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Wikimedia Foundation Workers Overwhelmingly Vote to Form Union with CWA

Wikimedia Foundation Workers Overwhelmingly Vote to Form Union with CWA

robin_reala

Comments (68)

  • dbingham
    Lots of people asking "Why?". They say so right on their site: There are big changes happening in the technology industry and they are acting pro-actively to ensure the workers have a strong collective voice in the ways the foundation chooses to respond to those changes."The Wikimedia Foundation and the broader technology and nonprofit sectors are navigating a period of significant change. From rapid advances in artificial intelligence to evolving organizational priorities and external pressures, and changing patterns of readership and discovery, the decisions being made today will shape our workplace for years to come. Our union members believe this is the right moment to establish a lasting, legally recognized voice in those conversations. Rather than waiting until difficult decisions are made, we are organizing now to help build a stronger Foundation that can meet future challenges through collaboration, transparency, and shared stewardship."https://wikiworkersunited.org/faq/
  • cm2012
    Everyone wants a piece of the wikipedia gravy train.In 2010: Wikimedia Foundation annual expenses were about $20mIn 2025: Wikimedia Foundation annual expenses are about $200mThe story of Wikipedia of the last 10 years especially is endlessly higher spending for a very stable number of monthly users (1.5b or so). You can make the case that 80% of this spend is not necessary to what the average users donating to Wikipedia think of as "wikipedia".It makes sense for the employees to want to lock in their share of the bag.
  • tux3
    Short statement from the WMF in response: https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2026/09/03/us-staff-uni...They seem to say they'll accept the outcome and pledge to engage in good-faith. Which is the only correct response, really, so time will tell if these words are more than generic PR.
  • spindump8930
    Commenters in these discussions always confuse wikipedia editors with Wikimedia employees - this is the latter!
  • pwillia7
    Hell yeah -- and on labor day weekend too.
  • tracerbulletx
    Unions should just rebrand as employee owned corporations that sell labor.
  • iamnothere
    As long as they don’t attempt to force the editorial side of Wikipedia to implement an ideological slant, or otherwise interfere with the NPOV policy, more power to them.
  • declan_roberts
    These unions don't even fight against H-1B, what's the point when when your employer can slowly replace you with a worker they have dramatically more control over?
  • echelon
    Is Wikipedia a bad place to work or something?I'd imagine it must be pretty relaxed/cushy, albeit probably at the lower end of market comp for software jobs in particular.Does the union stipulate the workers cannot be replaced with AI?
  • NoImmatureAdHom
    [flagged]
  • disdegeneration
    [flagged]