My gut answer is “yes!!!” or “revolution” but I want to hear what y’all think. For those unware, some creative professions such as film writers get paid a small portion of all revenue generated by their work after it’s been produced, which is called a “residual,” and it’s part of their current fight with hollywood not properly paying those residuals due to the streaming loophole.
Since most programs that are profitable are based on the work of long gone developers (basically capital that gets worked on by machine labour), I think this might be a great demand for an eventual software development union.
What do y’all think?
Fair points!
I think the perspective I’m going with this is more of a reformist socdem-ish “current conditions” one rather than the ideal world after a revolution. A lot of my colleagues had to jump straight from job to job without time to re-orient themselves, or even work without vacations for years for fear of being “let go” under the gig economy situation that is enforced particularly on poorer people. And it’d be very hard to enforce paid time off on freelancing afaik.
So the intent behind the idea is less of a “I will make a blockbuster app and make millions” but rather a “I’ll be able to afford rent even if I get fired.” But once we get to the point where people aren’t thrown on the streets for being unemployed, I definitely agree that residuals (or the concept of IP or non-FOSS software for that matter) shouldn’t be maintained.
The writers (and their current fight with AMPTP) are direct inspiration specifically because of how it was one of their strongest demands in the 70s and from what I heard it really made their lives more liveable, and it seems to be a pretty similar job structure to software development. A good intersection of those is the game dev industry, that is structured around hiring as many fresh developers, overworking them and then laying them off once the game is done. AFAIK they don’t have any residuals guaranteed by law, and their working conditions are generally pretty hellish being part of the biggest entertaining industry.
It’s a strange balance to make on a software union, because freelancing is not entirely a bad thing (i.e. more flexible hours and work from home by default), but a lot of already established STEM unions are explicitly against it and that puts off a lot of people from organising. Specially those who really need that freelancing job for their own particular reasons. I’m kinda trying to think of ways to reconcile those two very different forms of software work in my head in a way that doesn’t hurt either of them. I would be happy to hear more suggestions or feedback.