Money, it turns out, can’t buy you friends. Besieged by employee calls to #CancelTheContract with CBP, Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff offered to donate $250,000 to Texas nonprofit RAICES, to draw attention away from the contract. RAICES refused the donation, sending shockwaves through the industry: “We will not be a beneficiary of your effort to buy your way out of ethical responsibility.”

News from the border, meanwhile, has only gotten worse, as children have given firsthand accounts to media of their abuse in so-called detention facilities. Their stories include violent abuse and threats of sexual violence, among other heinous atrocities. We will not stand by as our employers continue to support these organizations. 

As tough as things are right now, our spirits are lifted by the words of the late, great labor organizer William Sylvis (1828-1869): “Single handed we can accomplish nothing, but united there is no power of wrong that we cannot openly defy.”

On Wednesday, the clock turned back 100 years, as police in Spain attacked peacefully demonstrating Amazon warehouse workers, over 96% of whom had joined together in a strike against the Seattle tech giant. The workers were demonstrating for better wages and improvements to what are grueling, abusive working conditions. The strength of this strike dramatically slowed Amazon’s ability to meet Prime Day demand, while the overwhelming display of violence by Spanish police demonstrated that we really are in a new Gilded Age.

While Amazon workers endured brutal violence in Spain while fighting for their rights, locally, over 100 members of the San Jose community came out to block the doors of the Amazon store and tell Amazon that we are not standing by while they help ICE and make facial recognition software for police. Workers around the world are waking up to the fact that all of these issues are connected.

If it’s all still got you down, try reading The Only Amazon Prime Day Guide You Need. Here’s a preview:

First, buy this 50 pack of Pacon Super Value Poster Board and a pack of black Sharpie Magnum Permanent Markers. Write “UNION” on each poster. Unionize your coworkers in the Amazon warehouse.

Fill your WolfWarriorX Military Tactical Assault Backpack with Military Surplus MREs and Purified Drinking Water. Now you’re ready to march. These KARKEIN Military Tactical Boots Army Combat Jungle Boots are suitable for all genders. Lace em up, gather all your union friends, and march your ass down to Washington, DC. Your destination is Jeff Bezos’ house, at 2320 and 2330 S Street NW. You can’t miss it—it’s the biggest fucking house in town.

And lastly, workers are keeping the heat on Microsoft. Marchers in Atlanta showed up at a Microsoft store to demand “No tech for ICE!”. Read their demands here and find a petition delivery near you.

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Upcoming Events

Game Workers United Bay Area Social
Saturday, 7/21 3PM at Biergarten in San Francisco
More info

Seattle Open Forum: #TechWontBuildIt
Saturday, 7/21 3:30PM at Douglass Truth Branch of The Seattle Public Library in Seattle
Facebook

Learning Club: Labor Law for Rank and Filers
Saturday, 7/21 4PM at Unite Here! Local 2 in San Francisco
Meetup

TWC at the Beach!
Sunday, 7/22 2PM at Golden Gardens Park in Seattle

Seattle Learning Club: Cold Calling the Revolution
Saturday, 7/28 3PM at Capitol Hill Branch of The Seattle Public Library in Seattle
Facebook • Reading materials

The Code of Conduct is in effect at all TWC events.

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In The News

On Wednesday the New York State labor review board ruled that Uber drivers are employees in what is considered a “precedental” loss for Uber. Read the full release from the New York Taxi Workers Alliance.

Uber is under EEOC investigation for gender discrimination.

Sierra Club employees are agitated and demanding answers from their executive director for playing social media pawn for Elon Musk. Musk called the director to ask him to “vouch for him on Twitter to quell a firestorm” over his recent financial contribution to congressional Republicans.

Counter to Facebook’s claims that they are cutting down fake news and hate speech, a new documentary reveals a “hands-off approach” to racist and hateful content.

Amazon “foes” Walmart and Microsoft partner up.

BuzzFeed News has obtained internal Facebook “presentations and memos that show the social media giant viewed Trump’s campaign as an ‘innovator’ of a fast-moving, test-oriented approach to marketing on Facebook. In the days following Donald Trump’s election victory over Hillary Clinton, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg placed a secret, previously unreported call to the president-elect during which, sources told BuzzFeed News, he congratulated the Trump team on its victory and successful campaign.”

Execs including Elon Musk and founders of DeepMind (Google’s AI subsidiary) have signed a pledge promising not to develop lethal autonomous weapons. 

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Song Of The Week

Wolfgang Tillmans - Device Control (official video)

With this Apple appliance, you can capture live videos
Still motion pictures shot at high frequency
Blurring, blurring the line between still and motion
With this Apple device
You can blur the border between still and motion pictures
You can blur the border between still and motion pictures
With this Sony Telephone 4K video is in your palm
It is in your palm, in your palm
In your hand, in your hand
With your eyes, with your eyes
You can capture real 4K
With this Samsung telephone, we don’t call it telephone
I think I saw billboards describing life interactivity
Life sharing, live posting, streaming off your videos
The new Samsung Galaxy allows you to livestream your life
Livestream your life, livestream your life
You can blur the border between still and motion pictures
You can still stream you life
Your life can be streamed
In endless communication
We all show interest in everybody’s life
Your life can be streamed
Life, your life can be streamed
Life, life
You can blur the border between still and motion pictures
You can blur the border between still and motion pictures
You can blur the border between still and motion pictures
You can blur the border
With this device, the border between still and motion pictures is absolutely blurred
Think of the possibilities, think of the possibilities
Think of the possibilities….with this…
Think of…the…possibilities
With this device, stream your life, it’s possible
Streaming life in this device is possible
Streaming life in this device is possible
Streaming life in this device is possible
Streaming life in this device is possible
Streaming life in this device is possible
It’s in your palm, dreams of pleasure in your hand
This device in your hand, streaming life in streams of pleasure
Blurred, still and motion, audio
Your life is an active stream of life
This stream of life, on this device Is causing an interactive stream of life
This stream of life, on this device Is causing a streamed life
A live stream of my life
Is caused by this device
By this device
An internet
Scheiß Ja, so ein großes device
Das schafft einen stream of life