Perhaps this is coming off of yesterday’s hilarious ‘fiasco’ where Astralis members didn’t properly cut their names out of the offered text from whatever social media organization has been helping their presence, or this could be a mere coincidence.
Whatever it is, it’s arguably a bit appalling for many to consider; Astralis is trying to find people to manage their social media for them, and they aren’t willing to pay a dime.
The modern take of ‘do it for the experience’ seems to be the rancorous appeal that the organization, which is traded on NASDAQ to the tune of $40 Million while paying roster members upwards of $50,000 a month, is attempting to use to get unwitting individuals to do work for free.
The same organization that requested their staff take a massive salary cut, to the alleged tune of 30%, due to COVID-19, and then used the savings to purchase four new players.
https://twitter.com/GroggyLuck/status/1313744601778397185?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Frankly, the pedigree alone of Astralis makes it a tempting offer, as it’s a monumental resume-building piece that would then allow users to use it as a stepping-stone upwards. However, this isn’t a Tier 3 team within Counter-Strike or other esports; this is an organization that long-cemented its dominance as the best European team (at least prior pandemic).
The organization is also looking for writers on their website willing to work for free (i.e. volunteer) to put together content in an editorial fashion.
Granted, this is relatively common within industries and the Astralis name, warts and all, is a massive name that will shine through on future works; it is not, however, reasonable for massive organizations that have the paltry sums that these individuals (volunteers) need to put food on the table to use their size as a form of bartering, stating on their website the rough equivalent of ‘doing it for exposure’ when the service being provided absolutely adds value to the organization as a whole.
This tends to be the fulcrum of the argument regarding whether internships and corporate work done under the guise of ‘volunteering’, regardless of how popular the organization may be within their respective scenes.
Regardless, it’s inevitable that people will jump at the opportunity to work under the legendary organization which continues to fuel the cycle of lowering salaries and expectations in an arguably exploitative manner.
The public is relatively split on this from opinions gleaned thus far: it’s a standard in business that many business owners would jump on if they could without risk: free workers have very little downsides. While some argue that it is exploitative and will create new norms within the industry of people desperate to break in, others accept this as a fact of bartering experience for time.