Thread by @haikus_by_KN

There are plenty of reasons why this "unions are only for badly-treated workers" argument is factually and historically ridiculous but I would like to raise something I think is particular to games and tech (thread) gizmodo.com/leaked-memo-sh…

Call me a stalker, but I looked up the LinkedIn profiles of these senior workers and managers (yes, one is a manager, despite her claim). Why did I do that? To see how young they were. Why did I do that, you may ask...

Was it because I thought "oh these people are naive!" No. It's because these workers (and manager) claim they and their colleagues are very privileged in terms of pay and conditions. Maybe they're right. But I'm afraid that doesn't actually count for a whole lot. Because...

Unfortunately for them, they work in the tech industry. And those relatively young people, already having reached the top of their careers (senior, even management etc.) have few places to go next. Will they attain one of the few spots at the very top?

And if not, will they retain their position, their nice salary, conditions and status until retirement? Look around you and count how many faces in the office are aged 40+... Yeah, strange how there aren't many, huh.

But that's the world of start-ups for you, you say. Maybe these self-described privileged, senior tech workers can move across to grown-up tech. The big tech companies that offer family-friendly, secure career jobs. Like...

IBM, for example. Oh wait.... (Damn, that wasn't supposed to happen! Not at solid old IBM!) features.propublica.org/ibm/ibm-age-di…

Based on probabilities, the future doesn't look good for these senior workers (and manager!) at Kickstarter who are currently so "privileged". Maybe they'll retain their privileged positions in tech until they're 65? Who knows? I wouldn't like to bet on it though.

And when the time comes (it's coming, they're getting older), they better hope there's a union in place so they have help when they need to fight to retain their jobs or negotiate their severance packages. (and, ahem, make sure they have a pension)

Because who else is going to stand by these women in tech when they're no longer bright young things but older, less attractive, their companies are less proud of them etc.. When people no longer flock to them at networking events. Their union.

If you're aged 30-35 & currently feel like the you're the kings & queens of tech/games: enjoy the next few years of your career - they may be your last.

And in the meantime, try not to *undermine/thwart/woke-shame the legitimate unionisation attempts of your colleagues*. Thx.

Am I bitter? Yes. As you get older you will see more and more of your senior games/tech colleagues put out to pasture. Until one day... it's your turn. (Don't get me wrong, many are happy in their new careers. But many go down in the world and stay down. It's not pretty.)

We see a lot of people struggling to break into the game industry, establish careers. It's getting tougher and tougher. But what's way less visible is the struggle of people trying to stay in. It's quiet, it's painful and it can be humiliating (and thus harder to shout about).

This is why older developers need unions. We need to unionise to protect the junior ones coming through - we owe it to them. But our "privilege" and even our careers in this industry is likely fleeting and tenuous. We owe it to our future selves as well.

When I first started it was "those C programmers" who started getting the chop, one by one. And "burnt out" game designers. I didn't think much of it at the time. I was 22 and a fucking idiot.

Because I was a C++ programmer and got annoyed when "those old C dudes" use preprocessor instructions instead of const ints, told me I had to use malloc instead of delete and other "old C dude" stuff. Thought I knew better. I did not.

Game industry management loves to set younger devs against the older ones they want to get rid of. Learn this early in your career. Do not fall for it.

And for one final moment of bitter realism, here is some footage of tech and games workers receiving their career achievement awards: