Berlin Tech Worker News

🎉 TWC Berlin turns 3 years old 🥳 Join new and former TWC members for a reflection on what's happened over the last 3 years of TWC - what have we accomplished? what have we learned? what's next? 📆 June 30 @ Südblock (Admiralstraße 1-2) ⏰ 19:00-20:00 - reflection & meeting from 20:00 - get to know others interested in tech organizing this is an open meeting for anyone interested, so bring friends/colleagues See u there!

Exciting news HelloFresh workers in Berlin are forming a Works Council! Unfortunately management seem to mix up their understanding of USA union-busting with German codetermination. https://twitter.com/TechWorkersBER/status/1534177541107458049

Support Getir riders of the newly formed https://twitter.com/GetirWorkers Collective against a management dominated event today Where: Koppenstraße 93, 10243 Berlin When: 12:00-15:00 We hope you all had a meaningful and safe International Workers Day yesterday! Everyday is an opportunity to organize and support workers including today.

As COVID-19 continues to go viral, hope you're healthy and well 🤗 31 March at 19:30 CET we are co-organizing a Night School with Lieferando, Flink riders and office workers at aequa.cc community space. Registration required https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSeYL-lMOWwFuMKxiBaNcO6DbSX01Hv18RUMbucSj7t4QWKQ1Q/viewform 🔗 Facebook event link: https://www.facebook.com/events/558167025278190/ 📰 In other news, we had a succesfully weekend in Bad Herself at Amazon Workers International biennial conference, organizing across value chain and promoting https://OrganizeAWAS.de/en surveillance campaign 📆 In the upcoming months, we're planning a wider conference for all English speaking tech workers and trade union organizers to address class struggle/labor militancy. Stay tuned!

🕊 20,000 Russian IT workers including from VK and Kaspersky sign a petition calling on Kremlin government to end the military agression. Petition enclosed below: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScEsxsoXl_7R4aD5F8-B7fCCBVwU_BXBaOVJsKszbFyRHRkkw/viewform Berlin has a large community of Ukrainian, Russian tech workers. If there are concrete ways we can support you domestically or abroad, please get in touch solidarity@techworkersberlin.com

Longer update forthcoming: This Thursday we are providing a free workshop in English about forming a Works Council/Betriebsrat in YOUR workplace. Registration is required. Please share https://techworkersberlin.com/events/works-council-training-for-beginners-4

2021 isn't over yet! Soon 2,500 riders of Lieferando platform in Berlin will have a Works Council too! Follow them on Telegram @lieferat_berlin and read about it in TAZ https://taz.de/Organisierung-bei-Lieferando/!5822003/ Additionally we have a soli fundraiser with our fellow organizers in Poznan, Poland. Read Magda Malinowska's powerful story about organizing transnationally in Poland https://news.techworkerscoalition.org/2021/12/28/issue-27/ We've raised over 2.000 euros already, let's keep the momentum and solidarity going! https://www.gofundme.com/f/support-amazon-worker-magda

Happy Holidays! We have some more good news before the end of the year! SumUp fintech workers are organizing! https://twitter.com/TechWorkersBER/status/1473233396964941825 👩🏽‍⚕️Are you obsessed with winning? Register for a Zoom webinar with Jane McAlevey in English/Germany about the recent Charite/Vivante hospital strikes! https://zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_mKtvZ1bhRwSVWT7hICMRMA

News concerning DWE-Kiezteam-strategy day just came over the main mailing list - to note down in your calendar 📅 🥸. Achtung Terminänderung DWE-Strategiewochenende When: the strategy weekend will now take place on 05. & 06. February 2022 Where: Franz Mehring Platz 1. they had to change the location, hence the date changed 🦠If corona allows it, then the meeting will be in person, otherwise online. 💪🏽On strategy-weekend, we want to discuss as a campaign how we want to strategically proceed. 🤷🏻‍♀️More infos concerning the program and possibilities to register are coming soon! 📍For the next main R2C meetings we are asked by the strategy-weekend TF to think about what should be discussed & what kind of workshops we think are needed on the weekend and if we would be willing to offer some input 🦜 Feedback and input to @rabeaberf by tomorrow? Seems a bit unrealistic :) 💜💛 🦩If there is enough of us planing to join we could organize English translation or let Rabea know we need it

It was great seeing everyone last week and having some Glühwein together before the 5th lockdown! We've got a lot of work to do still with organizing Amazon and all other workplaces. 📆 7 December, 19:30 🔗 Register here for free Works Council training

English underneath) Morgen ist „Black Friday“, ein von Amazon beworbener Konsumfeiertag, aber morgen starten Arbeiter*innen in mehr als 20 Ländern zusammen mit Aktivisten die Kampagne #MakeAmazonPay, um das zurückzufordern, was Amazon uns genommen hat. Zusätzlich zu den Mobilisierungen vor den Amazon-Lagern und Büros werden wir von 17-19 Uhr eine öffentliche Demo vor dem Amazon-Hochhaus veranstalten. Bringt Lichter, Nebelkerzen und macht Lärm gegen Amazon! https://www.facebook.com/events/316752910276315 Wir freuen uns, eine neue Kampagne ankündigen zu können: Amazon Workers Against Surveillance (Amazon Arbeiter*innen gegen Überwachung), denn Amazon könnte ohne die Überwachung von Arbeiter*innen und der Öffentlichkeit nicht so existieren, wie es das tut. Gemeinsam können wir unsere Stärke und Würde zurückgewinnen. *English* Tomorrow is Black Friday, a consumer holiday promoted by Amazon, but tomorrow along with fellow activists, workers in more than 20 countries are launching the #MakeAmazonPay campaign to reclaim what Amazon's taken from all of us. In addition to mobilizations at Amazon warehouses and offices, we'll be organizing a public demo in front of the Amazon tower from 17:00-19:00. Bring lights, smoke flares and make some noise against Amazon! https://www.facebook.com/events/316752910276315 We're excited to announce a new campaign: Amazon Workers Against Surveillance, because Amazon could not exist the way it does, without surveilling workers and the public. Together, we can reclaim our power and dignity.

⛄️ Enjoying the snow in Berlin today (yay climate change) Last month we had not one, but two events in English and German about "Fair Migration" and the Tech Industry, which is appropriate given that Berlin is a migrant city, and the tech industry even more so! Are you looking for further training on conducting conversations with your co-workers, leader identification and running a campaign? This 6 part online series may be for you! Registration deadline is May 10th! It begins weekly on May 18th at 18:00 CET https://techworkersberlin.com/events/organizing-for-power-6-weekly-sessions AI Conference May 19-20th is 2 day weekend on Ai policy, hosted in English and German by BMAS Think Tank working group https://www.denkfabrik-bmas.de/diskurs/veranstaltungen/ki-konferenz Gorilla Platform On June 3rd, 2021 workers of Gorilla platform delivery will have Works Council elections. In the meantime, check out their campaign on Telegram: kutt.it/gorillas. It also appears that Gorilla management has also created a FAKE campaign website, and it is important to remain vigilant. https://twitter.com/gorillasvoices SumUP layoffs Between 50-100 workers were laid off from FinTech SumUP, including in Berlin. At 15:00 today (in 10 minutes), we're hosting a workshop with Ver.di on your rights and potential collective action. Reply to SumUP@techworkersberlin.com if you want to spontaneously attend or be informed of specific actions in the near future Website updates: Liav Keren wrote an exclusive piece about relation of technology, robotics and Amazon: https://techworkersberlin.com/news/2021-05-06-bezos-universal-robots/ Our website was redesigned this weekend, to include more information, but it's still missing info, for example content on COVID-19, workplace issues and social issues. You can see the hidden website techworkersberlin.com/menu for some inspiration/ideas and contribute content in any language you are proficient in. What do you think of the website and designs?

Tonight we'll be presenting and answering Q/A with Marie Bauer from the "Fair Integration" project about Migration/Labour law specifically in the tech/startup industry at 19:00 CET tonight over Zoom https://techworkersberlin.com/events/migrant-and-labour-law-in-tech This is also our first event launching the Munich chapter of Tech Workers Coalition, and an important step towards expanding across Germany, though this event is suitable for anyone based anywhere in Germany. On May 1st, historically workers' day, two organizers Raksha Muthukumar and Soeren Lieske will speak about the recent Alphabet Workers Union, and what this means for global organizing. Google it ;) https://www.rosalux.de/en/event/es_detail/RN3N8/challenging-tech On May 18th, Abdurzak Hadi, a UK based Uber driver and organizer and @shushugah will be speaking about the challenges of co-organizing within the mobility sector despite their different positions across class, race and labour mobility (no pun intended). https://www.rosalux.de/en/event/es_detail/3BOD2/antagonists-accomplices-comrades?cHash=b7cdea970da7d40eea932e2c201c06f5 We'll be hosting for the third time, Organizing 4 Power 6 part intensive series. Register for the Tech Workers Coalition sub-group. We have two facilitators and 17 registrants already from Berlin, New York, Italian and San Diego signed up already! 🎬 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZmrAQgzLF0&t=57s 📝 Register: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZYkf-2uqDkoHtROZMmElzqCw-isJY2vAkAl Are you a member of a Works/Staff Council? On June 7th, we're partaking in a broader exchange from 9-15:00 CET, please RSVP at WorksCouncil@TechWorkersBerlin.com to attend with preference to those who are elected members of a Works Council/Staff Council (the public equivalent). Говорите по-русски? Мы тоже! https://techworkersberlin.com/ru/

Greetings fellow workers, Tonight we have our monthly general meeting at 19:30 CET, https://techworkersberlin.com/events/online-general-meeting-31 Some good news: We're launching a new chapter of TWC in Munich on Wednesday with a migration and labour law panel, which is relevant for everyone living in Germany, so please join even if you're not based in Munich and invite any Munich friends you know!: https://techworkersberlin.com/events/migrant-and-labour-law-in-tech and follow our new Twitter account @TechWorkersMUC On Tuesday, 650 tech workers of the New York Times newspaper publicly announced their union, which you can read about in the New York Times! While newsroom journalists have had a union for nearly 80 years, technical/digital staff in media are only more recently getting bargaining coverage https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/13/business/media/new-york-times-tech-workers-form-a-union.html Now for the bad news: Today the highest Federal German Court (BVerfG) overturned the Berlin Mietendeckel, so if your rent was decreased in the past year, it's likely you will have to pay back the difference, pending any further changes. There will be a demo organized by Deutsche Wohnen & Co. enteignen, at Hermannplatz tonight at 18:00. You can follow their English channel for updates directly on telegram @DWEberlin We're hosting a training with Jane McAlevey in May/June, so her analysis of why the Amazon union drive in Alabama didn't succeed is worth a read https://www.thenation.com/article/activism/bessemer-alabama-amazon-union/

Say Hello to new Munich Chapter and event on April 21st https://techworkersberlin.com/events/migrant-and-labour-law-in-tech https://twitter.com/TechWorkersMUC/status/1381287033889492993

There is something missing from tech worker organizing Let's discuss this article together in our reading group tonight, happening at 19:30 CET (90 minutes from now!) Join over Zoom https://us02web.zoom.us/j/87925908833?pwd=T1pDM0w0cDBNN2lrcnk2UTNTeEtkQT09

We meet tonight at 19:30 CET for our monthly meeting! https://zoom.us/j/82138847989