid.

Re: Wikimedia Foundation refuses union recognition, hires union-busting law firm

#44

Post by cyanydeez »

estearum wrote: post #42
inigyou wrote: post #19

[flagged]

The linked article doesn't even come close to suggesting money laundering. It really just argues that Wikimedia is similar to virtually every other successful organization on earth and that its bloat grows with its resources. Wow insightful. The mere existence of The Mythical Man-Month or Peopleware does not prevent this behavior. Turns out it's actually super, super hard to avoid. It's pervasive enough to have sever…

It is interesting how "enshittification" just happens because of scale.

Re: Wikimedia Foundation refuses union recognition, hires union-busting law firm

#45

Post by estearum »

armchairhacker wrote: post #41

Wikipedia's side > [W]e believe a secret-ballot election conducted by the National Labor Relations Board is the appropriate path forward. This process protects individual choice and ensures that any outcome reflects the collective will of those eligible to participate. > [Jimmy Wales:] One of the problems with the process so far is that it was not secret and we have heard from some staff members that they felt pressu…

Yeah for the counterargument like... if you were afraid of tipping your hand, maybe you should've done it the correct way (anonymously) the first time?

Re: Wikimedia Foundation refuses union recognition, hires union-busting law firm

#47

Post by jmusall »

inigyou wrote: post #19

[flagged]

I could not find any indication that the purpose of this ever-increasing spending (while alarming) is money laundering in the essay you linked. Can you provide any other source to back up this claim? Money laundering is illegal, while spending money in of itself is definitely not.

Re: Wikimedia Foundation refuses union recognition, hires union-busting law firm

#48

Post by cyanydeez »

amazingamazing wrote: post #43

Good. Most tech unions are worthless and only accelerate outsourcing. Unions can be good though, like in construction where the work is inherently dangerous.

yes, yes, blame the victims. It's always the fault of the pedestrian for being in the road.

Re: Wikimedia Foundation refuses union recognition, hires union-busting law firm

#50

Post by estearum »

cyanydeez wrote: post #44
estearum wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The linked article doesn't even come close to suggesting money laundering. It really just argues that Wikimedia is similar to virtually every other successful organization on earth and that its bloat grows with its resources. Wow insightful. The mere existence of The Mythical Man-Month or Peopleware does not prevent this behavior. Turns out it's actually super, super hard to avoid. It's pervasive enough to have sever…

It is interesting how "enshittification" just happens because of scale.

People are really not curious enough about bureaucracy. We complain literally our entire lives about "bureaucracy" and all the bad outcomes it produces.

But I've met literally no one who thought "hmm... if there's this emergent phenomenon across virtually every single large-scale human endeavor... and that phenomenon seems to systematically produce undesirable outcomes... at the cost of billions of dollars or millions of lives... maybe I oughta inspect this phenomenon more closely!"

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