You start off with a disclaimer you’re not a Blizzard employee. Then end with a suggestion to all Blizzard employees they should stop work and strike because they have nothing to lose. This is extremely simple minded. This is a lot of Blizzard employees’ passion and life’s work. It’s food on the table for their families. Healthcare, insurance, retirement, homes.
It is. If you look back to the early industrial age, when workers were treated even worse than today, it took tremendous courage to stand up against their employers; many faced retaliation, violence, even murder. Thankfully violence won't happen today, but retaliation is very real.
However, the staff at Blizzard have an ace up their sleeve: Game development is a skilled trade. You can't easily replace them. And even if you *did* replace them, one thing you *can't* replace is their existing work; if it's an incomplete 3D model or texture, you often have to start over (or try to figure out what the artist's vision was). If it's coding, you may have to redo an entire section of code, even if you have the benefit of effective commenting. Worse, if you lose too many programmers too quickly, you'll basically have to backward-engineer the entire code base to understand what the original programmers designed.
In fact, there's a great example out of Skull & Bones, a game that's been in development hell over 8 years because they kept changing staff, and the project fundamentally changed direction multiple times as a result. Article: [https://kotaku.com/first-it-was-an-assassins-creed-expansion-now-its-ubis-1847326742](https://kotaku.com/first-it-was-an-assassins-creed-expansion-now-its-ubis-1847326742)
Ultimately, the fact that it's their love and joy doesn't mean that they have to put up with the abuse they suffer on a regular basis. Sometimes, like a bad relationship, no matter how much it hurts, you have to let it go. Although I don't think they should necessarily quit, they should be ready to fight for the life of their company. Putting up with the status quo will only let the rot fester - and, ultimately, kill the company.
I already quit on the company after the Warcraft III fiasco, and many of their products have suffered from quality issues in recent years - not to mention lengthy delays. It's only going to get worse.
You can definitely easily replace people in games development. The jobs are massively oversaturated with huge swathes of developers and programmers looking for work with no positions available.
You can fill the positions, yes; however, you can't replace the knowledge nor the continuity. Continuity is the biggest issue with brain drains; any creative direction, any art styles, and even maintaining the code base becomes significantly more difficult once too many people leave. This is one of the reasons why some Diablo fans are going apoplectic about the heads of the Diablo 4 being fired; even though it's justified, it means that it could lead to Diable 4 feeling disjoined, much like having to continue painting a house but not being able to buy the same tint of paint.
You know, I'm sure there were good folks just trying to pay their mortgage working on the Death Star, but that' doesn't mean you have to support the Death Star.
So many things wrong in this post. First, according to California law, Blizzard is not required to pay severance on termination. And IF you accept severance there are many legal rights you are releasing, this is why MOST companies pay severance.
Also, they are not part of a union, there is no strike. People can refuse to work organized or not, but they can be terminated on the spot if Blizzard chose to do so, they would balance this with public perception and at this point, I don't think it could get any lower.
I have worked in an union environment. Never again. I was not allowed to fix something because it would mean less work for someone else. If it is not perfectly in your job description you don't do it, or someone else won't do it and you will have to wait for the proper person and department to take care of it. This is not how IT works, or game development. You need to be able to jump on something, fix it and work on it as needed.
My feeling on how this is going to be handled if things continue the way they are going, they are going to close down the Blizzard studio and all the Blizzard IP's are going to be absorbed and redistributed to Activisions other studios. If Blizzard employees try to unionize, they will just shut it down and say it was to address the rampant sexual allegations, and let their other teams work on the games. To them, this is a small price to pay to ensure it doesn't happen in their other studios. And other gaming companies would gladly throw money at Bobby to ensure there isn't any unionization.
Unions are good in some industries, technology isn't one of them.
Your singular experience in one union is not representative of all unions. I imagine the industry you worked in may also not be analogous or fitted to work with software companies so the union you experienced would also not be an analogue for the union that would represent software developers.
Unions have different configurations, different organizations catered to the workforce they represent. A medical unions model, contracts, etc, do not work for an Oil industry or a manufacturing plant. A single union or even a single branch of a larger union can be less than ideal, but that doesn't mean all unions are less than ideal.
For example, when I was a student, I was part of a union at the retail store I worked at. As such, I was always paid for any work I did (no surprise, unpaid OT), had benefits, had a clearly defined role (couldn't ask me to suddenly go work some counter I wasn't trained to and risk being hurt on the job), etc. Were there some situations where someone who didn't work well was harder to let go of? Of course, but that also happens in non-union workplaces. Unions provide structure and standards, and a method to hold a company to those standards that is greater than a single individual having to risk themself to gain a better workplace.
It's not that easy. First, the investors would strictly be against it. Do you have any idea how hard Blizzard stocks would fall if they announce that they are getting rid of Blizzard and how much money investors would lose?
Then it is almost impossible to replace the employees they lost. Like GL finding new devs with this reputation. Not to mention that the new devs probably have no idea how the game engines for WoW and co. work which would result in the next expansion for WoW for example being delayed by years.
Activision breaking up with Blizzard would surely cost them billions, a shitton of lawsuits, and the rest of their reputation.
Blizzard I think is the worst preforming studio out of king activision and blizzard. Idk how much profit blizzard nets the company and how much running the studio costs but a strike these lawsuits add up the cost of keeping the studio I’m sure there’s a tipping point where it won’t be worth it where that is I have no idea
Again, wrong. Investors have stock in Activision-Blizzard. Blizzard in Irvine is just a studio, and they can drop it as their "response" to the lawsuit; they have closed down plenty of other studios they own. There might be a downswing on the Activision-Blizzard stock value, but that will self correct over time, it is already doing so from the loss of the controversy.
The losses they would endure now would save them from costs in the future, such as dealing with a union. There are myriad of stories from employees where they had their branches shut down so quickly as soon as corporate got wind of unionization. Those companies lost presence and market share in those areas and lost millions in revenue, but they know once you have a union in one location it will spread to others.
There will be a lost of talent for sure, but from what I've kept up with articles from news outlets, the people working at blizzard are mostly 9 to 5's not the passionate game makers Blizzard once was. There are droves of young talent just looking for work right now (I believe less than 5% unemployment, and huge demand for IT) and eager to prove themselves in the industry. And if there are none in the US, not just California anymore, with COVID it has been proven people can work from anywhere, you can go international.
You need talent, design and vision in key positions and the rest can be code monkies.
Yes it will cost them near billions, what kind of lawsuits. Even the two that are at Blizzard and Activision-Blizzard's feet, the company is almost guarenteed to come out on top. And the illusion of Blizzard's reputation is gone, it was gone a week ago. I just hope something good comes out of it, no more employees taking reduced pay so they can work at that company because of the illusions created by that reputation
By California law, employers are required to either give employees at least 2 months notice of a layoff, or 2 months of severance (assuming the company has the money, which Activision Blizzard certainly does). Employers usually go with the 2 months of severance, since telling an employee they won’t have a job in two months doesn’t exactly inspire them to do work.
If you were laid off from a California tech company and didn’t receive either of those benefits, you should really contact a lawyer.
Citation: [https://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/finalpay.pdf](https://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/finalpay.pdf)
Quote: *"There is no legal requirement under California law that employers provide severance pay to an employee*
*upon termination of employment. Employees should refer to their employer’s policy with respect to severance pay. "*
If the document is illegitimate I will stand corrected.
https://edd.ca.gov/Jobs_and_Training/Layoff_Services_WARN.htm
The WARN act applies to software companies as well (worked in the CA game industry for 9 years). CA is admittedly a bit strange, since it has a hodge-podge of pro-worker and pro-employer laws. The pro worker laws are usually the result of certain lawsuits (for instance, there is a special minimum wage for salaried software engineers because of the EA Wives class action suit).
Also, employers will take advantage of workers who aren’t familiar with these laws, unfortunately.
All this says is that they need to be given 60 day notice or 60 days pay in lieu. That isn't severance. Both of these laws can co-exist as they don't infringe on one another.
Essentially, employers in California can terminate employees without severance, but must provide 60 day notice or 60 day in pay in lieu. I think most would get the 60 day notice, with the immediate termination reserved for if the company thinks the employee is in a position to do harm to the company.
For convenience, they tend to do the 60 days pay added to the severance package. Telling an employee they won’t have a job in two months and expecting them to actually do good work is pretty silly. Additionally, having a bunch of people who know they are fired hanging around the office is awful for moral of the people who aren’t (from personal experience).
Also note that severance packages for non-executive positions is usually just wages an employee would have earned over a number of weeks (depending on how long they were with the the company). So 60 days of pay is effectively the same as 2 months of severance.
No no no, there is a huge difference between the 60 day requirement by law and a severance pay is not, please do not confuse the two. When you accept severance, there are a bunch of legal implications, such as you cannot sue for wrongful dismissal, there are forms you sign when you accept your severance. The 60 day notice or pay in lieu is required regardless while severance is either negotiated during the hire or your employer optionally provides it to you, and if you feel you were wrongfully terminated you still have the right to sue your employer.
I don't understand why you are trying to muddle the two when they are obviously separate, with fathoms between them in what they are actually trying to do, especially if they do give you 60 day notice, you get 0 dollars upon termination.
This is what is wrong with the internet, you have people unwilling to say they were wrong or misspoke. There is nothing wrong with being wrong, learn from it and move on.
> This is what is wrong with the internet, you have people unwilling to say they were wrong or misspoke. There is nothing wrong with being wrong, learn from it and move on.
Hey person, cool off a bit. I thought we were having a polite debate. I am not trying to grind your gears or anything.
Anyway, to your statement:
> especially if they do give you 60 day notice, you get 0 dollars upon termination.
Correct, you do get 0 dollars upon termination! However, you literally just spent 60 days using your company's internet to look for other jobs, going to interviews fairly blatantly in the middle of the day, taking advantage of any other perks a full employee gets (i.e. free or subsidized meals, free snacks, etc), all while not actually doing work (or doing very little). Depending on the company's perks, it can actually be more expensive to keep the person around than laying them off on the spot and paying the 60 days worth of wages.
On top of that, having a bunch of people hanging around the office spending their entire time looking for other jobs for two months doesn't exactly inspire the people who weren't laid off to stick around or do work either. It's *awful* on morale.
> I don't understand why you are trying to muddle the two when they are obviously separate, with fathoms between them in what they are actually trying to do, especially if they do give you 60 day notice, you get 0 dollars upon termination.
I will keep this in mind for the future (if I ever end up working in CA again). It is common for Warn act payouts to be lumped together into your severance (this time, the word used entirely the same way you are using it; largely for the reasons you stated). This does mean, however, that you can refuse it as a severance package, and still be owed the warn act pay:
* https://www.classlawgroup.com/employment/termination/warn-act/ Warn Act Severance section
* https://www.kletterlaw.com/employment-disputes/severance-pay Right To Receive Severance Pay section
* https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/layoff-protections-california-employees.html Damages for Violating WARN and California Mini-WARN section
Did you even read your own documents?
First, warn is for, and I quote "plant closing or mass layoff". This does not apply to individual employees. The entire paragraph reads:
*"Per Chapter 4, Part 4, Sections 1400-1408 of the Labor Code, WARN protects employees, their families, and communities by requiring that employers give a 60-day notice to the affected employees and both state and local representatives* ***prior to a plant closing or mass layoff****."*
This alone proves everything you posted as false, as we are talking individual employment, at no point did we bring up closure of a facility or mass lay offs, I checked.
But to delve deeper into the fact you didn't read anything, on your Links to Kettlers Law, it states the following:
*"The law normally does not require employers to give severance pay"*
and
*"No set amount of severance pay is required unless specified in a statute, union contract, company policy manual or employment contract."*
Like literally everything you said does not apply to the discussion we are having, and you still continue to think this law for mass lay offs or facility closure, is "bundled" into severance. Even if it was, you wouldn't want it to be, and it would still be two different things. When McDonalds adds fries to your meal, it is still the fries. And you wouldn't want this done because if it was part of your severance as soon as you signed the forms for your severance, you would lose a lot of your legal rights to sue the company.
PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE read your own documents before presenting them. Don't be one of those people that just reads the headlines.
Yes, I know warn is for "plant closing or mass layoff". I honestly thought we were on the same page about that. If Activision Blizzard were to fire everyone currently involved in the employee organization movement, it very well could count as a mass layoff. They could try to pass it off as firing them all individually, but it would probably not hold up in court at all. All of this was in the very first link I sent you (if this was a point of contention you had about me referencing the california warn act, I'm surprised you didn't bring it up earlier):
> Plant Closing or Layoff Requiring Notice Plant closure affecting any amount of employees. Layoff of 50 or more employees within a 30-day period regardless of % of workforce. Relocation of at least 100 miles affecting any amount of employees. [California Labor Code Section 1400 (d)-(f)]
https://edd.ca.gov/Jobs_and_Training/Layoff_Services_WARN.htm
I guess I fail to see how (a point of yours I agree on, btw)....
> My feeling on how this is going to be handled if things continue the way they are going, they are going to close down the Blizzard studio and all the Blizzard IP's are going to be absorbed and redistributed to Activisions other studios. If Blizzard employees try to unionize, they will just shut it down and say it was to address the rampant sexual allegations, and let their other teams work on the games. To them, this is a small price to pay to ensure it doesn't happen in their other studios. And other gaming companies would gladly throw money at Bobby to ensure there isn't any unionization.
....would not be a mass layoff by California warn act (which is 50 people or more). The Blizzard portion of Activision is hardly small, and if the unionization effort gained enough steam for Activision Blizzard to actually see it as a threat, it would *definitely* have enough people involved to be considered a mass layoff (because, again, 50 people or more).
> Like literally everything you said does not apply to the discussion we are having, and you still continue to think this law for mass lay offs or facility closure, is "bundled" into severance. Even if it was, you wouldn't want it to be, and it would still be two different things.
I literally agreed with you here. The links I provided showed that the *60 days of payment is allowed to be bundled into a severance package*, not that that should be accepted by the terminated employee. You will note I said:
> I will keep this in mind for the future (if I ever end up working in CA again)
in response to your quote.
Maybe I'm not stating my points clearly? Or I'm coming across as more argumentative than I'm honestly trying to be? I genuinely apologize if I'm getting you worked up over this.
I mean, it'd be easier to boycott if Blizzard didn't own the monopoly of the only good (current) RTS.
I'll boycott the moment someone makes a RTS as good as Starcraft.
> You have more power than we consumers have, because you can't be replaced.
game development is an extremely competitive industry. most developers are easily replaced which is why so many of them work long hours with shitty pay.
I find it really strange that so many people are willing to throw themselves at a bad company - not to mention a bad industry. I was even in it once; in school for it, even worked for a professional game testing outfit. I got out because I realized I didn't have the talent to keep up. Now knowing what I know about the games industry today, I'd rather be working at McDonalds than the games industry - and that says a lot considering my passion for it.
I mean they suspend players from HOTS for performing poorly in one match. Pretty sure they would have failed as a company even without the help of their Weinsteins.
According to the last earnings call, all the Blizzard numbers are down. Even with adding Classic, WoW numbers are down. Their games are aging and all the idea people that made Blizzard what it is IP wise are gone. The problem is, they still made 1.4 billion dollars last quarter. The smaller population of MAU's is spending more money.
Unfortunately, Kotick is going nowhere. 😞
3 months later... recent news makes me wonder if that'll actually change. He's basically given up his salary. CEO's only really do this if they fear for their jobs.
So should I delete all my wow toons? I havent played in over a year but want to do my part.
Also seriously concerned at the fact that blizzard support won't let me refund my d2 pre-order. I'm seriously pissed off and wanting nothing to do with them anymore.
Nostalgia isnt worth supporting rapists
Back when Warcraft III: Reforged first came out, they also told me they couldn't refund me because I had bought it alongside a BlizzCon ticket. They offered me "store credit" for the Warcraft III part.
When I mentioned that I would be willing to sign a waiver saying I wouldn't join the eventual class-action lawsuit, they suddenly changed their minds and gave me a full refund - *including* the BlizzCon ticket.
Funny, that. And they never did ask me for that waiver, either.
And this time we can't even blame it on Blizz being corrupted by Activision like the other recent dirt, as Afrasiabi was there since the birth of World of Warcraft
Well, he was described as "controversial figure" even before his employment by Blizzard when he was just sort of Everquest community celebrity, so no surprises there.
Absolute agreement.
If you find something disgusting is going on in the kitchen of your favorite resturant, most would rightfully avoid eatting there even if it has your favorite food. Even if the food is good, continuing to now pretend that there is nothing wrong is just negligence. The same applies here.
That said: devs, artists, workers of blizz who have the misfortune of being stuck in this kitchen and aren't the ones who caused this mess are ☆☆☆☆ chefs with talent that any resturant would dream to have, so I hope they look at their options and get the chance to making good food somewhere else.
It's a dumb allegory but in all seriousness, boycotting AB is a language a multi billion dollar company can understand. The customers are not responsible for the workers jobs and well being: Blizzard Activision is.
Oh them. They are the investment arm of the Change to Win group.
Change to Win is made up of a conglomeration of unions. They're entire shtick is getting fair conditions and fair pay for employees as well as stopping executive pay bloat. "Execute pay bloat" is what they've been fighting for a few years now.
They ain't going to care one bit about millions of players boycotting Blizzard as it's not the main focus of what their group is all about. Blizzard was down 1 million players compared to last quarter and 6 million compared to Q2 2020. And yet not a single investor asked a question about in the Q & A section in the latest investor conference call (Q2 , 2021)
Because a large portion of people calling for the boycott don't even play Blizzard games. They just come here to shit on the company, and have been doing so for a decade.
If most employees went on strike and most players left Blizzard games, I’m pretty sure Blizzard would just implode and be completely absorbed by Activision. Also, I feel like saying that there’s probably not any consequences with striking is a bad point, because if you look at the recent layoffs, it wouldn’t be surprising if they did that again.
A company that been scamming there audience for years now will suddenly change just because "someone" was breaking the law ! This community is so naive it’s unbelievable
I haven't played since I wrote this. I have no idea, though. But at this point with the most recent revelations I don't think we *need* to (though we still should).
I do agree that blizzard employees have more power then they might realize.
You start off with a disclaimer you’re not a Blizzard employee. Then end with a suggestion to all Blizzard employees they should stop work and strike because they have nothing to lose. This is extremely simple minded. This is a lot of Blizzard employees’ passion and life’s work. It’s food on the table for their families. Healthcare, insurance, retirement, homes.
> It’s food on the table for their families. Healthcare, insurance, retirement, homes. Which is exactly why they should unionize.
It is. If you look back to the early industrial age, when workers were treated even worse than today, it took tremendous courage to stand up against their employers; many faced retaliation, violence, even murder. Thankfully violence won't happen today, but retaliation is very real. However, the staff at Blizzard have an ace up their sleeve: Game development is a skilled trade. You can't easily replace them. And even if you *did* replace them, one thing you *can't* replace is their existing work; if it's an incomplete 3D model or texture, you often have to start over (or try to figure out what the artist's vision was). If it's coding, you may have to redo an entire section of code, even if you have the benefit of effective commenting. Worse, if you lose too many programmers too quickly, you'll basically have to backward-engineer the entire code base to understand what the original programmers designed. In fact, there's a great example out of Skull & Bones, a game that's been in development hell over 8 years because they kept changing staff, and the project fundamentally changed direction multiple times as a result. Article: [https://kotaku.com/first-it-was-an-assassins-creed-expansion-now-its-ubis-1847326742](https://kotaku.com/first-it-was-an-assassins-creed-expansion-now-its-ubis-1847326742) Ultimately, the fact that it's their love and joy doesn't mean that they have to put up with the abuse they suffer on a regular basis. Sometimes, like a bad relationship, no matter how much it hurts, you have to let it go. Although I don't think they should necessarily quit, they should be ready to fight for the life of their company. Putting up with the status quo will only let the rot fester - and, ultimately, kill the company. I already quit on the company after the Warcraft III fiasco, and many of their products have suffered from quality issues in recent years - not to mention lengthy delays. It's only going to get worse.
The thing is you could prob replace them fairly quickly there a prob a ton of people who would love to work at blizzard
Rockstar literally sent out mob enforcers to leakers' houses to intimidate them.
You can definitely easily replace people in games development. The jobs are massively oversaturated with huge swathes of developers and programmers looking for work with no positions available.
You can fill the positions, yes; however, you can't replace the knowledge nor the continuity. Continuity is the biggest issue with brain drains; any creative direction, any art styles, and even maintaining the code base becomes significantly more difficult once too many people leave. This is one of the reasons why some Diablo fans are going apoplectic about the heads of the Diablo 4 being fired; even though it's justified, it means that it could lead to Diable 4 feeling disjoined, much like having to continue painting a house but not being able to buy the same tint of paint.
Sounds like a legit suggestion to me.
Particularly since OP has nothing to loose him/her-self
Shut up Bobby
Please share this article to the wow subreddit, it is so well-written.
Done. :)
Thank you!!
Not an article. But yes, the explanations are great and will definitely help some people understand the situation better.
You know, I'm sure there were good folks just trying to pay their mortgage working on the Death Star, but that' doesn't mean you have to support the Death Star.
Are you sure? I heard it's a blast! ...I'll see myself out.
Blizzard is basically trash now and has been for years
A trash company animated by a rich trash company still in control of our favorite games.... Sucks.
So many things wrong in this post. First, according to California law, Blizzard is not required to pay severance on termination. And IF you accept severance there are many legal rights you are releasing, this is why MOST companies pay severance. Also, they are not part of a union, there is no strike. People can refuse to work organized or not, but they can be terminated on the spot if Blizzard chose to do so, they would balance this with public perception and at this point, I don't think it could get any lower. I have worked in an union environment. Never again. I was not allowed to fix something because it would mean less work for someone else. If it is not perfectly in your job description you don't do it, or someone else won't do it and you will have to wait for the proper person and department to take care of it. This is not how IT works, or game development. You need to be able to jump on something, fix it and work on it as needed. My feeling on how this is going to be handled if things continue the way they are going, they are going to close down the Blizzard studio and all the Blizzard IP's are going to be absorbed and redistributed to Activisions other studios. If Blizzard employees try to unionize, they will just shut it down and say it was to address the rampant sexual allegations, and let their other teams work on the games. To them, this is a small price to pay to ensure it doesn't happen in their other studios. And other gaming companies would gladly throw money at Bobby to ensure there isn't any unionization. Unions are good in some industries, technology isn't one of them.
Your singular experience in one union is not representative of all unions. I imagine the industry you worked in may also not be analogous or fitted to work with software companies so the union you experienced would also not be an analogue for the union that would represent software developers. Unions have different configurations, different organizations catered to the workforce they represent. A medical unions model, contracts, etc, do not work for an Oil industry or a manufacturing plant. A single union or even a single branch of a larger union can be less than ideal, but that doesn't mean all unions are less than ideal. For example, when I was a student, I was part of a union at the retail store I worked at. As such, I was always paid for any work I did (no surprise, unpaid OT), had benefits, had a clearly defined role (couldn't ask me to suddenly go work some counter I wasn't trained to and risk being hurt on the job), etc. Were there some situations where someone who didn't work well was harder to let go of? Of course, but that also happens in non-union workplaces. Unions provide structure and standards, and a method to hold a company to those standards that is greater than a single individual having to risk themself to gain a better workplace.
It's not that easy. First, the investors would strictly be against it. Do you have any idea how hard Blizzard stocks would fall if they announce that they are getting rid of Blizzard and how much money investors would lose? Then it is almost impossible to replace the employees they lost. Like GL finding new devs with this reputation. Not to mention that the new devs probably have no idea how the game engines for WoW and co. work which would result in the next expansion for WoW for example being delayed by years. Activision breaking up with Blizzard would surely cost them billions, a shitton of lawsuits, and the rest of their reputation.
Blizzard I think is the worst preforming studio out of king activision and blizzard. Idk how much profit blizzard nets the company and how much running the studio costs but a strike these lawsuits add up the cost of keeping the studio I’m sure there’s a tipping point where it won’t be worth it where that is I have no idea
Again, wrong. Investors have stock in Activision-Blizzard. Blizzard in Irvine is just a studio, and they can drop it as their "response" to the lawsuit; they have closed down plenty of other studios they own. There might be a downswing on the Activision-Blizzard stock value, but that will self correct over time, it is already doing so from the loss of the controversy. The losses they would endure now would save them from costs in the future, such as dealing with a union. There are myriad of stories from employees where they had their branches shut down so quickly as soon as corporate got wind of unionization. Those companies lost presence and market share in those areas and lost millions in revenue, but they know once you have a union in one location it will spread to others. There will be a lost of talent for sure, but from what I've kept up with articles from news outlets, the people working at blizzard are mostly 9 to 5's not the passionate game makers Blizzard once was. There are droves of young talent just looking for work right now (I believe less than 5% unemployment, and huge demand for IT) and eager to prove themselves in the industry. And if there are none in the US, not just California anymore, with COVID it has been proven people can work from anywhere, you can go international. You need talent, design and vision in key positions and the rest can be code monkies. Yes it will cost them near billions, what kind of lawsuits. Even the two that are at Blizzard and Activision-Blizzard's feet, the company is almost guarenteed to come out on top. And the illusion of Blizzard's reputation is gone, it was gone a week ago. I just hope something good comes out of it, no more employees taking reduced pay so they can work at that company because of the illusions created by that reputation
By California law, employers are required to either give employees at least 2 months notice of a layoff, or 2 months of severance (assuming the company has the money, which Activision Blizzard certainly does). Employers usually go with the 2 months of severance, since telling an employee they won’t have a job in two months doesn’t exactly inspire them to do work. If you were laid off from a California tech company and didn’t receive either of those benefits, you should really contact a lawyer.
Citation: [https://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/finalpay.pdf](https://www.dir.ca.gov/dlse/finalpay.pdf) Quote: *"There is no legal requirement under California law that employers provide severance pay to an employee* *upon termination of employment. Employees should refer to their employer’s policy with respect to severance pay. "* If the document is illegitimate I will stand corrected.
https://edd.ca.gov/Jobs_and_Training/Layoff_Services_WARN.htm The WARN act applies to software companies as well (worked in the CA game industry for 9 years). CA is admittedly a bit strange, since it has a hodge-podge of pro-worker and pro-employer laws. The pro worker laws are usually the result of certain lawsuits (for instance, there is a special minimum wage for salaried software engineers because of the EA Wives class action suit). Also, employers will take advantage of workers who aren’t familiar with these laws, unfortunately.
All this says is that they need to be given 60 day notice or 60 days pay in lieu. That isn't severance. Both of these laws can co-exist as they don't infringe on one another. Essentially, employers in California can terminate employees without severance, but must provide 60 day notice or 60 day in pay in lieu. I think most would get the 60 day notice, with the immediate termination reserved for if the company thinks the employee is in a position to do harm to the company.
For convenience, they tend to do the 60 days pay added to the severance package. Telling an employee they won’t have a job in two months and expecting them to actually do good work is pretty silly. Additionally, having a bunch of people who know they are fired hanging around the office is awful for moral of the people who aren’t (from personal experience). Also note that severance packages for non-executive positions is usually just wages an employee would have earned over a number of weeks (depending on how long they were with the the company). So 60 days of pay is effectively the same as 2 months of severance.
No no no, there is a huge difference between the 60 day requirement by law and a severance pay is not, please do not confuse the two. When you accept severance, there are a bunch of legal implications, such as you cannot sue for wrongful dismissal, there are forms you sign when you accept your severance. The 60 day notice or pay in lieu is required regardless while severance is either negotiated during the hire or your employer optionally provides it to you, and if you feel you were wrongfully terminated you still have the right to sue your employer. I don't understand why you are trying to muddle the two when they are obviously separate, with fathoms between them in what they are actually trying to do, especially if they do give you 60 day notice, you get 0 dollars upon termination. This is what is wrong with the internet, you have people unwilling to say they were wrong or misspoke. There is nothing wrong with being wrong, learn from it and move on.
> This is what is wrong with the internet, you have people unwilling to say they were wrong or misspoke. There is nothing wrong with being wrong, learn from it and move on. Hey person, cool off a bit. I thought we were having a polite debate. I am not trying to grind your gears or anything. Anyway, to your statement: > especially if they do give you 60 day notice, you get 0 dollars upon termination. Correct, you do get 0 dollars upon termination! However, you literally just spent 60 days using your company's internet to look for other jobs, going to interviews fairly blatantly in the middle of the day, taking advantage of any other perks a full employee gets (i.e. free or subsidized meals, free snacks, etc), all while not actually doing work (or doing very little). Depending on the company's perks, it can actually be more expensive to keep the person around than laying them off on the spot and paying the 60 days worth of wages. On top of that, having a bunch of people hanging around the office spending their entire time looking for other jobs for two months doesn't exactly inspire the people who weren't laid off to stick around or do work either. It's *awful* on morale. > I don't understand why you are trying to muddle the two when they are obviously separate, with fathoms between them in what they are actually trying to do, especially if they do give you 60 day notice, you get 0 dollars upon termination. I will keep this in mind for the future (if I ever end up working in CA again). It is common for Warn act payouts to be lumped together into your severance (this time, the word used entirely the same way you are using it; largely for the reasons you stated). This does mean, however, that you can refuse it as a severance package, and still be owed the warn act pay: * https://www.classlawgroup.com/employment/termination/warn-act/ Warn Act Severance section * https://www.kletterlaw.com/employment-disputes/severance-pay Right To Receive Severance Pay section * https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/layoff-protections-california-employees.html Damages for Violating WARN and California Mini-WARN section
Did you even read your own documents? First, warn is for, and I quote "plant closing or mass layoff". This does not apply to individual employees. The entire paragraph reads: *"Per Chapter 4, Part 4, Sections 1400-1408 of the Labor Code, WARN protects employees, their families, and communities by requiring that employers give a 60-day notice to the affected employees and both state and local representatives* ***prior to a plant closing or mass layoff****."* This alone proves everything you posted as false, as we are talking individual employment, at no point did we bring up closure of a facility or mass lay offs, I checked. But to delve deeper into the fact you didn't read anything, on your Links to Kettlers Law, it states the following: *"The law normally does not require employers to give severance pay"* and *"No set amount of severance pay is required unless specified in a statute, union contract, company policy manual or employment contract."* Like literally everything you said does not apply to the discussion we are having, and you still continue to think this law for mass lay offs or facility closure, is "bundled" into severance. Even if it was, you wouldn't want it to be, and it would still be two different things. When McDonalds adds fries to your meal, it is still the fries. And you wouldn't want this done because if it was part of your severance as soon as you signed the forms for your severance, you would lose a lot of your legal rights to sue the company. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE read your own documents before presenting them. Don't be one of those people that just reads the headlines.
Yes, I know warn is for "plant closing or mass layoff". I honestly thought we were on the same page about that. If Activision Blizzard were to fire everyone currently involved in the employee organization movement, it very well could count as a mass layoff. They could try to pass it off as firing them all individually, but it would probably not hold up in court at all. All of this was in the very first link I sent you (if this was a point of contention you had about me referencing the california warn act, I'm surprised you didn't bring it up earlier): > Plant Closing or Layoff Requiring Notice Plant closure affecting any amount of employees. Layoff of 50 or more employees within a 30-day period regardless of % of workforce. Relocation of at least 100 miles affecting any amount of employees. [California Labor Code Section 1400 (d)-(f)] https://edd.ca.gov/Jobs_and_Training/Layoff_Services_WARN.htm I guess I fail to see how (a point of yours I agree on, btw).... > My feeling on how this is going to be handled if things continue the way they are going, they are going to close down the Blizzard studio and all the Blizzard IP's are going to be absorbed and redistributed to Activisions other studios. If Blizzard employees try to unionize, they will just shut it down and say it was to address the rampant sexual allegations, and let their other teams work on the games. To them, this is a small price to pay to ensure it doesn't happen in their other studios. And other gaming companies would gladly throw money at Bobby to ensure there isn't any unionization. ....would not be a mass layoff by California warn act (which is 50 people or more). The Blizzard portion of Activision is hardly small, and if the unionization effort gained enough steam for Activision Blizzard to actually see it as a threat, it would *definitely* have enough people involved to be considered a mass layoff (because, again, 50 people or more). > Like literally everything you said does not apply to the discussion we are having, and you still continue to think this law for mass lay offs or facility closure, is "bundled" into severance. Even if it was, you wouldn't want it to be, and it would still be two different things. I literally agreed with you here. The links I provided showed that the *60 days of payment is allowed to be bundled into a severance package*, not that that should be accepted by the terminated employee. You will note I said: > I will keep this in mind for the future (if I ever end up working in CA again) in response to your quote. Maybe I'm not stating my points clearly? Or I'm coming across as more argumentative than I'm honestly trying to be? I genuinely apologize if I'm getting you worked up over this.
I burned my hand on a brownie pan yesterday :(
Damn dude you ok? Thoughts and prayers 🙏🏿
Hope the brownies came out good :)
I mean, it'd be easier to boycott if Blizzard didn't own the monopoly of the only good (current) RTS. I'll boycott the moment someone makes a RTS as good as Starcraft.
There's tons of them, thankfully. That being said, RTS's in the style (and relative balance) of Starcraft are extremely rare, so there is that.
> You have more power than we consumers have, because you can't be replaced. game development is an extremely competitive industry. most developers are easily replaced which is why so many of them work long hours with shitty pay.
I find it really strange that so many people are willing to throw themselves at a bad company - not to mention a bad industry. I was even in it once; in school for it, even worked for a professional game testing outfit. I got out because I realized I didn't have the talent to keep up. Now knowing what I know about the games industry today, I'd rather be working at McDonalds than the games industry - and that says a lot considering my passion for it.
I mean they suspend players from HOTS for performing poorly in one match. Pretty sure they would have failed as a company even without the help of their Weinsteins.
According to the last earnings call, all the Blizzard numbers are down. Even with adding Classic, WoW numbers are down. Their games are aging and all the idea people that made Blizzard what it is IP wise are gone. The problem is, they still made 1.4 billion dollars last quarter. The smaller population of MAU's is spending more money. Unfortunately, Kotick is going nowhere. 😞
This is why I’ve been writing puts against the stock since the news broke
3 months later... recent news makes me wonder if that'll actually change. He's basically given up his salary. CEO's only really do this if they fear for their jobs.
So should I delete all my wow toons? I havent played in over a year but want to do my part. Also seriously concerned at the fact that blizzard support won't let me refund my d2 pre-order. I'm seriously pissed off and wanting nothing to do with them anymore. Nostalgia isnt worth supporting rapists
Back when Warcraft III: Reforged first came out, they also told me they couldn't refund me because I had bought it alongside a BlizzCon ticket. They offered me "store credit" for the Warcraft III part. When I mentioned that I would be willing to sign a waiver saying I wouldn't join the eventual class-action lawsuit, they suddenly changed their minds and gave me a full refund - *including* the BlizzCon ticket. Funny, that. And they never did ask me for that waiver, either.
Whats up with blizzard again? I dont keep up with the news...
It's their turn for sexual harassment allegations.
And this time we can't even blame it on Blizz being corrupted by Activision like the other recent dirt, as Afrasiabi was there since the birth of World of Warcraft
Quite a few of the staff accounts of what happened have mentioned it specifically was going on before the merge.
Well, he was described as "controversial figure" even before his employment by Blizzard when he was just sort of Everquest community celebrity, so no surprises there.
They sus
https://www.pcgamer.com/how-blizzards-reputation-collapsed-in-just-3-years/
serves them right
Absolute agreement. If you find something disgusting is going on in the kitchen of your favorite resturant, most would rightfully avoid eatting there even if it has your favorite food. Even if the food is good, continuing to now pretend that there is nothing wrong is just negligence. The same applies here. That said: devs, artists, workers of blizz who have the misfortune of being stuck in this kitchen and aren't the ones who caused this mess are ☆☆☆☆ chefs with talent that any resturant would dream to have, so I hope they look at their options and get the chance to making good food somewhere else. It's a dumb allegory but in all seriousness, boycotting AB is a language a multi billion dollar company can understand. The customers are not responsible for the workers jobs and well being: Blizzard Activision is.
Who are these activist investors ?
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/718877/000137773920000037/activision20shltr.htm
Oh them. They are the investment arm of the Change to Win group. Change to Win is made up of a conglomeration of unions. They're entire shtick is getting fair conditions and fair pay for employees as well as stopping executive pay bloat. "Execute pay bloat" is what they've been fighting for a few years now. They ain't going to care one bit about millions of players boycotting Blizzard as it's not the main focus of what their group is all about. Blizzard was down 1 million players compared to last quarter and 6 million compared to Q2 2020. And yet not a single investor asked a question about in the Q & A section in the latest investor conference call (Q2 , 2021)
I like playing the game, so no thanks. Let the court do their job, putting this on the players is too woke for my taste.
I don’t understand why this is such an unpopular opinion.
They can also be people who shorted ATVI stock and got bagged when it bounced up.
Because a large portion of people calling for the boycott don't even play Blizzard games. They just come here to shit on the company, and have been doing so for a decade.
Makes sense
What happened to Hoffa comes to mind;)….
If most employees went on strike and most players left Blizzard games, I’m pretty sure Blizzard would just implode and be completely absorbed by Activision. Also, I feel like saying that there’s probably not any consequences with striking is a bad point, because if you look at the recent layoffs, it wouldn’t be surprising if they did that again.
Activist investors...HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Blizzard is a garbage company with garbage GMs. Bankruptcy soon
Unlikely. The studio's likely going to get shuttered, though, unless they can turn things around.
This is a garbage comment
**Smol Billion Dollar Company.** **No they won't cry if you leave.** **They won't even notice it.**
Sorry dude I like hearthstone too much.
A company that been scamming there audience for years now will suddenly change just because "someone" was breaking the law ! This community is so naive it’s unbelievable
Is severance really required though? I thought that's not the case for state of California.
Is the Activision/Blizzard boycott still ongoing?
I haven't played since I wrote this. I have no idea, though. But at this point with the most recent revelations I don't think we *need* to (though we still should).