The Lever - YOU LOVE TO SEE IT: Game On For Workers

Friends:

Good things are happening! Workers press play on one of the video game industry's largest unions, the country’s top environmental regulator may potentially ban toxic industrial substances, landlords lose a powerful technology, and a New York judge sides with climate-minded investors.

Rock the boat.

World Of Warcraft Is A World Of Workers

On July 24, Microsoft officially recognized the union created by over 500 workers behind the video game World of Warcraft. The organization is the first wall-to-wall union at Activision Blizzard, a Microsoft subsidiary, meaning that workers in all sectors, from quality assurance engineers to designers, are included. The people behind the World of Warcraft join over 1,000 Microsoft video game employees who are already unionized.

The union is part of the Communication Workers of America, which formed a labor neutrality pact with Microsoft in 2022 as the company was in talks to acquire Activision Blizzard. This pact, which kicked in sixty days after Microsoft completed the acquisition, encourages unionized staff to communicate with each other and union representatives in order to prevent labor disruptions. Just a few months before signing the pact, the National Labor Relations Board had found that Activision Blizzard had illegally threatened staff to deter them from organizing.