Andrew Gorry

What is California going to do to stand up for the UC system?

These Wisconsin video game workers were first to unionize at a major U.S. studio. Three years later, they have a contract. The deal at Raven Software in Middleton affects quality assurance testers, some of the video game industry’s lowest-paid workers. It caps a saga that included a strike and a purchase by Micro…

Congrats on getting to a collective bargaining agreement. Sad it took 3 years.

Mandatory arbitration of first contracts in newly-certified units would end the effectiveness of stalling, bad-faith bargaining tactics.
wisconsinwatch.org/2025/08/thes...

New Yorkers favor rent stabilization and social housing to solve housing crisis, new poll shows The poll from Housing Justice for All and Data for Progress found New Yorkers would be more likely to vote for candidates who back tenant protection measures.

New polling shows that 69% of New Yorkers would be more likely to support a candidate who backed rent stabilization, and 68% would be more likely to support a candidate who backed public investments in social housing.

www.cityandstateny.com/politics/202...

Sounds like Trump really does not want Mamdani to become mayor. 🤔

The president has been briefed by Mark Penn, a pollster who has worked for Bill and Hillary Clinton, and Andrew Stein, a former New York City Council president and decades-long friend of Mr. Trump, on a range of polling that showed Mr. Cuomo could still be competitive as an independent candidate. Both men have pushed Mr. Cuomo as the best candidate despite his loss in the Democratic primary, including in a recent Wall Street Journal op-ed. One of Mr. Penn’s firms did extensive work for a pro-Cuomo super PAC in the primary. And in a previously undisclosed call in recent weeks, Mr. Trump spoke about the race directly with Mr. Cuomo, an old associate and foil, according to three people briefed on the call, who were not authorized to discuss it.

Bombshell report from The New York Times reveals that President Donald Trump spoke directly to Andrew Cuomo about how to stop Zohran Mamdani from becoming NYC mayor. www.nytimes.com/2025/08/06/n...

Raven Software Workers Secure First Contract at Microsoft The contract builds on the recent organizing momentum by Microsoft video game workers organizing with CWA to raise standards across the video game industry.

In 2022, Raven Software workers became the first unit at Activision Blizzard to form a union.

Now, they've secured a first contract ensuring wage increases and the elimination of mandatory crunch. #unionstrong 💪

All major Las Vegas Strip casinos are now unionized in historic labor victory The Culinary Workers Union representing 60,000 hospitality workers in Nevada has achieved a historic victory on the Las Vegas Strip.

The Culinary Workers Union representing 60,000 hospitality workers in Nevada has achieved a historic victory on the Las Vegas Strip. For the first time in its 90-year history, all major casinos on the Strip are unionized.

For the overwhelming majority of people who practice it, sports is not about competition. It's about social belonging. Once you understand that, the reason why transphobes want to ban trans women from it even outside of competition and even in disciplines like darts is pretty obvious.

say it again:

4 million people work in higher ed, the largest employer in 10 states, second largest employer in 10 more, and in 60 of the 100 biggest cities

demolishing higher education is economic sabotage

With Trump about to try to fake economic stats, it's not very helpful for leftists to say they were already cooked. They're not. I follow this stuff very closely and have for years. They're very good and assembled by civil servants who take their jobs very seriously.

More attention here please.

This isn't a list of jobs that A.I. can easily replace.

It's a list of jobs that techno fascists don't think are worthwhile or meaningful and that they want to eliminate.

They don't want humans to try to make sense of the world, they want us to believe whatever we're told.

Also ... do we really believe LLMs can replace human customer service agents? By the time I've contacted a customer service agent to ask for help, I have a problem that can't be solved by scraping the web. The AI "agents" I've seen so far are nothing more than FAQs with reduced visibility.

I predict that in the next 5-10 years a lot of people making decisions like this are going to try and hold on to their positions of power like none of this happened, and it’s on every one of us to make sure they are shamed out of public life forever

gift link here courtesy of Josie

Al-Baqa Cafe massacre: Shattered dreams and Israel’s destruction of a haven for Gaza’s Palestinians At least 41 people were killed on June 30 in Israel’s attack on Al-Baqa Cafe, a beloved seaside cafe in Gaza

On June 30, an Israeli airstrike dropped a 500-lb, U.S.-made bomb on the seaside Al-Baqa Cafe. Eyewitnesses described the scene as absolute carnage, the floor drenched in blood. Among those killed were attendees of a child’s birthday party, cafe employees, & multiple students, Asma Barakat reports.

Travelers to the U.S. must pay a new $250 'visa integrity fee' — what to know Travelers to the U.S. must pay a new "visa integrity fee" to visit, but questions remain as to how and when it will be implemented. Here's what we know so far.

A lot of people in other countries have certainly already lost their desire to visit the US right now, but I'm sure this will help.

reposted with alt text! FUCK EM UP, WGA

this merger needs to be stopped

Someone on a Discord mentioned they looked like Zod and his gang, so I just had to...

Updating Massachusetts' Shield Law is critical to defending reproductive and gender-affirming health care - and the providers who deliver it - at a time when attacks on these rights are escalating.

I'm proud to see the House and Senate pass legislation doing just that.

Young refuseniks burn their IOF draft papers in the middle of Tel Aviv

They refuse to serve in the Israeli Occupation Forces, and are willing to go to military jail for their position. The new generation of refuseniks is supported by the older, many of them spent months in jail already

repost if you're part of the anti-newsom troll farm network

This is probably right, and if workers in higher ed want that number to go up we need to stand up and fight for ourselves in a way that the public can see. Moral and transactional arguments are important, but respect in the public sphere will be earned through struggle. We have so much to fight for!

All that relentless complaining about "the groups" and "leftists online" undermining the Democratic party but we can't get leadership to endorse the actual winner of the Dem primary over a sex pest, a crook, and a Republican in a beret. Our leadership is toxic as hell and needs to go ASAP.

I never understand all the performative sympathy for the immediate kin and social ties of objectively horrible people. You realize that generally they flock together right? I mean don’t hurt the minors but all of us grow up on the halo of our parents’ reputation. It’s a vital feedback loop for you.

just smashing the "Americans actually hate the realities of mass deportation and we should be hitting R's on it, not running away from it" button again and again

Erik Loomis’ (@erikloomis.bsky.social) review of Union Booms and Busts: The Ongoing Fight over the U.S. Labor Movement (Oxford University Press) by Judith Stepan-Norris and Jasmine Kerrissey

doi.org/10.1215/1547...

I wonder how X and Grok is doin-.....jfc

@moderation.bsky.app suspended our director, Evan Greer's Bluesky account for speaking out about an awful experience from a transphobic bigot...is @bsky.app on the way to becoming the next Twitter/X ?

Re-skeet + demand Bluesky unsuspend her account!