#IT COST THEM $14 BILLION + THEIR HAIL MARY - AND THEN THEY FIRED THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE!!!!!!

[lord-radish]

Tens of thousands of people have been fired in the tech sector in the last six months alone. With the economy the way it is, and with people who are already unable to get a job, I wonder how an extra 20,000+ jobseekers are going to have any luck finding work.

#i just want to point out that this isn't just automation. it's different for every company but a lot of it comes down to profiteering imo #the video game industry made disgusting amounts of money during the pandemic. best three years of sales in history #but that momentum was never going to keep up forever. even when the momentum was at full swing people were getting laid off #Activision-Blizzard laid off over a hundred people just before christmas while bobby kotick got a $250 million bonus #thst might have even been before the pandemic #but you're seeing it with microsoft and ubisoft. wouldn't surprise me if sony and nintendo were following suit in a less public manner #microsoft - arguably the biggest tech conglomerate in the world (next to tencent) - laid off 10 thousand workers alone #i live in a town with just over 10 thousand people. in my entire fucking town. in my perspective that's more or less the world around me #all of those people - jobless #facebook - didn't like 7k people just get fired? that's hot on the heels of john carmack leaving too #john carmack is probably one of the top 100 people in the tech industry. his tech improvements helped aging PC hardware keep up for years #DOOM might be a meme but it ran that well because id software under john carmack revolutionised rendering techniques and scrolling #and stuff like that. john carmack has been at the forefront of graphical technology and game development for 30+ years #that's resulted in a couple duds like RAGE. he was also all-in on voxel technology before he moved into VR #all of that was context for this: john carmack left meta (who bought oculus) and lambasted the company for poor management on the way out #saying that he'd never seen such unnecessary and wanton expenditure in his career. meta were throwing their money at things thay don't work #here's john carmack trying to lay the groundwork of a successful game for meta's metaverse. here's meta chasing superfluous buzzwords #meta spent almost $14 BILLION on buzzwords and marketing at the behest of the actual tech. and then they FIRED 7000 PEOPLE!!!!!! #they had a HAIL MARY working on their game - because metaverse IS A GAME - and they prioritised SELLING THE PRODUCT BEFORE BUILDING IT #IT COST THEM $14 BILLION + THEIR HAIL MARY - AND THEN THEY FIRED THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE!!!!!! #Ubisoft and Activision-Blizzard have been facing mass resignations after years of abusive and toxic workplaces #and on top of that they're firing people too. google stadia just went under. it wouldn't surprise me if 2k and rockstar were firing people #I don't know how many other unemployed people there are in america - hundreds of thousands? but 20k more is even worse for everyone #keep in mind that even with a $14 billion loss - meta still makes billions. Microsoft is in no financial danger #tech is more lucrative now than ever. i genuinely believe that these cuts are to keep record profits at record heights #because the pandemic boom is ending and their ALREADY OBSCENELY LUCRATIVE revenue flows are going back to normal #so 20k+ tech workers are losing their jobs to keep $80 billion instead of $79 billion. all of those people - jobless #that's 20 thousand people with individual lives and families and expenses. lost their jobs in the last six months #that example i gave - $80 billion instead of $79 billion. that's not revenue. that's profit. #all of those people out of work due to incompetence at best and rank orofiteering at worst. their salaries and benefits come under revenue