Should Bloggers Unionize?

Originally Posted by Bradylama

If you blog and don't make money off of it, it's a hobby. If you blog and do make money off of it, it's a business. One that the blogger owns and has full creative control over.

A blogger's union would be like Rockefeller and Carnegie forming an Industrialist's Union.

My grandfather was a union organizer for the machinists and would not shut up about it. So I like to think that I know (through no fault of my own) a fair bit about unions and what they're supposed to do and how they're supposed t work. With that in mind:

This is an idiotic idea. The point of a union is to provide a way for workers to collectively bargain so they don't get completely assfucked by management. You don't need a union if: 1) you're not getting assfucked, or 2) there is no management.

A bloggers union would be like the employees of a startup -- all 5 of them -- forming a union.

"Uh, so who do we do our collective bargaining with, Tom?"
"Fuck if I know. Pass the chips."

DailyKos has a "community" that is almost as incestuous as GFF, if not more so. It surprises me not one bit that something retarded like this came out of there.

If they're looking for "journalistic integrity," they should form some sort of guild or industry group -- basically an invite-only organization that would make sure the people they allowed in weren't complete cocksnugglers.

Of course that's far, far too rational for the people at DK.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

Originally Posted by Bradylama

Except they're not even startups, they aren't in business with each other. Every blog that makes a profit is essentially its own proprietorship.

Good point.

So we even already have other organizations with a multitude of names that are the exact same thing: trade councils, industry group, etc. If you want to get nasty you could start using words like Cartel, but I don't think we're quite there yet.

That implies a certain level of ... influence and/or competence.

There's nowhere I can't reach.