A new report claims that Grand Theft Auto giant Rockstar’s recent dismissal of 34 staff for “gross misconduct” was triggered by external discussion of the studio’s Slack policies.
That’s according to People Make Games, which has published a new video claiming that staff were let go after talking about changes to the company’s Slack rules in an invite-only Discord server. This closed forum was created in 2022 for Rockstar members who were showing an interest in unionisation, and contained reps from the Independent Workers of Great Britain (IWGB) union. Discussion between reps and union members took place in secure channels, but there was a general channel used by unionised and non-unionised employees.
In early October, Rockstar shuttered a number of internal Slack channels where employees could discuss hobbies and interests, citing concerns about their impact on productivity. One of these channels was a games forum which had been used to post industry news, such as the numerous layoffs across the industry in the last few years. A subsequent change restricted what Rockstar staff could put in their status messages on Slack.
Rockstar has, perhaps understandably, restricted staff from accessing their email from outside the office. When the emails were sent detailing changes to Slack policies, some UK workers were not at the office, so staff who did have access posted their content into the Discord for others to read. One member of staff, it is claimed, went to Rockstar management to express concern at these emails being discussed, which prompted an investigation of the Discord server.
34 staff in the server were subsequently dismissed for what Rockstar and parent company Take-Two Interactive described as “gross misconduct”.
Members who spoke to People Make Games couldn’t recall any instances of anyone sharing confidential information in the server, but said there was discussion of topics like salaries.
“I think it is absolutely normal for people to be discussing their material conditions, whether that’s bonuses, whether that’s policies, whether that’s anything like that,” IWGB president Alex Marshall told People Make Games.
“That’s completely normal for staff to be doing that and for an employer to respond in a way that comes down so hard on that shows not only that they are governing by this lack of transparency, but they’re also trying to govern by fear. They feel completely threatened by the idea of workers talking to each other and that’s why they’ve taken this act to try and destroy the union, decimate any form of kind of solidarity being built between workers.”
Asked for comment by People Make Games, Take-Two declined to add anything new to the statements it had made previously on the matter. It’s possible that even external sharing of innocuous-seeming internal communications like the notification of the Slack policy change could have been considered a contractual violation, but no details have been provided.
The IWGB union has claimed that Rockstar was union busting when it fired the affected staff – something the company denies – and has filed a wrongful dismissal case against the Grand Theft Auto giant.
Since, over 200 members of Rockstar North employees have signed a letter asking for the impacted workers to be reinstated, while affected staff have held protests in London and Edinburgh.
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