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A Proposal For Unionizing Bloggers
mikesd81 writes "Coloumbia Journal Review writes about the possibility of unionizing bloggers. Chris Mooney writes 'Yes, dear reader: the Bloggers Guild of America may be on its way. The dispute between screen and television writers and media conglomerates has its roots, after all, in the Web.' He says, then, they get zero compensation for their products being distributed over the Internet. 'Bloggers often earn that same salary. There are exceptions, of course, those fortunate few who have become quasi-celebrities in their own right and found themselves, and their sites, snatched up by major media companies,' he goes on to say. He also adds that a bloggers guild could protect a blogger's intellectual property and help ensure they're compensated for it."
Its the best idea ever.
That way we can abuse their rights and they can go on strike!!!
liqbase
It shouldn't come as a shock that people who simply post their opinions publicly so that someone will listen to them would only be paid what those opinions are worth.
they get zero compensation for their products being distributed over the Internet
The vast majority of them earn every penny of that.
...when it's members aren't actually employed. I don't mean bloggers don't have jobs, just that their job isn't generally blogging. A union exists to give workers collective leverage against their employers, who stand to lose economically if a strike is called.
Who loses money if the bloggers go on strike? For that matter, if they weren't blogging, how would we even know they were on strike? By the lack of updates? I doubt the print media would care enough to inform us.
A guild in the sense of a trade organization might make sense, but a union?
You might just as sensibly organize the elephants and have them strike if ivory poaching continues.
It's the hackers thatt need a union, what with all the negative publicity they get when they do naughty stuff.
;)
The Hackers Guild could then provide *protection* to the Bloggers Guild - for a small fee, of course...
"He Who Dares Wins"
apterous.org
Nope. The ability of certain people to invent new ways of making themselves seem important is astounding.
Where, exactly would a group of bloggers create enough value that "we" would be prepared to pay extra to have them continue?
They have no leverage as most of them are hobbyists and do it more for their own benefit and self-image than for anyone else. If they stopped, they would not be missed and there would not be a hole in our lives that needed filling (possibly the reverse!!!)
politicians are like babies' nappies: they should both be changed regularly and for the same reasons
... no one gives a fuck if you go on strike. in fact i would propose that we help them form said union so that we can force them into a permanent strike so that all blogs dry up and my goggle searches can be useful again.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
The reasons many of these laws exist is because of the work done by unions in the past. Moreover the fundamental problem that an employer usually has more power and resources than an employee still stands, this means that if you are subject to unfair or illegal treatment it is still a case of you (with limited resources) against your employer (with more resources), a fight that you may find hard to start let alone win. Unions are supposed to address this imbalance by providing you with the resources and support you need to take an errant employer on.
It should also be noted that there are still issues that unions are fighting on, obviously what these issues are depends on where you look, but they exist. A simple situation that unions can and do address is pay, employers often do not want to pay employee's (especially at the lowest level) what they are worth, sure they will pay the minimum legal wage, they may even pay more than the minimum possible wage, however for an employee to take unilateral action (i.e. protest or demand extra pay on threat of leaving) would be pointless, they would be dismissed and the situation would remain the same, the dismissal serving as a disincentive for any other employee considering the same path. Obviously a union makes it possible for the entire workforce (or the group affected) to take action.
Now that example in the context of the US is usually seen as negative, it is usually assumed that this pressure by unions for higher pay (and often job protection) is unfair on the employer, and in some cases it is, especially when an employer *is* paying a fair wage, or where an employer *Cannot* pay more. In these cases the union should always be looking to protect its members interest, that is to say to safeguard the jobs of its members and achieving the best possible collective agreements, not to harm its members by forcing an employer to become uncompetitive in the marketplace (leading to potential job cuts or insolvency).
So in short, unions are valuable and useful, if, the members of a union have sufficient sway within it (so as to be able to present their views, usually by way of a ballot), and also if the union organisation is rational and reasonable when dealing with employers. Most importantly there should always be good communication between unions and employers, strikes should be avoided and used only as a last resort against uncooperative and abusive employers.
Modern unions also generally provide additional protections and services to members, things like legal advice (not just related to employment) and insurance, due to the fact that they (generally) represent a large pool of employed individuals, they are also in a position to use their size to arrange preferential prices for goods and services (in some cases housing) for their members. Finally they are also a potential ally for an employer who has issues with a particular employee, they are after all a third party and therefore able to give (one would hope) rational and informed (and partially independent) advice and guidance with regard to disciplinary action.
Anyway, unions are a good thing, as long as they are reasonable, every one I have dealt with has been professional and showed common sense in their dealings, although I must say some of the stories I hear coming from the US are that the unions that exist there are not quite set up in the same manner, in some cases apparently acting more a labour cartel than an organisation geared to protect vulnerable workers from exploitation (I hope that that is not a correct picture but simply that horror stories are more fun to tell than stories about successes).
I put PDFs and BibTeX for all of my peer-reviewed papers online. You can read and cite them without going near a for-profit journal, even if that is where they were originally published. If other scientists don't do this, you should complain to them for not exercising their freedoms in a way that benefits you (or just bounce your connection via an HTTP proxy hosted in a university IP range, which gets you access to most things).
Also, bear in mind that the writings of a researcher are typically not regarded as having intrinsic value, they represent something which has value (the research) and are intended as advertising rather than a product. In contrast, the writings of a blogger are their product.
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Well, some bloggers like to think of themselves as free radicals!
Incidentally:
http://membership.acs.org/W/WNY/db2005/db0305.html
'Since I know the chemical profession best, I devised two questions, for instance, to tell a chemist from a nonchemist. Here they are:
(1) How do you pronounce UNIONIZED?
(2) What is a mole?
In response to the first question, the nonchemist is bound to say "YOO-yun-ized," which is the logical pronunciation, and the dictionary pronunciation, too. The chemist, however, would never think of such a thing; he would say without a moment's hesitation: "un- EYE -on-ized."
In response to the second question, the nonchemist is bound to say, "A little furry animal that burrows underground," unless he is a civil engineer who will say, "A breakwater." A chemist, on the other hand, will clear his throat, and say, "Well, it's like this -" and keep talking for hours.
There's my cue. Shall we talk about the chemical version of the little furry animal?"
~~"To Tell a Chemist" Isaac Asimov 1965'
Well that's the trick, isn't it? Blogs are the new soap box, and there's no shortage of people preaching to anyone who will listen (although ironically this is usually just to other bloggers). Sure, most of them are elitist pricks whom, much like many politicians, believe that they serve some vital role in our lives and without which modern society would collapse in on itself like a dying star.
Like modern unions, this is a scam so that a few select people can wield power while deceiving everyone under them into thinking that they are necessary.
Unless someone is paying you to blog, blogging isn't a job. Shit, you certainly don't have to come home from your 9-5 job at Starbucks and blog about every fucking aspect of your life. Saying you want to be compensated for what you produce is like me asking the County to pay me for what I flush down the toilet. If you really do want to make a business out of it then charge for your content. I'm sure within a few, short days you'll realize how completely useless and trite the crap you spew out of your pie-hole is and exactly how little anyone really cares: 0.
I completely blame the media outlets for letting bloggers' egos get so ridiculously inflated to think that the trash they produce is somehow useful or important. People don't care what the 'blogosphere' is saying as they aren't a sample of any group but themselves. For fucks sake, if you want to write something meaningful, become a scientist and publish!
Hmmm... Lets get a look at Germany Unions instead, IG-Metal to be particular.
It's the union that covers all metallurgic works, including car-making.
They actually have a war chest that covers salaries while on strike, so it can go-on for a longer time to FORCE the Bosses to give-in before it cost them their own bonuses.
=> Ig-Metal affiliates are among the best paid in their work line in Europe.
Please remember Capitalism is "rule of the strongest", and that as a worker you have to make it work for you, the lowest link in the pyramid.
"When everything else has failed, give it a kick. It will satisfy a deep urge and sometime even make it work" (Me) - works also quite well for the non-physical world.
It takes 40+ muscles to frown, but only four to extend your arm and bitchslap the motherfucker