Judge rules that Tesla sexual harassment suit can proceed in court

A California county court judge ruled Monday that a sexual harassment suit against Tesla can proceed in court, rejecting the automaker’s request for closed-door arbitration, according to Bloomberg.

That means that Tesla must defend itself in open court against claims that female employees face “rampant sexual harassment” at its Fremont, California, factory. Alameda County Superior Court Judge Stephen Kaus denied the automaker’s request in a one-sentence order without explanation, even though the plaintiff in the class-action case signed an arbitration agreement giving up her right to sue.

“The Motion to Compel Arbitration filed by Tesla, Inc. on 02/16/22 is Denied” is all Kaus wrote.

Tesla also faces harassment suits filed by at least six other female employees since late last year alleging that they were subjected to discrimination, catcalling, unwanted advances and physical contact at work.

Jessica Barraza, the plaintiff in Barraza v. Tesla, 21-cv-2714, Superior Court of California, Alameda County (Oakland), alleges that supervisors failed to take action after she reported working under “nightmarish” conditions as a night-shift employee, with co-workers and supervisors repeatedly making lewd comments and gestures to her.

The complaint, filed in Alameda County Superior Court in November, stated, “The pervasive culture of sexual harassment, which includes a daily barrage of sexist language and behavior, including frequent groping on the factory floor, is known to supervisors and managers and often perpetrated by them.”

Meanwhile, Tesla has also faced a spate of lawsuits alleging racial discrimination at its Fremont factory. In February, the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing filed a lawsuit against the automaker in state court alleging that it has received “hundreds of complaints from workers” and found evidence that the California factory is a “segregated workplace where black workers are subjected to racial slurs and discriminated against in job assignments, discipline, pay and promotion creating a hostile work environment.”

CEO Elon Musk has been vocal in his complaints against the state, moving Tesla’s headquarters from Fremont to Austin, Texas, last year, after filing a lawsuit against Alameda County due to COVID restrictions that forced the automaker to shutter its Fremont plant.

“Frankly, this is the final straw,” Musk tweeted. “Tesla will now move its HQ and future programs to Texas/Nevada immediately. If we even retain Fremont manufacturing activity at all, it will be dependent on how Tesla is treated in the future. Tesla is the last carmaker left in CA.”

NFT aggregator Gem acquired by OpenSea shortly after ousting co-founder for sexual misconduct

OpenSea, the largest NFT marketplace, acquired NFT aggregator Gem to “better serve” its more experienced users, the company said in a blog post. The deal, which comes a few months after OpenSea bought DeFi wallet startup Dharma Labs, will allow OpenSea to “learn from Gem’s expertise and intuition about the advanced NFT community,” the company said.

The news comes about two weeks after Gem removed Josh Thompson, a core developer and former shareholder at the company, from its team over allegations from several individuals that Thomson had engaged in rape, sexual harassment, and the grooming of minors, as BuzzFeed News first reported.

Thompson, who held shares in Gem prior to the transaction, was terminated from Gem without severance at that time, and the deal with OpenSea was contingent upon both his departure from the company and his liquidation from Gem’s cap table, a spokesperson for OpenSea told TechCrunch. Thompson does not hold shares in Gem or OpenSea today.

“During the course of our diligence, we learned about, and immediately surfaced, some deeply concerning allegations against a now-former member of Gem’s leadership team who operated under the pseudonym Neso. Upon investigating the allegations, the employee was immediately exited prior to the close of this deal. This individual has never and will never be affiliated with OpenSea,” OpenSea wrote in the blog post.

Gem said the acquisition offer from OpenSea was unexpected, adding that the company will now have access to OpenSea’s infrastructure and resources to accelerate its growth, The Block reported. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Venture firms Dragonfly Capital Partners, Sfermion, and Tioga Capital Partners are all investors in Gem, according to Pitchbook.

Gem’s product allows users to buy NFTs across multiple marketplaces in a single transaction, pay with any ERC-20 token rather than spending their ETH, and view analytics such as sales volume, floor prices and rarity-based ranking for NFT collections. As an aggregator, the company claims its product saves users up to 40% on gas fees compared to using an NFT marketplace like OpenSea directly. Its users often leverage the platform for “floor-sweeping,” a term that refers to acquiring multiple of the lowest-priced NFTs in a given project.

Gem will continue to operate as a standalone product and brand, OpenSea wrote in the post, though OpenSea plans to integrate some of Gem’s features with its own platform. Some people expressed disappointment over the acquisition in their replies to Gem’s announcement tweet, referencing the centralized nature of the OpenSea platform.

207,577 transactions had been completed on Gem as of mid-day Monday, April 25, according to data provider Dune Analytics. The platform has added over 48,000 new users since last September, the Dune data shows.

Flutterwave CEO addresses alleged misconduct claims in email to employees

Flutterwave CEO Olugbenga Agboola has, for the first time, addressed financial and personal misconduct claims leveled against him and the company this month, according to an email to employees obtained by TechCrunch.

“I’m writing today because I want you to know how concerned I am about the impact that reading the false allegations against our company has had on you all,” he wrote.

The fact that the allegations of financial impropriety, conflict of interest and sexual harassment have been proved false or have already been reported, investigated and addressed by management matters less to me than the reality that these claims may have shaken your confidence in the company. As founder and CEO, it is my responsibility to address the concerns you may have, and this will be a priority for me moving forward.”

These are the first comments by the chief executive since a report by West African Weekly, a Substack newsletter written by journalist David Hundeyin, revealed several allegations against the startup and Agboola ranging from fraud and perjury to insider trading and sexual harassment.

The report came days after Clara Wanjiku Odero — an ex-employee and current CEO of Credrails — published a Medium post and a series of tweets on April 4 accusing the company and its CEO, Olugbenga Agboola, of bullying her in the past. 

It’s been a week since these allegations from the West African Weekly came to light. At some point, it was believed that Flutterwave wouldn’t address them publicly. For most, the delayed response was a terrible look and spoke to a weak company culture that might lead to more tea spilled.

But three days ago, TechCabal, a publication focused on African tech, in an interview with ex-CEO Iyinoluwa Aboyeji said it received a statement from Flutterwave’s management that read: “the blog post in question is based on recycled and previously addressed claims and several others that are false.” Agboola’s email to his employees carries a similar characterization.

Allegations and Agboola’s response

One of the allegations against the CEO was his involvement with his previous employer, Access Bank, while working on Flutterwave in its early days. According to the report, Agboola didn’t let his previous employers know he was working on the startup and was accused of taking advantage of his position and resources to build Flutterwave.

Agboola, in the email, responded to this by saying: “The allegations about how I started the company are untrue. I shared with you during the retreat that a former boss helped us close one of our enterprise clients. I am thankful for the learning and mentorship I received at the numerous employers I worked at before starting Flutterwave.”

On insider trading accusations, Agboola is said to have created an investment vehicle that cashed in on share prices sold below the company’s valuation to employees who had stock options, especially before a fundraising round.

But according to Agboola, neither he nor Flutterwave has engaged in insider trading and mentioned that ex-employees sold shares they owned to outside parties at some points.

“We followed all legal processes and procedures, including obtaining board approval when needed, when approving the sale of shares,” he wrote. In addition, we work closely with our outside law firms to stay in compliance with all applicable regulations.”

Addressing SEC-related issues, Agboola further backed the account provided by ex-CEO Iyinoluwa Aboyeji to TechCabal on the matter, stating that in 2017, the SEC had an inquiry with which Flutterwave fully complied, and he’s unaware of any ongoing SEC investigation into the company’s activities. 

Aboyeji, in his interview, said that the SEC case was related to concerns about Flutterwave having some unaccredited investors under U.S. law and was not an indictment on the CEO’s insider trading accusations stated in West African Weekly’s article.

The SEC didn’t confirm or deny any investigation when Hundeyin, the newsletter’s author, reached out, citing privacy conditions.

The newsletter also disclosed several emails accusing Agboola and his co-founder Ifeoluwa Orioke of having sexual relations with several female employees and harassing some. On this issue, Agboola wrote;

We have previously investigated employee sexual harassment allegations (including those made against me, and of which I was cleared) and terminated employees who have been inappropriate towards team members. We have had independent third party reviews which gave birth to the We Hear You and whistleblowing policies that you all know of today. We have always had a zero-tolerance policy [to] sexual harassment and we will continue to take action when necessary. No exceptions.

What Flutterwave and Agboola didn’t address

The West African Weekly’s report accused Agboola of creating a fictitious co-founder and CTO identity called ‘Greg’ to allocate more shares to himself (even though he was the major shareholder) in the company’s early days. And though Aboyeji, who was Flutterwave’s first CEO, verified this allegation in his interview, Agboola didn’t specifically address this in his email to Flutterwave’s staff.

The chief executive didn’t also respond to the accusations that Flutterwave performed fraudulent activities — with investors’ knowledge — against its clients.

Lastly, there was no word on the ongoing court cases it’s facing from ex-employees Clara Wanjiku Odero and another lady, who, according to the West African Weekly, is suing Flutterwave for not offering her stock options after almost three years working at the company in a senior role.

Here is the fintech’s response to Odero’s. On the latter, TechCrunch reached out for a comment regarding the allegations, including its relationship with Banwo & Ighodalo, the said ex-employee’s former legal counsel that dropped her case despite showing initial interest in going up against the unicorn.

“As a general policy, we do not comment on specific employee matters of this nature or pending litigation even when they may involve false, recycled, or previously addressed claims,” Flutterwave said in an email to TechCrunch. B&I, on the other hand, didn’t respond to TechCrunch’s request for comment.

Meanwhile, a source told TechCrunch that Agboola has since made an out-of-court offer to this ex-employee through an intermediary. The source also said the ex-employee rejected the proposal, which was significantly lower than the current value of her 40,000 shares signed off by ex-CEO Aboyeji during his time as CEO. 

Aboyeji didn’t comment on the number of shares or its current value, but here’s what he told TechCrunch:

“When I was at the helm of Flutterwave, it was very important to me that all our staff were rewarded for their incredible sacrifice in helping us build an amazing company,” he said. “I helped design the stock options program of the company and had drawn up with my co-founders, early employees and advisors who will be rewarded with stock options [including *the ex-employee] but couldn’t fully implement before I resigned.”

Why Flutterwave didn’t proceed to implement the agreement, particularly hers, is unclear, even to the then-CEO.

“I was made aware afterward that the founders decided to do things differently and some of the people on that list weren’t issued stock options after I left, but I don’t know why,” he added.

Flutterwave wants to fix up with its CEO still at the helm

In the email to his employees, CEO Agboola outlined actions the company would carry out to improve its culture, which looks tainted at the moment in the eyes of the public. 

These measures include improving its HR policies while working closely with audit and advisory firms, taking a survey of employees — particularly female employees — to get feedback on their experiences in the company, an “inclusive workplace training,” increasing mental health resources, and providing more transparency.

“We have made some significant changes to how we communicate transparently in the organization on compensation, promotions, etc.,” the CEO wrote. In addition, all members of the executive leadership team will hold monthly open hours for staff at all levels. This will be a time for us to hear directly from all of you and what we can be doing to be continuously improving.”

On the one hand, it’s understandable that Flutterwave wants to restore the image it had just months ago as the darling of Africa’s tech ecosystem. Still, the questions on some minds will be why the company is making these changes if these entire claims are false. 

Speaking about changes and contrary to what tech stakeholders might have thought would happen, it appears Agboola will not be stepping down as CEO just yet. There was no mention of that in the email.

Alongside the leadership team, Agboola said he plans to visit every Flutterwave office on the continent by the end of the year to have “one-on-one” chats with employees. 

The end of the email reiterates this:

I know this is a lot to take in! We will have more conversations to discuss all this in greater detail. I want to hear from you all and answer any questions you have.

I’ll end by saying that when we started the company in 2016, our mission was to simplify payments for endless possibilities for businesses, consumers, and especially our customers. That remains our mission, of which all of you are a crucial part in making a reality.

I will always put Flutterwave first. And Flutterwave is all of you. Like I always say our people are the secret sauce of Flutterwave and I mean that.

…Thank you for reminding me that to whom much is give, much is required. I will live up to your expectations of me.

Flutterwave responds as CEO is put on the spot for alleged bullying by ex-employee

On Monday, Clara Wanjiku Odero, a former employee of African payments giant and unicorn Flutterwave, accused the company’s chief executive officer Olugbenga ‘GB’ Agboola of bullying and harassing her for years. She made the allegations in a Medium post and series of tweets that came after.

In the blog post, Odero recounted how a series of undescribed events led her to quit her job as Head of Implementation (Rest of Africa) in 2018 and when the time came for her to be settled, she claimed the company refused to do so.

However, upon her threats to sue the company, which she claimed led to various employees from the company “asking to talk and resolve this amicably,” Flutterwave finally paid her dues, she said in the post.

According to Odero, what followed was an accusation made by the company of her involvement with a Twitter account that called out male members of Flutterwave’s management for sexual harassment.

“I asked for my dues multiple times, [I] got no response, in fact [I] was threatened and I responded accordingly,” said Odero, who is now CEO of Credrails, an open finance platform backed by SoftBank.

“Flutterwave paid me my money after having multiple people call me to call off my lawyers; lawyers I had to call because they refused to pay me simply because they thought I would do nothing [a.k.a] bully me. Without any proof, they accused me of being behind an account calling out the male members of management for sexual harassment.”

Odero’s post also revealed how she got “introduced to a bank in Nigeria for a role which GB then sabotaged by saying I was a bad worker, a crime in California.” But what broke the camel’s back for her was when Flutterwave, “in an attempt to keep doing business in Kenya with M-Pesa, had kept my number as the contact person on the Mpesa pay bill.”

In this local piece published two years ago, Wanjiku claimed her number was used as the contact person in a fraud that involved Flutterwave allegedly setting up non-existent sex parties in Thika, Kenya and extorting Kenyans up to Sh1,500. 

Wanjiku sued Flutterwave for damages and won a settlement, according to her blog. However, she appealed the case after deeming the payment inadequate to compensate for all the troubles caused. This was corroborated in a recent interview granted by Agboola and several important members of Flutterwave and released hours before Wanjiku published her Medium post.

“An ex-employee who led one of our country expansions sued us for negligence and emotional trauma for not removing their name as the contact person in the country. So anytime there was a merchant enquiry, they were called. They said this was emotional harassment,” Flutterwave’s CEO revealed.

“We tried to resolve this amicably, but it was impossible. They asked for $900,000 to quash the lawsuit. We refused because we didn’t believe $900,000 in damages represented the cost of the alleged negligence. They proceeded with the lawsuit, and the judge awarded them an equivalent of $2,500 for damages. When it was time to cut the check, they declined it and said they’d appeal.”

The interview, which might have prompted Wanjiku to tell her side of the story, mainly highlighted Flutterwave’s rise to becoming Africa’s most valued company after completing a $250 million Series D round at a $3 billion valuation in February. It also noted that Flutterwave dealt with a sexual harassment case where it “discovered an employee had been inappropriate towards his team members.” which led to immediate dismissal, the company claimed.

TechCrunch reached out to Flutterwave for comments, asking specific questions about Wanjiku’s bullying claims by the company and its CEO. The fintech company declined to address each of our questions and instead sent this response:

As an organization that continuously strives to create an environment where employees feel secure and safe, we take the recent allegations of bullying from a former employee very seriously.

We categorically state that there is no place for bullying or harassment of any kind in our workplace. We have a zero-tolerance stance on bullying and a robust independent disciplinary committee and processes in place to stamp out abuse of any kind.

Flutterwave has grown significantly in personnel, over the last 3 years. We experienced most of that growth during lockdown — it was very important for us to bring the entire company together to meet each other in one location, (for the first time in many cases), share out story, challenges and build camaraderie. Sharing some of our challenges as a company, understandably caused a reaction from a former employee.

We confirm that at the point of resignation, all monies due to our former employee at the time were promptly disbursed and we have records to confirm this. We however sincerely regret the circumstances that led to the dispute and wish it had been addressed in a more timely manner.

In no way did we take this lightly. We want the ecosystem to have a health and productive work culture and we are committed to doing our part.

In an interesting turn of events, Wanjiku told TechCrunch, “I am no longer allowed to speak on this for ‘the ecosystem’” when we reached out to her to share more parts of her story.

This news comes two weeks after Lagos-based tech publication TechCabal published a report on the toxic and unhealthy workplace culture created in Bento, an HR platform by its CEO Ebun Okubanjo. The report has sparked a conversation leading other employees across tech and different sectors in Nigeria and Africa to share similar workplace experiences in the past few weeks.

This is a developing story…

Activision Blizzard confirms SEC investigation, loses chief legal officer

The consequences are mounting for gaming giant Activision Blizzard after the company became the subject of a landmark state investigation into discriminatory workplace practices and sexual harassment this summer.

Now, Activision Blizzard confirms that it is the subject of a federal investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission, which has been ramping up enforcement efforts against tech companies in recent months.

The Wall Street Journal reported Monday that the SEC has subpoenaed Activision Blizzard and a number of the company’s key executives, including CEO Bobby Kotick. Activision Blizzard confirmed the SEC investigation Tuesday in a statement to investors, noting that it “continues to productively engage with regulators” including the SEC, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the National Labor Relations Board and the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing.

The SEC requested documents from the company including “minutes from Activision board meetings since 2019, personnel files of six former employees and separation agreements the company has reached this year with staffers” according to the WSJ. The paper also reported that the agency is seeking any records between Kotick and other executives discussing sexual harassment and discrimination allegations at the company.

The California Department of Fair Employment and Housing sued Activision Blizzard in July over allegations that it created a hostile “frat house” environment in which gender-based harassment and discrimination were routine.

Following an inflammatory response from the company’s leaders, who dismissed the lawsuit as the actions of “unaccountable state bureaucrats,” a group of employees staged a high profile walkout. The protest attracted solidarity from many corners of the gaming world and drew more attention to the workplace environment that many Blizzard workers allegedly suffered in for years.

Activision Blizzard publishes some of the biggest titles in gaming, including the Call of Duty franchise, World of Warcraft, Overwatch and Starcraft. The flurry of regulatory interest in allegations of a toxic, hostile work environment at the company could have far-reaching implications for workplace culture not just at Activision Blizzard, but for the gaming industry at large.

After the state lawsuit became public, former President of Blizzard Entertainment, J. Allen Brack left the company, followed by its global HR head Jesse Meschuk. On Tuesday, Blizzard Entertainment Chief Legal Officer Claire Hart became the latest high profile employee to announce their departure, signaling that she wouldn’t be sticking around to weather the regulatory storm.

“The past three years have been full of unexpected twists and turns, but I feel honored to have worked with and met so many great people at Blizzard and across the Activision Blizzard businesses,” Hart wrote on Linkedin.

 

Harassment will happen at my startup and yours: Here’s how we prepare

Sexual harassment is, unfortunately, always in the news. Of late, it’s revelations at gaming giants and governments. Yet despite how prevalent harassment is, companies often adopt an “it can’t happen here” stance — until it does, and then there are knee-jerk reactions and crisis communications.

A better approach: recognizing how pervasive it is and planning with that in mind.

When I first started Ethena, I explained the concept of innovative harassment prevention training to my father. Like any good parent, he thought my entrepreneurial genius was actually a terrible idea and advised me to stay put at my job. But when he finally accepted that I was going to start this company, he said, “Make sure you don’t have harassment at your company. That would be bad.”

He’s not wrong. My team provides a modern compliance training platform. Since our first product was harassment prevention training, it would be pretty bad if we were talking the talk without walking the walk.

Train your team members to better understand inclusion and recognize what harassment looks like so the bar is set higher than “let’s just not get sued.”

If I could prevent workplace harassment on optimism alone, I absolutely would. But I’ve seen the data on the prevalence of workplace harassment.

A 2018 Pew survey, for example, found that 59% of women and 27% of men reported experiencing sexual harassment. And the rise of remote work hasn’t changed things. In fact, there are some indications that harassment is on the rise thanks to “keyboard courage.”

Knowing that, I’ve come to terms with the fact that these are issues we’ll likely face, so I want us to be prepared. Today’s workplace demands that leaders acknowledge gray areas and engage with uncomfortable topics; it’s how companies grow in new and healthy directions. Here’s how we think about that growth.

Plan for it

As a Floridian, I grew up assuming hurricanes would hit my house. We always had some plywood and canned food because when you know something is going to happen, you plan for it.

Unlike prepared Floridians, startups tend to adopt an ostrich approach when it comes to harassment. Instead of stocking the pantry, so to speak, companies wait until they’re already in a storm.

Early on, a startup is a small group of (usually homogeneous) friends, and it’s uncomfortable to acknowledge that bad things could happen. It’s much easier to hope that building a team of stellar humans is enough.

But, unfortunately, bad things do happen, because sometimes harassment is not as cut-and-dried as we are led to believe. Rather, harassment often grows from the complexities of human interactions — intent, perception, privilege and context, to name a few. It can start with a few small jokes, a colleague who gets drunkenly inappropriate every Friday, or a team that never seems to hire anyone outside of their social circle.

Then, things can escalate, and people start to realize that what they’re actually experiencing is a hostile work environment. Unfortunately, at that point, it’s really hard to right the ship because the company is suddenly 600 people and change gets harder as companies grow.

Knowing that problems are more likely as companies scale, it’s vital that teams prepare by learning how to identify warning signs early. At a bare minimum, train your team members to recognize what workplace harassment looks like and better understand inclusion so that the bar is set higher than “let’s just not get sued.”

Out of everyone at the company, managers really need to get the memo. As a company scales, senior leaders have a limited span of control, so frontline managers become the most crucial employees in either promoting or preventing inclusive workplaces. It just so happens that training is legally required in states like California and New York.

Make feedback, not just “tell HR,” an option

The traditional way that harassment is talked about is very binary. Either a workplace is perfectly inclusive or it’s a toxic cesspool. Obviously, it’s important to take these issues seriously, but the problem with treating every act as either fine or serious, capital-H harassment is that it gives employees a choice between bad and worse.

Let’s say Elena is on an engineering pod with Jonah, and Jonah occasionally does small things that cause her to feel less than included.

For example, they’re hiring for a new front-end engineer and Jonah always refers to this future hire as “he.” In the traditional, frowny-faced lawyer version of harassment, Elena has two options:

  1. Do nothing: Bad because Jonah is going to keep doing it.
  2. Tell HR: Also bad. Elena doesn’t want to get Jonah fired. She just wants him to be more inclusive.

However, if training teaches Elena — and, ideally, everyone else on her team — to say something in the moment, Elena now has a tool she can actually use.

Next time Jonah says, “OK so when he joins … ” Elena can jump in with, “Unless you’re psychic, which seems unlikely given how poorly you did in Fantasy Football, please use ‘they’ to refer to our new hire, since we don’t know their gender.”

Did Elena need to insert the burn? Probably not, but humor can diffuse a tense situation so sure, why not? Regardless, once Elena says something, it’s on Jonah to accept her feedback and make a change; and, if team values are clear, hopefully Jonah’s colleagues will hold Jonah accountable, too.

Accountability is everything

This last lesson is only applicable after something at the company happens. Let’s say Jonah’s comments escalate, even after Elena gives feedback. Jonah consistently excludes Elena and other women from key meetings, talks over them, and when confronted, says, “Look, we all know they’re only here for diversity stats.”

If Jonah’s manager at this fictitious, problematic company does nothing, that’s the ballgame. There’s literally no amount of workshops, training, blog posts or all-hands meetings that can convince Elena that the company cares. Actions speak loudest.

The best possible version of dealing with an issue involves transparency so that people can learn from what happened and see that the company does care. Obviously, it’s hard when issues involve private information and protecting those who reported the issues, but to the extent possible, it’s crucial to have accountability.

Of course, my dad is right: Harassment at my company would be bad. But we’re preparing for it because scaling a company means rapidly increasing the number of human interactions.

Thankfully, building an inclusive company looks a lot like building a good company — preparation, feedback and accountability are managerial best practices that should be put in place early.

Activision Blizzard workers will stage a walkout after ‘abhorrent’ response to harassment suit

One of the world’s biggest video game companies is reeling after a state discrimination and sexual harassment suit kicked off a firestorm of controversy within the company. California’s Department of Fair Employment and Housing sued Activision Blizzard last week, alleging that the company fostered a “breeding ground for harassment and discrimination against women.”

Following a combative response to the lawsuit from corporate leadership, a group of employees at Blizzard will stage a walkout, which is planned for Wednesday at 10AM PT. Most employees at Blizzard continue to work remotely, but walkout participants will gather tomorrow at the gates to the company’s Irvine campus.

“Given last week’s statements from Activision Blizzard, Inc. and their legal counsel regarding the DFEH lawsuit, as well as the subsequent internal statement from Frances Townsend, and the many stories shared by current and former employees of Activision Blizzard since, we believe that our values as employees are not being accurately reflected in the words and actions of our leadership,” the organizers wrote.

In the new statement, they called for supporters to donate to organizations including Black Girls Code, the anti-sexual violence organization RAINN and Girls Who Code.

Activision Blizzard publishes some of the biggest titles in gaming, including the Call of Duty franchise, World of Warcraft, Starcraft and Overwatch. Blizzard came under Activision’s wing through a 2008 merger and the subsidiary operates out of its own Irvine, California headquarters.

In the suit, the state agency describes a “frat house” atmosphere in which women are not only not afforded the same opportunities as their male counterparts, but routinely and openly harassed, sometimes by their superiors.

The company pushed last week back in a fiery statement, blaming “unaccountable State bureaucrats that are driving many of the State’s best businesses out of California” for pursuing the lawsuit. Activision Blizzard Executive Vice President Frances Townsend, former Homeland Security advisor to George W. Bush, echoed that aggressive messaging in an internal memo, slamming the lawsuit as a “distorted and untrue picture of our company.”

In an open letter published Monday, the walkout’s organizers condemned Blizzard’s response to the lawsuit’s allegations. “We believe these statements have damaged our ongoing quest for equality inside and outside of our industry,” they wrote. “… These statements make it clear that our leadership is not putting our values first.”

More than 2,600 employees signed the letter, which demands an end to mandatory arbitration clauses that “protect abusers and limit the ability of victims to seek restitution,” improved representation and opportunities for women and non-binary employees, salary transparency and a full audit of diversity, equity, and inclusion at the company.

On Twitter, streamers, gamers, game devs and former employees expressed support for Wednesday’s walkout under the hashtag #ActiBlizzWalkout, with some calling for a blackout on Activision Blizzard games as a show of solidarity. Others called for streamers to use the walkout time slot to raise awareness about rampant sexual harassment and discrimination in gaming culture at large.

One Blizzard employee shared a photo of the company’s iconic statue depicting an axe-wielding orc, a central feature of its Irvine headquarters. Three plaques displaying corporate values that surround the statue had been covered with paper: “Lead responsibly,” “play nice, play fair,” and “every voice matters.”

Don’t wait for legislation banning NDAs: Write ethical policies now

Companies across the United States should be closely following the California State Legislature hearings on the “Silenced No More Act,” which would prevent the use of nondisclosure agreements (NDAs) to silence employees from speaking up about all forms of discrimination and harassment.

The legislation was introduced in response to the stunning claims brought forward by former Pinterest employees alleging a pattern of racial and gender discrimination, harassment and retaliation. They courageously called attention to the hypocrisy of Pinterest’s aspirational comments on social issues even though the company had required them to sign NDAs.

As attorneys who work with shareholders to hold companies accountable for this misconduct, these allegations have deeply impacted our work. They formed the basis of an ongoing shareholder derivative lawsuit that a state pension fund we represent brought against Pinterest’s board of directors and top executives for participating in and otherwise protecting powerful executives who are alleged to have discriminated against Pinterest employees.

Failure to recognize this necessity will lead to future corporate scandals as multiple accounts of the same type of misconduct in the workplace come to light.

The Silenced No More Act would extend existing laws that limit the use of NDAs. Such laws are important because NDAs are intended to protect executives by keeping their harassment, discrimination and retaliation under wraps. That NDAs chill the voices of employees who have already been victimized makes them even more toxic. NDAs cause women to fear reprisal from the company, sometimes even incorporating financial penalty clauses, long after their individual claims have been resolved.

The Silenced No More Act should pass swiftly and be a model for other states, but this is what all companies throughout the country should be doing on their own, rather than waiting for legislation to drag an ethical NDA policy out of them.

Failure to recognize this necessity will lead to future corporate scandals as multiple accounts of the same type of misconduct in the workplace come to light. It will continue to uphold an unsustainable corporate system where executives in positions of power assume they will be protected no matter how unlawful their behavior toward others in the workplace.

We have seen from our investigations the compounding impacts of NDAs and how they allow problems to fester over years.

The two of us, working with others and on behalf of Alphabet shareholders, were part of the team that led a groundbreaking $310 million settlement with the tech company that led to historic diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) reforms at the company. That settlement was the result of a shareholder derivative lawsuit where stockholders alleged that executives and board members violated their fiduciary duties by enabling a double standard that allowed executives to sexually harass and discriminate against women without consequence.

In that case, we believe Alphabet’s “culture of concealment” was driven in large part by the silencing effects of NDAs.

The duration of misconduct, enabled by NDAs, goes far beyond Alphabet and Pinterest. There is no shortage of #MeToo scandals at powerful companies, many with presences in California, that were exacerbated by muzzling NDAs. Weinstein Company, Wynn Resorts, NBC and 21st Century Fox are prominent examples of companies that first tried to keep allegations quiet through the use of NDAs and later faced a firestorm of allegations from former employees.

Fortunately, the landscape surrounding discrimination and harassment in the workplace is changing. Shareholders, workers, customers and other key business stakeholders are becoming more active in demanding that companies stop protecting harassers.

All of this should send a message to boards and C-suite executives that they must set the tone from the top and they are far better off being proactive than reactive. That means actively creating a company culture where DEI is a foundational component — not an afterthought. It also means intentionally prioritizing transparency and proactively doing away with policies that are antithetical to that goal, like NDAs that are intentionally designed to suppress the voices of employees.

The public and shareholders want to be associated with companies that do right by their employees. Business should recognize this change from a culture of compliance to one of equity and inclusion and embrace this new reality by stopping the practice of requiring complainants to enter into NDAs and fostering a culture of inclusion and accountability.

Twitch updates its hateful content and harassment policy after company called out for its own abuses

Following several reports of a toxic workplace and abuse this year, Twitch today announced the introduction of a new hateful content and harassment policy for its streamer community that will go into effect on Jan. 22, 2021. Under the updated guidelines, Twitch’s Safety team will change the way it evaluates potentially violating content. The company says it will now focus less on the perceived intent of a streamer’s statements or actions, and more on the content itself as well as its impact. Twitch also expanded, clarified, and toughened the guidelines around hateful conduct and harassment, including sexual harassment, which now has its own section.

As Twitch notes in a blog post detailing the new policy, “words and actions have meaning and impact, even if your intent is not meant to be hurtful or cause harm.”

The company explains that even if the streamer and the target of the harassment isn’t bothered by what took place, others in the Twitch community may be. So Twitch will evaluate streamer’s behavior based on whether it’s abusive and in violation of the company’s guidelines, rather than only on the intent.

Twitch says it may also take into consideration other factors when making determinations of punitive actions, including the reports from the targeted user or a mod team as well as other indications a behavior was unwanted, like a channel time-out or ban, as needed.

The new policy additionally makes clearer that certain behaviors are considered harassment and are prohibited. This includes claiming that the victim of a well-documented violent tragedy is a crisis actor or lying; encouraging others to DDoS, hack, doxx or swat another person; and inciting malicious raids of another person’s social media accounts. This means that even off-platform behavior is being wrapped into these new guidelines.

Twitch is also adding “caste,” “color” and “immigration status” to its list of identity characteristics it uses to determine what’s considered hateful content. The list already includes protected characteristics like race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sex, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, serious medical condition, and veteran status.

And while hate speech and symbols were already banned on Twitch, the guidelines now explicitly ban hate groups, membership in hate groups, and the sharing of hate group propaganda. It’s also banning black/brown/yellow/redface, unless being shown in an “explicitly educational context.” (This is not meant to be a new change, but rather the language here has been made clearer, Twitch says.)

In another notable change, displaying the Confederate flag is now prohibited given its “historic and symbolic association with slavery and white supremacist groups in the U.S.”

Sometimes, harassment may not be as obvious, so the new policy looks for ways users try to get away with abuse by using emotes instead of text. Under the updated policy, the way combinations of emotes are used will also be considered when the Safety team is reviewing malicious content — even if no text was involved.

Meanwhile, following complaints from the community about being too lax on sexual harassment, the new policy will now also break out sexual harassment under its own section and lower the bar as to what’s considered objectifying or harassing behavior.

New changes of note here include repeatedly commenting on someone’s perceived attractiveness — even if this is intended as a compliment — if the commenter has been given an indication that it’s unwelcome. This could mean the commenter has already been asked to stop, timed-out or channel-banned. Twitch will also prohibit making lewd or explicit comments about anyone’s sexuality or physical appearance — with no exception for public figures. Sending unwanted or unsolicited links to nude images and videos is also prohibited.

Twitch says it will soon offer three live sessions on different dates before the policy goes into effect, where it will walk creators through the various changes and give them a chance to ask questions. These will be later available on demand, too. The first is at 10 AM on 12/11 on  /CreatorCamp, followed by a 10 AM session on /twitch on 12/16, then a 12 PM session on /CreatorCamp on Jan. 1, 2021.

The company is not necessarily changing the penalties associated with various behaviors. But, because the policy is more detailed, Twitch believes it will be able to better tailor a punitive action to the appropriate level with regard to the severity of the violation. For instance, lower severity violations may receive a warning or a lighter suspension, while the most severe actions will result in indefinite suspensions, even on a first offense.

The blog post answers other questions about the rollout of the policy, like how older content is handled or how Twitch will handle harassment when reports aren’t filed, for example, among other things. (The policy will only apply to new content created on or after Jan. 22; reports from someone are needed for Twitch to take action, as it wants to avoid punishing users win situations where banter or trash talk was welcome).

Of course, many may wonder how well Twitch will be able to properly enforce its new guidelines, given that its own corporate culture has been called out in the recent past as being toxic and abusive.

Several reports from former and current Twitch employees have documented Twitch executives and staff engaging in or ignoring issues like sexism, racism, harassment and other abuse both in the workplace and in the broader Twitch community. That raises the question as to how well can a company — a place where men allegedly referred to women streamers as “boob streamers,” for example, or assaulted their coworkers —  properly enforce a sexual harassment policy? At Twitch, when a coworker called a colleague the c-word and spat on her, a manager asked what she did to deserve it, one report claimed. Many women also described sexual assault in the workplace, including groping, forced kisses and unwanted massages.

Twitch has a history of making bad choices in other areas, too — like featuring a Black Lives Matter support video where only one line was spoken by a Black streamer; a Pride celebration video where Twitch said the “G” also stood for “gamer;” and the release of Hispanic Heritage Month emotes that allowed users to add sombreros or maracas to their emotes, as reported by Gamesindustry.biz.

The company says the policy rewrite had been underway since the beginning of the year, but the recent conversations with the community, including those about the sexual misconduct allegations, “absolutely informed” the changes.

Earlier this year, Twitch CEO Emmett Shear publicly posted a memo to staff that promised people’s voices had been heard on these matters, and that the company aimed to make changes. This policy is one step in that direction but Twitch still has a lot more to prove.

Twitch updates its hateful content and harassment policy after company called out for its own abuses

Following several reports of a toxic workplace and abuse this year, Twitch today announced the introduction of a new hateful content and harassment policy for its streamer community that will go into effect on Jan. 22, 2021. Under the updated guidelines, Twitch’s Safety team will change the way it evaluates potentially violating content. The company says it will now focus less on the perceived intent of a streamer’s statements or actions, and more on the content itself as well as its impact. Twitch also expanded, clarified, and toughened the guidelines around hateful conduct and harassment, including sexual harassment, which now has its own section.

As Twitch notes in a blog post detailing the new policy, “words and actions have meaning and impact, even if your intent is not meant to be hurtful or cause harm.”

The company explains that even if the streamer and the target of the harassment isn’t bothered by what took place, others in the Twitch community may be. So Twitch will evaluate streamer’s behavior based on whether it’s abusive and in violation of the company’s guidelines, rather than only on the intent.

Twitch says it may also take into consideration other factors when making determinations of punitive actions, including the reports from the targeted user or a mod team as well as other indications a behavior was unwanted, like a channel time-out or ban, as needed.

The new policy additionally makes clearer that certain behaviors are considered harassment and are prohibited. This includes claiming that the victim of a well-documented violent tragedy is a crisis actor or lying; encouraging others to DDoS, hack, doxx or swat another person; and inciting malicious raids of another person’s social media accounts. This means that even off-platform behavior is being wrapped into these new guidelines.

Twitch is also adding “caste,” “color” and “immigration status” to its list of identity characteristics it uses to determine what’s considered hateful content. The list already includes protected characteristics like race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sex, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, disability, serious medical condition, and veteran status.

And while hate speech and symbols were already banned on Twitch, the guidelines now explicitly ban hate groups, membership in hate groups, and the sharing of hate group propaganda. It’s also banning black/brown/yellow/redface, unless being shown in an “explicitly educational context.” (This is not meant to be a new change, but rather the language here has been made clearer, Twitch says.)

In another notable change, displaying the Confederate flag is now prohibited given its “historic and symbolic association with slavery and white supremacist groups in the U.S.”

Sometimes, harassment may not be as obvious, so the new policy looks for ways users try to get away with abuse by using emotes instead of text. Under the updated policy, the way combinations of emotes are used will also be considered when the Safety team is reviewing malicious content — even if no text was involved.

Meanwhile, following complaints from the community about being too lax on sexual harassment, the new policy will now also break out sexual harassment under its own section and lower the bar as to what’s considered objectifying or harassing behavior.

New changes of note here include repeatedly commenting on someone’s perceived attractiveness — even if this is intended as a compliment — if the commenter has been given an indication that it’s unwelcome. This could mean the commenter has already been asked to stop, timed-out or channel-banned. Twitch will also prohibit making lewd or explicit comments about anyone’s sexuality or physical appearance — with no exception for public figures. Sending unwanted or unsolicited links to nude images and videos is also prohibited.

Twitch says it will soon offer three live sessions on different dates before the policy goes into effect, where it will walk creators through the various changes and give them a chance to ask questions. These will be later available on demand, too. The first is at 10 AM on 12/11 on  /CreatorCamp, followed by a 10 AM session on /twitch on 12/16, then a 12 PM session on /CreatorCamp on Jan. 1, 2021.

The company is not necessarily changing the penalties associated with various behaviors. But, because the policy is more detailed, Twitch believes it will be able to better tailor a punitive action to the appropriate level with regard to the severity of the violation. For instance, lower severity violations may receive a warning or a lighter suspension, while the most severe actions will result in indefinite suspensions, even on a first offense.

The blog post answers other questions about the rollout of the policy, like how older content is handled or how Twitch will handle harassment when reports aren’t filed, for example, among other things. (The policy will only apply to new content created on or after Jan. 22; reports from someone are needed for Twitch to take action, as it wants to avoid punishing users win situations where banter or trash talk was welcome).

Of course, many may wonder how well Twitch will be able to properly enforce its new guidelines, given that its own corporate culture has been called out in the recent past as being toxic and abusive.

Several reports from former and current Twitch employees have documented Twitch executives and staff engaging in or ignoring issues like sexism, racism, harassment and other abuse both in the workplace and in the broader Twitch community. That raises the question as to how well can a company — a place where men allegedly referred to women streamers as “boob streamers,” for example, or assaulted their coworkers —  properly enforce a sexual harassment policy? At Twitch, when a coworker called a colleague the c-word and spat on her, a manager asked what she did to deserve it, one report claimed. Many women also described sexual assault in the workplace, including groping, forced kisses and unwanted massages.

Twitch has a history of making bad choices in other areas, too — like featuring a Black Lives Matter support video where only one line was spoken by a Black streamer; a Pride celebration video where Twitch said the “G” also stood for “gamer;” and the release of Hispanic Heritage Month emotes that allowed users to add sombreros or maracas to their emotes, as reported by Gamesindustry.biz.

The company says the policy rewrite had been underway since the beginning of the year, but the recent conversations with the community, including those about the sexual misconduct allegations, “absolutely informed” the changes.

Earlier this year, Twitch CEO Emmett Shear publicly posted a memo to staff that promised people’s voices had been heard on these matters, and that the company aimed to make changes. This policy is one step in that direction but Twitch still has a lot more to prove.