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Wikimedia please fire whatever consulting firm told you it’s a good idea to do extractive capitalism as a non-profit foundation, reliant on long-term community goodwill and sustainable work ethics with low turnover rate
I was initially 80/20 against/for Wikipedia’s stance. I tentatively agreed with Wales’ criticism of identity tracking for the initial vote, but needed more information to form a solid opinion. Then I saw the mention of their hiring a union busting firm in addition to their current relationship with a known union busting law firm.
Fuck them, 100%. I immediately cancelled my ongoing monthly donation, which I’ve provided for years. Until the Wikimedia Foundation recognizes their unionized employees and works with them in good faith, they will get not a penny from me
Yeah I’m cancelling my donation immediately. Not that my $2.30/month will break their budget, but fuck them now.
Next headline: Wikipidia sends mobsters beating workers up during an information meeting.
I knew there was a reason I got a set of actual encyclopedias. Not new, nor as extensive, but it’s in my hands so filthy rich assholes are gonna have to come to my door to stop me from having access to information
Oh god, is Darknet Wikipedia going to be what finally fucks these assholes?
If your so called free society has laws to protect child murderers and racists but nothing to support the right to join a labour union it’s not a free society. Go back to the beginning and try again.
God dammit. No more donations.
I never would have heard about this if not for the fediverse
Can’t wait for ol’ Jimbo to come by with his hand out this year, "Please dear reader, won’t you give us money to abuse our employees?’
Wikimedia, what the actual fuck…
What a good use for donations!
Whoa. Jones Day is not exactly cheap.
Really?? WTF who sold out?? This can only be some sort of sponsored covert op… The compromised crooks need to be sacked, yesterday!
I’m not familiar with how unions work in the USA. Why does a union need to he recognized by a company? Just to have a formal communication pathway or is there more to it?
I do know the answer to this. In the US, the process goes roughly so:
Workers want to form a union. Workers sign authorization cards allowing a specific union to represent them. The union approaches the company and says, we have enough of your workers who want to join, (50% +1) will you voluntarily recognize that your workers have formed a union.
At this point it can go a few ways. The company can demand proof that there are 50%+1 workers authorizing the union to rep them. A neutral 3rd party will inspect the cards and attest this to the National Labor Relations Board office in that state. Like a public notary or professional witness. This protects the anonymity of the workers.
The company can immediately, or following this process recognize the union. They can go to the bargaining table and strike a deal with the workers, or enroll with the union under the area agreement and get the workers signed up.
The company can refuse, like wikimedia did, and demand it go to an election. A date is set and the workers come in to vote by anonymous ballot wether to be represented by the union.
If the company is some real shitheels they’ll start dumping $$ into discouraging the workers from voting yes. They hire a union buster and hold captive audience meetings. The union buster tells the workers any kind of lies and bullshit they want, they are a 3rd party and therefore not liable for the bullshit they spout. They say the company will go bankrupt. The company can’t afford to have union workers. Unions are corrupt and suck you dry with dues and don’t deliver a better life for you and your family. Etc.
Companies frequently violate labor law during this time period. They give raises and benefits to anti-union workers. They fire union supporters (they will owe these workers back wages later). They lie to their workers, threaten the workers, intimidate the workers. Often this corrupts the election process and if the election fails, it can be overturned and repeated because of the illegal practices of the company and union busters. Their goal is to wear out and drive away pro-union workers by dragging the process on indefinately. When you see pickets, this is often what the picket is about. Informing the public that the company is mistreating the workers violating their right to form a union.
Wikimedia are some real shitheels.
That’s exactly how it worked for my agency.
They were dragging new hires in and ordering them to sign away the union without knowing anything about them.
INAL and even further away from am American one, but I shall inboke the law of Cunningham . Having the company recognising or just generally being okay with the union formation makes the whole process easier. No hiding your unionisation activities and such. I believe the role of the union-buster is to dissuade the employees from signing up to it, see if there’s any dirt on union leaders to have then fired, and to just generally be a royal pain in the arse for everyone.
If I got the story right a bunch of Blizzard developers got fired because they shared company secrets/IP in the same discord server they discussed their unionisation work, so Blizzard’s lawyers found an easy way to get rid of them.
God dammit, this is like the moment the Titanic first hit the iceberg. No matter how this labor issue is resolved, it will permanently demonize Wikimedia. No matter how valuable Wikipedia is or has ever been, current culture provides no foregiveness or path of redemption after an ethical transgression. Again, dammit, I love Wikipedia and have been donating steadily for years.
You really don’t need to donate to them. Wikipedia has enough money to run itself indefinitely. The foundation just keeps growing and wasting money on non-Wikipedia stuff.
Let’s not say never. Because they can course correct but it has to be hard pivot:
- immediately recognize the union
- in the same statement, provide a path for every other employee to form a union and guarantee that if formation passes, that they will immediately recognize it
- commit whatever amount they were going to pay their union busting attorneys plus 25% towards helping other unionizing efforts across the tech industry
- provide free legal services for unions at other companies to help them get recognized
The fact that Wikimedia foundation chose profits over people is absolutely disgusting.
Yeah I’m probably never donating again after this. Why even bother arguing with the current US administration when the foundation is just going to copy all the bullshit the administration is pushing anyway…like, congratulations now literally everybody is pissed at your service.
