Game dev union members marched at GDC to propose a 'Game Workers' Bill of Rights'

Developers and members of the United Videogame Workers of CWA union marched through the Game Developers Conference on Wednesday, a demonstration similar to the one held at last year's GDC. This year, UVW organizers are announcing a campaign demanding protection for game workers from ICE in the US and sharing a draft of their planned "Game Workers' Bill of Rights."

UVW members hosted a game worker union campaigns panel along with members of the ZeniMax QA union and World of Warcraft team union, covering topics like how to organize within a studio and future plans of the UVW. After the talk, developers joined together to march to the Yerba Buena Gardens, a space that itself is a bit controversial this year as some developers are frustrated by GDC cordoning off portions of a space that was always a public gathering area in the past.

The group of around 50 developers chanted "videogames are worker-made" and "game workers united will never be defeated." Out at Yerba Buena, organizers shared a first draft of their "Bill of Rights," a set of universal protections that it plans to help shop unions like the ones at Blizzard and ZeniMax bargain for and even use as a template for new unions or freelancers to advocate for themselves using.

Suggested protections in the bill of rights handed out include protections from AI use being required by companies or used as replacement for workers, anti-crunch policies, and protections for remote workers. It also suggests protections for workers in the US who are immigrants and could be targeted by ICE agents.

It's a busy week for UVW-CWA which is announcing a wider "We don't play with ICE campaign," this week as well and has announced a free Gamer Workers Conference to be held online in May this year.