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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

#51

Post by robhlt »

immibis wrote: post #11
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.

Gabe is the Apple of PC gaming, taking a 30% tax on all transactions. It's not this particular kind of evil, but it is a different kind of evil.

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.

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

#52

Post by flumpcakes »

pixelpoet wrote: post #29

Very brave of them to speak out, but TBH I'm not sure I'd do it if I were worried about anonymity - their written English is flawless, which is very uncommon. Unless they took considerable care to imitate a different writing style, it's probably trivial to identify who wrote it. In any case, a longtime friend of mine was senior graphics programmer on GTA5, and I was very close to interviewing with Rockstar in Edinbur…

> their written English is flawless, which is very uncommon. Unless they took considerable care to imitate a different writing style, it's probably trivial to identify who wrote it.

Rockstar North is based in Edinburgh as you say, why wouldn't English be at a high level?

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

#55

Post by gruez »

samiwami wrote: post #14
immibis wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gabe is the Apple of PC gaming, taking a 30% tax on all transactions. It's not this particular kind of evil, but it is a different kind of evil.

There is nothing forcing developers to release on steam, they can sell directly through a website. It’s not Valve’s fault no other competitor has gotten close to the quality of Steam. Epic Games could have made a dent, but they decided to try to bribe customers instead of making a functioning store.

>instead of making a functioning store.

For all intents and purposes it's "functioning" for me. You can search for a game, hit buy, put in your credit card number, then download/play it. I've seen some spurious arguments about how it lacks a cart or reviews, but it's a stretch to claim the lack of them makes them non "functioning". I never bulk buy games, and for reviews I can go to steam or metacritic.

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

#57

Post by pixelpoet »

shaky-carrousel wrote: post #9

Well, there goes GTA 6. Better for my wallet, I guess. Don't want to finance some thugs.

I'll probably end up buying GTA 6, once it's on sale or something; good people worked on it too I would imagine, and helped make it a good game.

Also, with apologies for the whataboutism, we unfortunately finance thugs all day every day (my internet provider, German government and pension, Deutsche Bahn, etc are massive extortionists); it's not really black and white.

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

#58

Post by pixelpoet »

flumpcakes wrote: post #52
pixelpoet wrote: post #29

Very brave of them to speak out, but TBH I'm not sure I'd do it if I were worried about anonymity - their written English is flawless, which is very uncommon. Unless they took considerable care to imitate a different writing style, it's probably trivial to identify who wrote it. In any case, a longtime friend of mine was senior graphics programmer on GTA5, and I was very close to interviewing with Rockstar in Edinbur…

> their written English is flawless, which is very uncommon. Unless they took considerable care to imitate a different writing style, it's probably trivial to identify who wrote it. Rockstar North is based in Edinburgh as you say, why wouldn't English be at a high level?

I'm going to get downvoted into a massive smoking hole in the ground for daring to state this opinion, but, as a lifelong enjoyer of the English language: native speakers butcher it the most.

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

#59

Post by vlovich123 »

vlovich123 wrote: post #53
lazzlazzlazz wrote: post #48

[flagged]

Citations? I’m not aware of this strong a conclusion. In fact, my understanding is that generally wages go up.

Doing my own research, ChatGPT summarizes the state as generally unions improve wages and working conditions for employees much more than they pay in premiums. This has gone down since the 1970s but is still a noticeable effect. Indeed the 40 hour work week comes from unions. There is a negative effect on profitability, but that’s subject to interpretation:

> The negative effect on profitability from unionization may reflect that unions raise labour costs (via higher wages/benefits) and may impose work rules or other constraints that reduce flexibility. The classic model: higher labour cost → lower margins, unless offset by higher productivity or price increases. But the productivity and growth effects are less clear: many studies find little or no negative effect on productivity or capital structure, suggesting that unions may shift the distribution of returns (towards workers) rather than clearly kill growth.

So it may be worth revisiting the research you cited so decisively against unions as it likely contradicts your belief about them.

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