[game_edu] Internship question

[Ian Schreiber]

Unpaid internships, regardless of anything else, are illegal in many states and are sketchy to begin with. Minimum wage is cheap, and a handful of paid interns isn't going to be the thing that makes or breaks a company's bottom line. They also have the down side of perpetuating a social class gap: students from disadvantaged backgrounds are less able to take an unpaid internship to begin with. I would tend to steer students away from unpaid internships in general (at least the good students; let the terrible students work for the company for free, as punishment to both the student and the company ;-). As for "you'll get great experience" - you know what else gives great experience without pay? Working on your own game. Have the interested students do that instead. As for "we might hire you if you do great work as an unpaid intern," if they underpay interns, I'd assume they don't treat you any better as a permanent employee, so that's not exactly a selling point either.

Non-competes are another red flag, ESPECIALLY at the intern level. To the extent that non-competes are okay, it's mainly to prevent someone like a team lead or director level employee from leaving the company and pulling half the dev team with them to start their own studio. (One could argue that a better defense against this situation is to treat your employees well enough that they wouldn't want to leave, rather than just sticking a legal poison bomb in their work contract, but whatever.) Telling a student that they can't work in the industry, though? I can't see any rational justification for this. Also, worth noting that non-competes are unenforceable in many jurisdictions.
Both of those things together? Not normal, definitely unethical, possibly illegal. I would stay far, far away. Definitely NOT the kind of place I would want my students to go.
If a student had other reasons that outweighed the negatives that made them really interested in this particular internship for some reason, I would have them research the labor laws in the state that the company lives in to see what their rights are.
- Ian


      From: Ben Chang <changb3 at rpi.edu>
 To: game_edu at igda.org 
 Sent: Tuesday, January 27, 2015 4:05 PM
 Subject: [game_edu] Internship question
   
Hi all,

I have a student who's been offered an unpaid internship.  The contract 
has as non-compete that would bar him from doing game dev work in a 
related field for one year after completion.  Is this normal for unpaid 
internship?  It seems disadvantageous.  The only value he receives from 
performing the work is experience to use towards future employment, but 
he would be prevented from seeking employment doing the thing he'd 
gotten experience doing.

thanks,

--Ben Chang

-- 
Benjamin Chang
Associate Professor, Department of the Arts
Director, Games and Simulation Arts and Sciences
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
110 8th Street, Troy, NY 12180
changb3 at rpi.edu
518.276.2366

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