Activision Blizzard workers join walkout

At least 200 Activision Blizzard workers across various studios and teams have walked out of work Tuesday as a continuation of a work stoppage initiated by workers at Raven Software Monday. Over 60 workers at Raven Software, an Activision Blizzard-owned game studio, walked out of work Monday in protest of their parent company laying off 12 of the studio’s quality assurance testers Friday. This is the parent company’s third work stoppage in five months since it was sued in late July over sexual harassment and misconduct claims.

On Tuesday, quality assurance testers in Texas and Minnesota, as well as some working at Blizzard in Irvine, California will join Raven Software contractors in solidarity, and in protest of the total of 20 people that Activision Blizzard laid off as of Monday. As part of the walkout, which has no set end date, workers are demanding that all Raven quality assurance contractors, including the ones laid off Friday, receive full-time positions and that the company reverses the past week’s layoffs at Raven.

The walkout is taking place virtually, starting at 10:15 a.m. Eastern time and across social media with the hashtag #Weareraven. Raven workers sent management notifications that they are out of office Tuesday “in solidarity with my teammates in QA who were let go arbitrarily.”

The stoppage began on Monday at 12:30 p.m. Eastern time and included both contractors and full-time employees.