「労働組合」と言ったら普通、工場等で労働環境改善、賃金引き上げを社員が会社に要求するためのもの、例えばこの前のTartine Bakeryのやつ、
ここシリコンバレーのIT業界ではまず考えられなかったけど、
キックスターターが労働組合結成、というニュース。実は今までもGoogle/Facebook/Amazon等で労働組合結成の動きがあったけれど、どれも失敗。なのでこれは結構画期的なニュース。
それにしてもキックスターター、そんなに労働環境劣悪なのか、と思って聴いてたら、UCBerkeleyの研究員の説明によれば、
NEDZVETSKAYA: Yeah. So what set this all off with Kickstarter was there's this comic book that was, you know, on the fundraising platform. It's called "Always Punch Nazis." The news outlet Breitbart saw that this was on Kickstarter. They got in touch with the company and basically said, you know, this is a violation of your company policy. This promotes violence. The company initially took it down. A lot of workers were upset by this action because they felt like it was acquiescing to the alt-right. Basically, the workers had one kind of moral take on the issue, and then company management had a very different one. And I think it was this moment in the company when people realized, you know, we don't have as much of a say in the decision-making as we would like to. This is our - you know, our intellectual labor as employees. We want a little bit more control over exactly what happens with that.
クラウドファンドしていた"Always Punch Nazis"というコミック、これをAlt-RightのBreitbartがキックスターターに取り下げを求め、会社もそれを承認。これに怒った社員たち、会社の決定に異議を唱えられるように組合を結成する、というのが主な理由。
「賃金を上げろー！」というのとはちょっと違うわけですね。
