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As you may have heard, the union representing workers at IBM Italia is organizing what is likely the world's first online job action. In September the RSU will be calling on its members and supporters around the world to join in a picket at IBM's 'offices' in Second Life, the online virtual world.

You can sign up to receive an e-mail when the date and time for the picket are set and learn how to use Second Life by visiting this site set up by UNI, the global union federation for the service industries.

For more information about the job action and it potential see this article at Straight Goods

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"There was no effect on IBM's business operations,"

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This is the key limitation of this strategy. A virtual strike is a good educational tool and, because of its novelty, it was a good media tool in this case and may be effective in mobilizing IT workers towards engaging in a real strike but it is not a substitute for an actual strike that disrupts the corporation's profits and thus exercises real leverage towards winning concessions on real demands.

Reminds me a bit of the mid 1990s when students around Ontario were engaged in a series of occupations of university administrative offices in order to protest tuition increases. The student council at the University of Western Ontario, bless them, decided that instead of an actual occupation they'd organize a "virtual occupation" which was a webpage on which people logged on to say they were now engaging in a virtual occupation of the principal's office. I don't know if the principal was even ever aware this was going on