EA Spouse Posts Plans for Watchdog Organ 87
Jaero writes "The Spouse has a followup post to her "EA: The Human Story" from over a month ago. Not only was it nominated for a Best Software Essay of 2004, but she has revealed plans to start an independent industry watchdog organization called GameWatch.org, meant to monitor the quality of life in the game development world. Anyone will be able to post their story, as well as design the logo (a contest which lasts until January 15th)."
Re:Watchdog Organ? (Score:1, Informative)
Unsure about the best possible solution here. (Score:5, Informative)
I am fortunate enough to work at a company that is exactly what EA is not. So I dont feel particularly persecuted or exploited at the moment. Hell, I can post to slashdot while at work, it appears.
There is something about Unions that are repulsive on some level to myself and the programmers I know. Mostly due to the negative connotations they have aquired.
First, myself and my coworkers basically agree one one element though. A crunch is acceptible when needed. A death march is not. The goal then, is to prevent a death march.
Second, the amount of hours that are needed for a project is directly dependant on how much time a project is given and how much money is offered for it. Both those variables are controlled by the publisher. The dev studios must work with what they can get in that regard.
A death march happens when either the time frame for a project cannot be met using sane hours from the available programmers. The way to avoid a death march is to ensure that there are enough programmers on a project to complete in in the allotted time frame.
Having a union for game programers at one developer studio means that a publisher will simply not give that studio any projects. To my thinking, there is just too much of a disconnect between the part of the industry that gets the lions share of the money and the part of the industry that creates the products.
EA did not turn into a shit hole to work at until after they started to focus hard on the bottom line. Being a publisher AND develper, they should know better. But I bet that the guys in Decision Making positions do nothing more then dictate how a game will be made. They do not have to actually work under the conditions they mandate.
My previous job, when we were in a crunch, I do not recall the decision makers actually being at the office. The lead programmers were the highest meatbags on the food chain, and they were just as slammed as anyone. But at my current job, I can honestly say that my boss puts in harder hours then anyone else, for the most part. The resulting difference in crunch policy is obvious to one who has seen both methods.
The I think that the real solution is to make sure that the people who dictate schedules are also working under those schedules. But I dont know how to make that happen. All a union does is add another layer of people who do not work under the conditions they create (though I concede that the union types are closer to those conditions then management types).
END COMMUNICATION
Re:Union Now (Score:1, Informative)
Union: Give us our 1% cost of living increase.
Management: no. and since you have no contract right now, lets change a few other things.
Union: If we don't have a contract, then we stop working.
Management: fine, see how long till your savings run out.
Union: Ok, we are striking.
Management: (to customers) it's all the union's fault! they don't want to work! (begin shift of blame)
Even in IT, if one is a contractor, and thier employier desides to not give them a contract and negociations fail to produce something both sides will sign, the contrctor will *gasp* not work! And of course, since it's the contractor who is visably not doing something (rather then the behind the scenes 'not doing something' of the employer) it's easy to again, shift the blame to one side.
Always look into why people go on strike. Outside a few high-profile, terribly currupt unions, most of them just want a contract and pay that keep them above the poverty line. If a strike is disrupting you, then maybe one should ask management, the people who are holding the power, why thier workers are so unhappy.
Re:A problem is with unions in general (Score:5, Informative)
I'm related to one of the vice-presidents of Costco and asked him about this. He told me that apparently there have been only two costco warehouses with unionized workers and recently, one of them disbanded because the workers realized that they were paying union dues for no reasons. Costco treats its employees very well. The upshot of this is that Wall Street doesn't like Costco very much, because they spend too much money on their employees; but they nevertheless continue to be a very sucessful company.
The moral is that while there are certainly bloated unions who only stifle industry; they're the exception. If businesses take good care of their workers, the workers won't feel the need to unionize. From the sound of things, parts of the game industry are in desperate need of unionization.
EA should be unionized by IATSE (Score:3, Informative)
For EA Redwood City, IATSE Local 16 has jurisdiction. Here's the union contract for Industrial Light and Magic [mpsc839.org], whose CGI employees are represented by IATSE Local 16, San Francisco. [local16.org]
Some key clauses:
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The basic five day workweek for this computer graphics unit is 45 hours (40 hours of straight time and 5 hours of (1.5 times rate) overtime. This workweek is a flexible one, allowing the employee to work as many as 12 hours in a day without additional pay as long as the aggregate hours worked in the five day period does not exceed 45. Hours worked in excess of 12 in one day or 45 in the five day workweek will be compensated at 1.5 times the hourly rate. All overtime beyond 9 hours in any day or 45 hours in any week must be expressly pre-approved by the employee's supervisor. Any employee who works more than five (5) days out of any seven (7) consecutive days shall be compensated (i) for time worked on the sixth day at a rate not less than one and one-half times the hourly rate for the classification of the employee and (ii) for time worked on the seventh day at a rate not less than two times the hourly rate for the classification of tfie employee.
With a contract like that, "crunches" mean huge overtime pay. They still happen, but the paychecks go way up when they do. So employers don't understaff.IATSE also represents Dreamworks SKG employees, who work in the same building complex as EA Redwood City, doing very similar jobs.
An IATSE organizer can be found at most Bay Area SIGGRAPH meetings. The links above will take you to the union web sites.