Digital Services Restored in Lagrange

Anhedonia Station, Lagrange Orbital Colonial Authority -- 29 Mar. 2057:  A two-week digital services strike which almost shut down the economy of the L5 cluster has ended this day with a negotiated settlement between an Omnicor Hypercorp LLC. labour-relations team and the indigenous boutique union of a local Infomatic franchise.  The new contract raises wages, shortens required shifts, establishes an arbitration process for disputes and employee discipline, and forbids 'company store' rules which required indentured softworkers to purchase relaxation programming from Omnicor-owned services at extortionate rates, a practice which labour analysts claim amounts to debt slavery.

The cluster-wide strike, organized by the Post-Industrial Workers of the Web Local 32986, was declared illegal by the LOCA Concilium, but could not be stopped despite vigorous actions by the district Department of Cyberlaw Enforcement.  "The simple truth," stated PWW spokesperson Tangent Polynomial in a press release late today, "is that there is no legally enforceable way of making people work who don't want to.  They managed to get enough scabs in from the virtual slums on Earth to get back some basic functionality, but most digital services are not, contrary to popular belief, something that just any data ghost or backfilled partial can provide.  Hundreds of our comrades were rounded up into sandboxes and suspended with null input, but they couldn't be broken.  Unless the fascists finally resort to direct mind editing, summary deletion or torturescapes, nothing they do can threaten us.  The people united can never be defeated!"

Residents are breathing a sigh of relief today as they regain their ability to easily transact business, search the hyperlayer, charter vehicles, and give orders to their houses and workplaces.  Varlem Thrush, the newly-elected head of the Infomatic shop union, has released a statement thanking the PWW for their assistance.  "I won't deny that I'm here because I'm not good with money," stated Vr. Thrush, "but all I wanted is a chance to work my debt off honestly and live a decent life.  We never imagined that we could take on a big company like Omnicor, but with the Wobblies on our side we did it."

The PWW has now called for an investigation into allegations of personhood rights abuses at the Anhedonia Infomatic shop.  Representatives of Omnicor and of the LOCA government did not respond to requests for comment.

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