More than 600 developers and designers of The New York Times go on strike the day before the US election — the publication’s servers are under threat

The New York Times Tech Guild represents more than 600 software developers, product managers, data scientists and designers who power the newspaper’s digital services — including live blogs, mobile push notifications and election feeds.

As noted by The Washington Post  New York Times tech guild has been negotiating its first union contract since 2022, the latest talks lasted the night before and reached a deadlock, provoking a massive strike. In fact, the day before the start of the US elections, the newspaper’s servers may be left completely without service.

The New York Times’ senior software engineer, Kate Hene, says that the election brings an increase in traffic to the newspaper’s website, creating a «system load» that will be difficult to handle without experienced engineers on hand.

Picket underway outside @nytimes pic.twitter.com/dVVD3XRUR6

— NewsGuild of New York (@nyguild) November 4, 2024

The negotiations have been focused on three key issues: protection from dismissal without cause and due process; return-to-work policy; and equality and fairness in pay (the study found a pay gap for women and black people).

We are on ULP strike. We gave @nytimes management months of notice of our strike deadline, we made ourselves available around the clock, but the company has decided that our members aren’t worth enough to agree to a fair contract and stop committing unfair labor practices. pic.twitter.com/jYlANW1ruw

— New York Times Tech Guild (@NYTGuildTech) November 4, 2024

Meanwhile, more than 750 journalists of the newspaper signed a statement saying that they would not be able to do their job without technical staff.

A spokeswoman for The New York Times said earlier that the company has «robust plans to ensure that the publication’s mission is» fulfilled, but declined to specify what measures have been put in place.