{"id":2458,"date":"2025-10-16T16:28:30","date_gmt":"2025-10-16T16:28:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/?p=2458"},"modified":"2025-11-12T15:15:18","modified_gmt":"2025-11-12T15:15:18","slug":"activision-blizzard-battle-net-workers-unionise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/index.php\/2025\/10\/16\/activision-blizzard-battle-net-workers-unionise\/","title":{"rendered":"Activision Blizzard Battle.net workers unionise"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" alt=\"photograph of statue in front of activision blizzard campus\" class=\"wp-image-213310 lazyload\" data-src=\"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/1677872874874-large.png\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Image Credit: Activision Blizzard<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<div id=\"esi-paragraph-6914a480709b5\" class=\"esi-paragraph \">\n<p>Nearly 400 workers within <strong>Activision Blizzard<\/strong>&#8216;s Platform &amp; Technology department have voted to form a union with the Communications Workers of America (CWA), representing the company&#8217;s latest expansion of organised labour.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"esi-paragraph-6914a48071012\" class=\"esi-paragraph \">\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/cwa-union.org\/news\/releases\/activision-blizzards-platform-and-technology-workers-form-union-communications\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">newly organised units<\/a> include the engineers, designers and support staff who maintain Battle.net \u2014 the platform powering esports competitions for Overwatch 2, Hearthstone and StarCraft II. Workers voted either through union authorisation cards or an online portal, with representation split between CWA Local 9510 in Irvine, California and CWA Local 6215 in Austin, Texas.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"keep-reading \" id=\"kr-6914a48072057\">\n<div class=\"heading section__title \"><span>Keep Reading<\/span><\/div>\n<ul class=\"d-flex flex-column\">\n<li id=\"post-137509\"><a href=\"https:\/\/esportsinsider.com\/2023\/04\/activision-blizzard-salary-lawsuit\">Activision Blizzard settles esports salary cap lawsuit<\/a><\/li>\n<li id=\"post-64172\"><a href=\"https:\/\/esportsinsider.com\/2021\/04\/activision-blizzard-sport1-explansion\">Activision Blizzard expands media rights deal with SPORT1<\/a><\/li>\n<li id=\"post-60364\"><a href=\"https:\/\/esportsinsider.com\/2021\/02\/activision-research-esports-receptive-advertising\">Activision Blizzard conducts research, finds esports fans more receptive to advertising<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"esi-paragraph-6914a4807342f\" class=\"esi-paragraph \">\n<p>Battle.net serves as the critical infrastructure for Blizzard&#8217;s esports ecosystem, managing online services, tournament systems, in-game purchases and account management that millions of competitive players rely on daily.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"esi-paragraph-6914a48073b86\" class=\"esi-paragraph \">\n<p>Microsoft has recognised both unions, with the vote occurring just before the expiration of the labour neutrality agreement between Microsoft and CWA this week. The agreement, signed in 2022 during Microsoft&#8217;s $68.7bn (~\u00a352.7bn) acquisition of Activision Blizzard, streamlined the unionisation process for game workers at the company.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"esi-paragraph-6914a4807422d\" class=\"esi-paragraph \">\n<p>Daniel Weltz, Principal Software Engineer and organising committee member, highlighted retention concerns driving the unionisation effort: &#8220;I&#8217;ve been at Blizzard for nearly 20 years, and I&#8217;ve seen so many incredible colleagues in the industry come and go for preventable reasons \u2014 either for better compensation or as a result of layoffs. <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"esi-paragraph-6914a480748e6\" class=\"esi-paragraph \">\n<p>&#8220;Our culture is our people, and we can&#8217;t afford to lose that.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"esi-heading-6914a48074fad\" class=\"esi-heading \">\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><span id=\"ever_more_changes_for_microsoft-2\">Ever More Changes for Microsoft<\/span><\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<div id=\"esi-paragraph-6914a480756e9\" class=\"esi-paragraph \">\n<p>The move follows significant workforce reductions at Microsoft&#8217;s gaming division, including 1,900 positions eliminated in January. Alex Kohn, Senior Data Scientist and organising committee member, referenced these cuts directly: &#8220;After seeing so many hard-working, passionate coworkers laid off, we are excited to have greater control over our workplace to minimise the suffering caused by future layoffs in the industry.&#8221; <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"esi-paragraph-6914a48075d90\" class=\"esi-paragraph \">\n<p>This is not the first unionisation amongst the company&#8217;s workforce, with several divisions having done so previously, <a href=\"https:\/\/esportsinsider.com\/2025\/08\/450-more-blizzard-developers-unionise-following-microsoft-layoffs\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">including the Diablo team less than two months ago.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"esi-paragraph-6914a480764b1\" class=\"esi-paragraph \">\n<p>Jason Justice, President of CWA Local 9510, commented on the broader implications: &#8220;With each new Blizzard unit organising, California continues to become the proving ground for tech and video game power. <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"esi-paragraph-6914a48076ba2\" class=\"esi-paragraph \">\n<p>&#8220;Workers here are redefining what it means to work in entertainment \u2014 moving from passion alone to power through solidarity.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"esi-paragraph-6914a4807726f\" class=\"esi-paragraph \">\n<p>Job security emerged as a recurring theme among organizers. Timothy Biley, Senior Quality Analyst and organizing committee member, cited multiple factors behind the push. He explained that &#8216;talented coworkers&#8217; have left the company due to layoffs, unfair compensation and unmet accommodations.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div id=\"esi-paragraph-6914a48077a9e\" class=\"esi-paragraph \">\n<p>The successful vote coincides with the announcement of United Videogame Workers-CWA (UVW-CWA), an industry-spanning union designed to build power across the gaming sector regardless of employer or employment status. <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>The post <a href=\"https:\/\/esportsinsider.com\/2025\/10\/activision-blizzard-battle-net-workers-unionise\">Activision Blizzard Battle.net workers unionise<\/a> appeared first on <a href=\"https:\/\/esportsinsider.com\">Esports Insider<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Image Credit: Activision Blizzard Nearly 400 workers within Activision Blizzard&#8216;s Platform &amp; Technology department have voted to form a union with the Communications Workers of America (CWA), representing the company&#8217;s latest expansion of organised labour. The newly organised units include the engineers, designers and support staff who maintain Battle.net \u2014 the platform powering esports competitions for Overwatch 2, Hearthstone and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2460,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2458"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2458\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2461,"href":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2458\/revisions\/2461"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2460"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.declareitspiritwear.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}