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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

#281

Post by bitshiftfaced »

nativeit wrote: post #232
bitshiftfaced wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't Wikimedia a non profit? Who exactly are the employers on the other side negotiating with the union here? They're higher on the hierarchical structure, but they're not actually stakeholders the same as there are in private for-profit companies.

Some of the largest unions in the world are for teachers, police, and government employees. I’m not sure why you would think a for-profit company is uniquely subject to its staff unionizing?

I have similar questions about public service unions as well. The reason why it makes sense to me for private for-profit companies is because stakeholders have a profit incentive to exploit workers. If non-profit tech workers are especially vulnerable to exploitation, then I guess it makes sense too, but I'm having trouble finding evidence for that.

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

#282

Post by traverseda »

psunavy03 wrote: post #248
sassbadger wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> However, it eventually transpired that the Foundation has chosen to be represented by the law firm Littler Mendelson, which has an equally strong reputation for union busting.

Yeah, Littler is one of THE union-busting, anti-worker law firms out there. Their website specifically notes that they specialize in labor law from only the side of representing management.

I didn't expect it to be that prominent. First text on there says that they represent employers in big header letters.

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

#283

Post by water-data-dude »

tchalla wrote: post #152
Stitch4223 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“SV”?

I think all these silly little acronyms and abbreviations are the real cancer. I don’t why people feel the need to use it. Poor communication skills in my books.

TMDA (too many damn acronyms)?

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

#284

Post by joshspankit »

alt227 wrote: post #219
shimman wrote: post #212

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's pretty cool and worthy endeavor. Having public domain pictures of cultural events seems like a worthy cause IMO.

The point is when you go to Wikipedia and they are on a funding drive with their very prominent ads for donation requests, they dont mention any of this. They make it sound like wikipedia is very much at risk of dying due to lack of funds when in reality they are looking for more funding for programmes like this, which is where a lot of the mistrust and 'deceptive advertising' opinions come from.

Honestly, I’ve never donated bc “keeping Wikipedia up” could be a solved problem by now. Not just cheaper processing and bandwidth costs, but p2p hosting, etc. Every time I see that ad, I say to myself “it should not be that expensive”.

Now, if they had said “We need 200k to send CC photographers to the Olympics”, count me in. That sounds bigger and way more interesting!

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

#285

Post by dofm »

ericmay wrote: post #277
dofm wrote: post #247

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have additionally gone down a bit of a rabbit hole on this bit: > the public realizing the need for stronger labor laws To a meaningful extent, especially in 19th century Britain, the concept of the general public is the product of labour organisation, not the source of it. It's a pretty new concept — the idea that the public have any single collective solidarity or consensus, can be consulted, have the ability to…

I reject the notion that the public is the same thing as a union in the manner you are describing.

Again, I am literally not saying that they are. I very clearly say that, in some significant measure, the former is the product of the latter. That is the word I used. Not "the same thing".

Don't do these silly bad faith, straw man characterisations.

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

#286

Post by dofm »

ericmay wrote: post #276
dofm wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I literally did not say that vaccine and vaccine adoption has anything to do with unions. Why would you ever think I did? It's an analogy. (Though as it goes, I suspect vaccine rollout and universal healthcare does, in fact, owe some of its ability to function to the products of the organised labour movement; national, universal healthcare in the UK literally sprang from the first Labour government) If you can't unde…

> I literally did not say that vaccine and vaccine adoption has anything to do with unions. Why would you ever think I did? It's an analogy. ??? > we don't need unions anymore are engaging with the status quo in the same way as people who say we don't need vaccines anymore. > If you can't understand why I am comparing anti-union with anti-vax, then I think you don't really understand the point I am making about histo…

It's an analogy. In that sentence I'm not saying that one has to do with the other.

I am talking there about the relationship of people arguing against a concept with the status quo for that respective concept.

The way those arguments are made is similarly ignorant of history, is the simple point.

It's not that difficult. Really. Other people grasped it.

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

#287

Post by stasomatic »

cool_dude85 wrote: post #218
stasomatic wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have enough employees to need a union and a board? It's a CRUD PHP site that I could run from a VPS (joking ofc, but not that much off). I've never worked in an industry where unionization was a thing, but my general understanding is that the unions are protectionist dreaming of things that were true before but not today, but they want to keep things as they were. Good luck. I've benefited from Wikipedia, but I…

>my general understanding is that the unions are protectionist dreaming of things that were true before but not today, but they want to keep things as they were. This mindset really baffles me, as a unionized guy with a white collar email job. Don't you, like, want things that your employer doesn't want to give you? Job protection? Better than CoL wage growth? Work from home? Internal job progression? Clear, understa…

I don’t “understand it” because it’s an antagonist relationship, us vs them. How’s that solved anything ever without violence?

I don’t know what the solution is, we’ve tried a few. Perhaps there are none.

Do you want to keep trying for your union to earn their seat at the table each year proving their worth, or “else”?

There is going to be another meeting where the bosses from each side will sip martinis and introduce their spouses and then they depart the galla in long black limos. It’s been written.

P.S. Your employer, your chosen object of warship, your partner or children, owe you nothing. Gotta find a way to reconcile that.

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

#288

Post by idoubtit »

hobofan wrote: post #271
dannyw wrote: post #135

Some people here think Wikimedia Foundation's mission is to keep Wikipedia up. That's a subset of their mission. I attribute nearly all of the blame to WMF, because their donation ads are quite deceptive. The actual, public mission of Wikimedia Foundation: > The mission of the Wikimedia Foundation is to empower and engage people around the world to collect and develop educational content under a free license or in th…

> WMF spends a lot money (combined) on a splatter of projects According to [0], they intend to spend $18m on community projects total, out of their total $240m FY26-27 budget[1]. $330k of that go to the WikiPortraits project[2]. Almost half of their expenses still go into "keeping Wikipedia up" (+ it's companion projects). I would hardly call that deceptive. [0]: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Grants:Regions#Wikimed…

> Almost half of their expenses still go into "keeping Wikipedia up" (+ it's companion projects)

That's a bit of a stretch. I couldn't find any up to date information, but for 2024-2025 WMF wrote: "Across the Product & Tech department, we plan on allocating an estimated 50% of our resources to Wiki Experiences, 30% to Signals and Services, 5% to Future Audiences, and the remaining 15% to Product and Engineering Services."[0]

So "keeping Wikipedia up" is a very minor part (15%) of the "Investments in Technology" budget. It receives around 7% (15% of 48%) of the WMF total budget.

That not to say the rest of those "Investments in Technology" is useless. It's just that it's mostly about developing features, like updating the Wikipedia app, or creating functions and Wikipedia Abstract.

[0]: https://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_Annual_...

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

#289

Post by sokoloff »

cool_dude85 wrote: post #213
sokoloff wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a world where AI heavily disrupts software, a union striking over economics (to get an extra $50M paid out to union members every year) would immediately notice all the replacement tech workers (who were out of work due to AI disruption) streaming in to do the work. It's really hard for me to imagine the conjunction of significant disruption from AI and effective union bargaining.

I said contract negotiations, you said strike. Even in this example, and there is an army of scabs outside the door, if a strike and its associated costs would cost the employer 75 million, it would be rational to give the union its 50. Anyway, I agree with you that simultaneous productivity gains and deskilling as a result of AI efficiency, if it comes to pass, would work against labor power. The claim is that union…

Understanding the dynamics and likely limits of what those “union protections” would be critical to answering your last question.

Contract negotiations are back-stopped by strikes. If a union is asking for an extra $50M per year for their members, they’d better have a credible threat of a strike to back that.

I think most every employer would much rather fade a $75M strike expense than agree to the $50M every year expense. It breaks even in only 18 months on a cash basis, plus gives them additional union-undermining value in a very public display.

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

#290

Post by ericmay »

dofm wrote: post #285
ericmay wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I reject the notion that the public is the same thing as a union in the manner you are describing.

Again, I am literally not saying that they are. I very clearly say that, in some significant measure, the former is the product of the latter. That is the word I used. Not "the same thing". Don't do these silly bad faith, straw man characterisations.

> Don't do these silly bad faith, straw man characterisations.

I reject the association literally or otherwise.

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