Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers • Hacker News Board

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#511

Post by friendlybus » Wed, Jan 15, 2020, 10:48 AM UTC

claudeganon wrote: post #481

friendlybus wrote: post #476

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is the dream that we can unionize without it becoming an all-encompassing force. Hollywood has not experienced that.

Indie films still get made, big actors work at scale, or certain content shifts to new platforms (e.g. streaming). The decline of independence in Hollywood has little to do with unions and more to do with unregulated, entertainment industry monopolies.

Who do you think enforces those monopolies? Working outside SAG can have deleterious effects on your access to future roles. Disobeying Disney as a movie theater can sink your access to their future releases. Both the institution and the union work together to make the monopoly. They are two sides of the same coin.

Psy, gangnam style becoming a billion-view hit doesn't happen in a heavily controlled music industry. YouTube made that happen. Unions are bad news and they are meant to be. The decade of good is over.

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#512

Post by Apocryphon » Wed, Jan 29, 2020, 8:07 AM UTC

friendlybus wrote: post #511

claudeganon wrote: post #481

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indie films still get made, big actors work at scale, or certain content shifts to new platforms (e.g. streaming). The decline of independence in Hollywood has little to do with unions and more to do with unregulated, entertainment industry monopolies.

Who do you think enforces those monopolies? Working outside SAG can have deleterious effects on your access to future roles. Disobeying Disney as a movie theater can sink your access to their future releases. Both the institution and the union work together to make the monopoly. They are two sides of the same coin. Psy, gangnam style becoming a billion-view hit doesn't happen in a heavily controlled music industry. Y…

Again, this is a failure of imagination, believing that unions are inevitably shaped like the unions of the past. As tech is founded on disruption and innovation, it is defeatism to assume that worker relationships have to be a certain way- especially when there are models of unions and management having a less antagonistic relationship, as in Germany.

Re: Major union launches campaign to organize video game and tech workers

#513

Post by Apocryphon » Wed, Jan 29, 2020, 8:08 AM UTC

friendlybus wrote: post #510

unapologetic wrote: post #490

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Steve Jobs died an obscenely wealthy man. Elon Musk will probably die an obscenely wealthy man. Every billionaire has a plan to save the world. None of them involve paying taxes.

Remarkably ignorant. Mining billionaires have said they could pay more tax. Bill gates is one of the biggest proponents of a robot tax and patent reform. Elon is a billionaire in Tesla stocks, not liquid cash. Tesla pays payroll tax and a bunch of other taxes. What would you do with more taxes to save the world?

None of these figures have ever supported a wealth tax.

Fixing the water situation in Flint, Michigan would be a good starting point.