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Bandcamp's Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off

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Re: Bandcamp's Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off

#81

Post by ivalm »

derrida wrote: post #61
nemo44x wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IT doesn’t traditionally gafe unions in the USA. Teachers are unionized here and are one of the most powerful political forces. They are also a likely reason why so many people here don’t like unions.

And in the EU it is probably why they have free healthcare, high minimum wage, work weeks of 34-38 hrs, welfare, 8 hour work days, overtime after, high proportion of part time workers, and highest productivity per hour in Germany. But yeah, unions, hate what you gotta hate. I personally hate long hours for bullshit pay.

US median income, even disposable income after all the medical/housing costs, is higher than all of the large EU countries (France, Germany, etc). So if anyone has bullshit pay, it’s the Europeans.

Re: Bandcamp's Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off

#82

Post by baggy_trough »

onethought wrote: post #16
baggy_trough wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you define exploitation?

Unless you have shares - you are exploited for your surplus value. This is true for any and all wage based labour.

Do you mean because the company values my labor more than they pay me, that's exploitation?

How about when I buy eggs from the grocery and value them more than they cost me, so that there is consumer surplus. Is that exploitation?

Re: Bandcamp's Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off

#83

Post by thaumasiotes »

eru wrote: post #76
thaumasiotes wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you saying anything I didn't already point out in this paragraph? >> You might want to ask yourself "Do I really believe that, if I thought I might be about to get fired, that would have no influence on whether I tried to join a union?"

Being a union bargainer is different from just being a member of a union? I would assume it takes more lead time than most people in the 'about to get fired' scenario have?

Ah, fair enough.

Re: Bandcamp's Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off

#84

Post by pjmlp »

katzenversteher wrote: post #80
ivolimmen wrote: post #49

I find it so weird to read these stories on how Americans cope with unionizing. In the Netherlands where I live it is very common and normal to be member of a union. Most branches have a union, IT sector is a "free sector" and does not have a union. My wife works as a teacher and she is member of a union.

Same in Germany but e.g. I work in a company that does mechanical engineering, so I can join the IG Metall. If I'd work for the public I could join Verdi etc. However, I believe there is also no specific Union for "pure" IT.

IG Metall does cover IT, at least on my case for the last decades being in Germany.

Re: Bandcamp's Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off

#85

Post by pjmlp »

ivolimmen wrote: post #49

I find it so weird to read these stories on how Americans cope with unionizing. In the Netherlands where I live it is very common and normal to be member of a union. Most branches have a union, IT sector is a "free sector" and does not have a union. My wife works as a teacher and she is member of a union.

In Germany IG Metal is one of the unions where IT is represented.

Re: Bandcamp's Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off

#86

Post by baggy_trough »

onion2k wrote: post #17
baggy_trough wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you define exploitation?

Being sold a job working for a specific salary at 40 hours a week, and then being told to work 80+ hours a week without overtime in order to keep your job, and having all trace of your work removed from the credits if you leave. That's how the games industry works.

If you don't like it, refuse to do it, and maybe they'll fire you. Or, if you're OK with it, then do it. I don't really see where the exploitation comes in.

Re: Bandcamp's Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off

#87

Post by hkt »

bananaquant wrote: post #32
extraduder_ire wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seeing the headline, and remembering that 50% of employees were laid off, my first thought was: "what're the odds?" I assume I'd have to use NCR or something to calculate that. I know the upper (rarest) bound is 1/2^40, but it's likely much more likely, and not random.

As an HR would say, those people are "a bad cultural fit", which legitimately raises the probability of them being laid off to 100%. Simple.

"legitimately"? I'd be surprised..

Re: Bandcamp's Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off

#88

Post by SXX »

vore wrote: post #72
SXX wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except everyone who going for a job in games industry knows about it. It's not like people going for those 40 hours and unknowingly getting into modern slavery in a basement with their documents taken away. There just too many people who want to make games and budgets are limited while competition is high. There is very few companies that are highly profitable, but majority of people wouldn't want to work for them. I…

Why can't they also want to make conditions better? Why do people have to accept that conditions are bad, tough tits, deal with it? We would probably have not half the safety regulations we have today and people would be dying a lot more on the job.

Because game development is what's called "successful product industry" which means sometimes you have to make 10 failed games to finally release 1 successful. Majority of game studios don't make it and competition is very high which means game budgets is race to the bottom.

Also platforms like consoles and Steam take their 30% cut, then publisher / investor take their 30-60% cut and you also have to pay taxes on every step. Usual game studio that working using publisher or investor money only get 20-30% of gross sales.

Large companies are able to make conditions better and they actually have higher salaries and better work life balance whithin the market, but since for everyone else it's run to the bottom they have countless number of potential new employees.

PS: I am CTO of small game development company and to make games I have to be okay that I'll earn 3x less than I would as middle software engineer in fintech. Game dev is tough industry to work in, but it's always by choice.

Literally everyone who works in game dev are able to find better paid job elsewhere: gambling, marketing, fintech, etc. People just love making games and dont want to move elsewhere.

Re: Bandcamp's Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off

#89

Post by drcongo »

johnnyanmac wrote: post #35
tchbnl wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. They acquired the company for no logical reason, did nothing with it, and then dumped it rather than spin it out because they don't care and want their money back. Epic ruined it.

From the perspective of a Bandcamp customer, does any of this actually affect their ability to browse, buy, and listen to music? "ruin" implies the quality degraded, while "nothing" implies a neutral progression. The only degregation here is the layoffs from the torch passing, but I believe Bandcamp still has more employees now than they did before being acquired.

Nearly the entire editorial staff have been laid off, for music fans /artists of certain genres, these were the only people writing about their music. That's a significant degradation. The employee head count bit needs a citation I think, I wasn't aware that Epic had hired anyone at all into the Bandcamp team during their brief custody which would make that statement completely impossible.

Re: Bandcamp's Entire Union Bargaining Team Was Laid Off

#90

Post by username332211 »

vanderZwan wrote: post #59
nemo44x wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IT doesn’t traditionally gafe unions in the USA. Teachers are unionized here and are one of the most powerful political forces. They are also a likely reason why so many people here don’t like unions.

> Teachers are unionized here and are one of the most powerful political forces. This does not seem compatible with all the stories I've heard about underpaid teachers having to buy material for their students out of their own pocket. I'm sure it somehow ends up both being true in a twisted way, but it still sounds strange.

If you think about it, American teachers are the most obvious example of why unionization doesn't necessarily improve anything at all. An average class of 24 costs just short of $700k per year to the citizens of New York City and the cost is rising rapidly every year. Meanwhile, teachers are supposed to be underpaid, overworked and exploited.

I guess teachers are supposed to take solace in the fact they are very powerful.

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