Networky

Posted on | April 26, 2007 | 5 Comments

Rosalind Gill has a new report on new media labour available for free download at the Institute of Network Cultures website. Given the nature of the discussions taking place here over the last few days, it might be of interest to some of you. The report is only a brief introduction, and it mostly focuses on ‘web work’ in Amsterdam, but it points to some issues that have wider relevance for people working in contract-based, high intensity information jobs. These range from the difficulty of knocking off when work is ‘pleasurable’, the pressure to keep pace with technological innovation, whether one can realistically have kids and maintain a career, the risks involved in taking a holiday, and the inability for most new media workers to imagine their future – whether it’s 5 or 15 years from now. These were some of the challenges to traditional labour politics we talked about at the seminar on precarious labour Ros and Andy Pratt organised at LSE last month, and it’s why I’m finding my background in affect theory and feminism surprisingly useful for understanding them. To some extent, I’m swayed by Catherine’s intervention, and wonder whether these are actually the dilemmas of a lucky minority (the report also shows how these web workers are extremely well educated, despite their low pay). And I can’t tell whether it’s great or just alarming to see that Ros’ findings confirm the arguments I’ve been developing from the paper I gave in Canberra last year:

Amongst our 34 respondents, only two reported ever having found work in new media through traditional means of job searching – namely responding to an advertisement. Given that each participant told us about three or four of their work experiences, this amounts to less than 2% of the whole spectrum.

Fundamentally, finding work in new media – in whatever capacity or contractual status – is based on an amalgam between two commonplaces that circulated through our interviews. These were the phrases ‘it’s all down to who you know’ and ‘you are only as good as your last job’. The two could sometimes be in tension, but often worked in concert – particularly in the absence of ‘official accounts’ of workers achievements, such as employer references or formal qualifications (in a context in which, as we have seen, much learning is done informally or ‘on the job’)… the entire economy of work opportunities operates through contacts – people you meet at conferences, parties, drinks evenings, friends of friends, ex-colleagues, etc. (p.25)

Category: Reading, Research, Work

Comments

5 Responses to “Networky”

  1. Catherine
    April 26th, 2007 @ 10:32 pm

    Oh my god, I made an intervention? Who knew? :D

  2. melgregg
    April 27th, 2007 @ 9:11 am

    i thought of other words but then i thought it warranted intervention!

  3. Terry
    April 30th, 2007 @ 2:26 pm

    I’ve also read Ros Gill’s paper with interest. One place where these issues are quite sharp is in the games industry. Students are flocking to Games degrees at present, but it is an industry where working conditions for the majority are notoriously poor, to the point where designers and programmers took up a class action against Electronic Arts in late 2004 (The ‘EA woidows’, or long-suffering firends and partners of EA employees).

    http://archive.southcoasttoday.com/daily/12-04/12-21-04/l02ca275.htm

    Interestingly the industry sort of acknowledges the problems of a permanent ‘crunch time’ and the impact it has on people working in the industry.

    http://www.igda.org/qol/

    In terms of netwroking, from what others tell me about who enrols in the games degree, the ideal networking opportunity would have been the Slayer concert at the Brisbane Riverstage last week. I have never seen so many black-clad metal heads in the Botanical Gardens in my life.

  4. Jason W
    April 30th, 2007 @ 7:21 pm

    WARNING – PLUG. Terry – the issues you talk about are covered in depth in a great piece about the “professional identity of game workers” by Mark Deuze, Chase Martin and Christian Allen in the upcoming special games issue of Convergence (published in November 07, co-edited by Helen Kennedy and yrs trly). They actually talk to game workers directly about the issues you mention, and their voices emerge really clearly in the context of a discussion that thinks through flexibility, crunches, burnout etc. Anyway I won’t spoil the surprise, but I think that this is an area of research that has a long way to run. PLUG ENDS.(Sorry, Mel)

  5. Club Troppo » Missing Link (somewhat belated)
    May 2nd, 2007 @ 11:05 am

    [...] Over at Home-Cooked Theory, there’s talk about how hard it is to find jobs in New Media through traditional avenues. I can’t help wondering if this will flow on into other industries, or if it will remain sector-confined, like getting work for free-lancing of almost any variety. [...]

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