Hi,
It seemed to me that some of the emails on the mepbmlist were from players
who were worried that we were running our business in an unethical way. We
don't normally discuss this outside the company but just so that you get an
insight into who we are and we stand for:
We have always used recycled paper, we drink fair-trade coffee and tea and
eat fair-trade food at lunch (and anything else that we can get fair trade
we use). We bank with the Co-op who do not invest in unethical businesses. A
small percentage of our profits helps to sponsor the activities of the local
World Development Movement group.
Employees discuss all aspects of the business practise. We agree on hours,
wages, what jobs they want to do and when they want to work - they also get
a mostly free lunch. They also help us decide the businesses direction and
help choose our pay level!
Everyone here earns about 60% of what they could elsewhere, but prefer to
work here because of the way we do things.
We are not pro Microsoft, we support copyleft and opensource development, as
we have with Automagic. We boycott firms which we think are sufficiently
unethical (the major food firms and banks, for example), and we don't think
Microsoft and Bill Gates quite fall into that category.
As with many ethics, we have to choose a middle-ground sometimes but we
attempt to act in an enthical manners as possible and this includes our
employees. I am aware that some of you might not agree with our ethical
choices, but just so that you are aware that we have given serious
consideration to how we run things here and what we want to achieve.
Thanks
Clint
