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Rockstar employee shares account of the company's union-busting efforts

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Re: Rockstar employee shares account of the company's union-busting efforts

#231

Post by ProllyInfamous »

exabrial wrote: post #99

Every union I've been a part of has been more of a pain than its worth, or has tried to keep individuals from become any more successful that others. I don't understand the obsession with them on HN.

Former IBEW; I'm forever grateful for the paid training and industry experience.

Had I any dependants, I'd definitely stay (just for the benefits! which cost nothing-more for one dude or an entire family).

Started my own residential shop, now-retired; life probably would have been easier had I stuck with commercial, instead.

Re: Rockstar employee shares account of the company's union-busting efforts

#232

Post by thereisnospork »

worldfoodgood wrote: post #190
sugarpimpdorsey wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're a game company. They're not feeding the poor. Your employment is "at will". You are not entitled to any item in your list of demands. You are, however, free to leave at any time for something more suited to your tastes.

> You are not entitled to any item in your list of demands. Can you point to the word entitled in my posts? Or are you putting words in my mouth? Can you point to any demands? Or are you arguing against something I didn't say?

You seem to be misunderstanding how language works? Can you please explain why you think the literal word entitled had to be said by you here?

You listed a bunch of things which should be, an opinion, he says your not entitled to those things, a probable fact relevant to the likelihood of attaining your professed desires, and he then offers a solution if you are unhappy with not having the things you professed 'should' be afforded.

Re: Rockstar employee shares account of the company's union-busting efforts

#233

Post by jsheard »

rcxdude wrote: post #180
bigyabai wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They are both still too high. You don't get to decide that. Apple's price is not set by free market competition, Valve's is.

Valve's price is still very strongly predicated on network effects which make it very hard to avoid.

Indeed, when big publishers like EA and Ubisoft started leaving Steam they introduced a tiered pricing system which progressively reduces the cut to 25% or 20% after tens of millions of dollars in revenue, to lure those AAA juggernauts back. The price is now indirectly based on how much leverage you have over Valve - Ubisoft can get away with not releasing their games on Steam, so they pay 20%, while small-to-medium studios effectively have no choice, so they pay 30%.

It's especially backwards when you consider that those AAA games put far more strain on Steams infrastructure with their >150GB install sizes.

Re: Rockstar employee shares account of the company's union-busting efforts

#234

Post by eckmLJE »

worldfoodgood wrote: post #38
elephanlemon wrote: post #8

As a kid I always lamented that every studio seemed to sell out as soon as they had the chance. Valve is basically the only one that didn’t… clearly it’s paid off very well for Gabe and the employees. Wish more people would resist the payday and keep what’s theirs.

Valve makes a significant amount of their money from the gambling they've attached to their games, and profits immensely from the culture of farming loot boxes to gamble on for skins and such. They also take an absurd cut of developer income and saddle devs with costs that they don't always want. (Selling on Steam? Valve takes 30% and forces you to moderate the forums on your listing page that you cannot opt out of.)…

I appreciate what you've posted here. Valve fanboyism is widespread (I'm guilty of it too) and while they are shoulders above the alternatives, it's a good reminder that no one's perfect and I'll be sure to take a closer look at the company in the future.

Re: Rockstar employee shares account of the company's union-busting efforts

#235

Post by mjr00 »

kevinh wrote: post #208
robhlt wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Valve allows developers to generate activation keys for their games and sell them on other platforms, where Valve gets a 0% cut. This is how you're able to buy games from places like the Humble Store and activate them on Steam. Their agreement does technically require that you don't sell at a lower price on other platforms, but as far as I know it's never been enforced.

There's a lawsuit ongoing about Valve threatening developers with delisting if they sell non-Steam copies of games (that's NOT Steam keys, but, say, a version on the Epic store) on other stores.

Can you provide a source for this? This is the first I've heard of anything like this and searching only gives results about the game delisting due to payment processor problems from a few months ago.

edit: after some additional search tweaking this is most likely in reference to Wolfire v. Valve, which is now a class-action suit.[0] The argument seems to be that Valve is engaging in anticompetitive behavior by disallowing developers from reselling Steam keys for their games for lower prices on other platforms, not selling the games themselves on other platforms. So this may or may not be what the parent post was referencing.

[0] https://www.gamesindustry.biz/wolfire-and-dark-catts-antitru...

Re: Rockstar employee shares account of the company's union-busting efforts

#236

Post by jimbokun »

worldfoodgood wrote: post #220
o11c wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The second link is paywalled, but from the various sources I looked at, the diversity problems with Valve seem limited to "Valve refuses to spend company time/effort to support my cause". I have not seen any concrete claims of misbehavior, in direct contrast to some other video game companies. Additionally, when I actually look into the alleged statistics of claims that "Valve is primarily white and male", the number…

Additional allegations of discrimination: https://discriminationandsexualharassmentlawyers.com/valve-c... Allegations of unpaid labor: https://web.archive.org/web/20160209211205/https://www.reddi...

Did the plaintiff win that suit? (A quick Google didn't find the outcome.)

As for the second, I'm confused as to why anyone would provide unpaid labor to a large, profitable corporation.

Re: Rockstar employee shares account of the company's union-busting efforts

#237

Post by epolanski »

metadat wrote: post #2

This makes me sad, R* has made some of my most favorite games, especially Red Dead Redemption 2. They make so much money, why can't they play nice and treat their employees like human beings? I don't recall reports of Valve (Steam, also super profitable) stooping. Is Rockstar a genetic relative of GAFA, because this is more like what I've come to expect from Amazon.

> They make so much money, why can't they play nice and treat their employees like human beings?

Because they can.

In the gaming industry the biggest studios get away with running sweat shops because there's endless hordes of brilliant engineers and artists who had always dreamed to make videogames and need a huge name on the CV to move to better places.

Re: Rockstar employee shares account of the company's union-busting efforts

#238

Post by annexrichmond »

ElevenLathe wrote: post #186

I would encourage anyone in tech that is interested in forming a union at their workplace to sign up for CWA's CODE (Campaign to Organize Digital Employees) training: https://code-cwa.org/ CWA is a big, traditional, national union (think phone company employees, health care workers, flight attendants) that has voted to set aside a portion of their dues to help organize us, their fellow workers in the tech sector, whi…

Are you aware of any resources for how to combat colleagues aiming to start a union? I am personally opposed to being part of a union.

Re: Rockstar employee shares account of the company's union-busting efforts

#239

Post by Bombthecat »

worldfoodgood wrote: post #38
elephanlemon wrote: post #8

As a kid I always lamented that every studio seemed to sell out as soon as they had the chance. Valve is basically the only one that didn’t… clearly it’s paid off very well for Gabe and the employees. Wish more people would resist the payday and keep what’s theirs.

Valve makes a significant amount of their money from the gambling they've attached to their games, and profits immensely from the culture of farming loot boxes to gamble on for skins and such. They also take an absurd cut of developer income and saddle devs with costs that they don't always want. (Selling on Steam? Valve takes 30% and forces you to moderate the forums on your listing page that you cannot opt out of.)…

How much money do they make through counter strike loot boxes and selling games etc?

Re: Rockstar employee shares account of the company's union-busting efforts

#240

Post by mrkpdl »

exabrial wrote: post #99

Every union I've been a part of has been more of a pain than its worth, or has tried to keep individuals from become any more successful that others. I don't understand the obsession with them on HN.

I work for a sector with a strong union and feel the benefits of collective bargaining every day. Higher wages, better job security, and many basic accomodations that are codified in an EBA that one might have to otherwise fight for (eg work from home at least two days a week is something that is protected in our eba thanks to our union).

Just because some unions aren’t as good as others is not a reason to dismiss unions.

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