Let’s say class got a little boring and the teaching is just droning on, or its fourth period and you’re used to a routine with the friends in your class, what do you turn to? The New York Times.
In and outside of school, the NYT website plays a vital role, whether students play classic games such as Wordle, Connections, Strands and the Mini Crossword Puzzle, which have become near daily staples in the lives of students, or visit the NYT Cooking website to figure out what to make for dinner once they get home.
Over the election weekend, on Nov. 4, the NYT’s Tech Guild, which represents over 600 workers who are behind Wordle, among various other features of the website, went on strike to demand hybrid work protections, limits on subcontracting and fair pay. NYT employees picketed outside the headquarters in Manhattan chanting “Strands! Wordle! Spelling Bee! Pay me what you earn from me!”
According to Variety, the Tech Guild alleged that the NYT’s management had “engaged in numerous labor law violations, including implementing return-to-office mandates without bargaining and attempting to intimidate members through interrogations about their strike intentions.”
As a result, anyone who played a game or read an article, from the eve of the election though Nov. 11, happened to be crossing strike picket lines. “I think it’s complicated and not black and white; the tech guild is reasonable for striking and higher management was in violation of multiple labor laws, which protect their workers. It isn’t really in my routine to play the games, but I understand that routine can be very hard to break so while they may have empathized with the cause, they haven’t experienced the workforce for a big company and aren’t very close to the issue so they continued to play the games thinking that when they just play a puzzle on a website, it isn’t going to affect the strike,” senior Anna Lizondo said.
Avid and consistent NYT puzzle player junior Trixie Verrija has “honestly mixed feelings about the strike, as much as I do love waking up and being able to play the daily NYT puzzles, I also believe that the employees on strike have a valid reason to be on strike and deserve to be respected as they feel strongly about their opinions,” Verrija said.
Besides the games, the NYT is a commonly used app by students. “I always use it to get inspired for dinner but when I found out about the strike, I tried to avoid using it at all. It’s a bit of an inconvenience for me but I support the workers and think they are trying to achieve a very valid goal,” senior Maggie Hennessy.
With the election rapidly approaching and the Guild continuing their negotiations on a contract, concerns were raised as to how accurate and dependable the Time’s vote-tracking technology would last on the day. Business Insider reported that nearly 100 tech workers crossed the picket line themselves on election day and the NYT Needle displayed the results of the election state-by-state.
Despite their efforts, workers proceeded to walk into work on Tuesday and end their week-long strike without having reached significant goals in their contract negotiation.
