Well the results are in.  Although disappointing that the IWW didn't win the competition for its centenary year, it is notable that the IWW beat all AFL-CIO union sites hands down.  

In this year's competition, 6,848 votes were cast for hundreds of trade union websites around the world. 5,578 (81%) of these confirmed their choice by email and only those votes are counted in this year's competition -- the first time we have ever undertaken this precaution.

This year, among the top 10 websites we have four from Canada, two from the USA, and one each from South Africa, Australia, the United Kingdom, and Ireland. These ten websites come from unions representing a total of nearly 3,000,000 workers. The winning site this year received more votes than any other site ever received in one of our annual competitions.

By Coley Ward - creativeloafing.com, December 28, 2005

Tabby Chase works nights as a dancer at the Clermont Lounge, so she was asleep the morning of Thurs., March 17, when she says FBI Special Agent Dante Jones called her.

Chase says she didn't know what the FBI wanted. When she awoke, it was late afternoon, and she had five messages from three numbers. She says each was from Jones, telling her the FBI needed to ask some questions.

Chase is tall and thin, with hair buzzed to about a quarter-inch, except for long blond bangs that routinely fall in her face. She describes herself as a flaky anarchist, somebody who has an inherent distrust of government and big business but who is "terrible at outreach" and "not involved in any organizing."

Fellow workers,

A European strike is organized dying 16 -17 of January 2006 by maritime and dockworkers. The strike will be held in 29 ports of 10 countries throughout Europe. The strikers are against the new European direction, regarding the free sea trade. Greek marine transport workers, along with the solidarity of the antiauthoritarian movement, ship builders union of Perama and Greek Wobblies, will participate in the forthcoming strike by closing the ports in Piraeus, Patra & Thessaloniki.           

In the heat of this new battle, European & Greek dockworkers call the maritime unions around the world to awake and support their strike by sending a solidarity statement or organise an action in their local work places. This strike is an attempt to reignite militancy and to underscore the necessity of international workers’ organisation for a revolutionary industrial unionism in today’s global economy.

Peter S Kalikow, Chairman

Metropolitan Transit Authority of New York

Fax No: (212) 878-7030

Dear Mr. Kalikow and members of the board,

The significance of the Transit Workers Union Local 100 strike cannot be underestimated. The workers that keep the trains, buses, subways and transportation systems of New York City running walked out not for themselves alone, but for millions of workers in both the public and private sector jobs who face a desperate future.

In the struggle for security in our later years the Transit Workers Union are heroes and will not be ignored. The Board of the Metropolitan Transit Authority is leading an attack not only on the safety and economic security of the New York City Transit Workers, but on all workers of the world. The promises made for a decent life, financial security, and some personal liberties are to be sacrificed upon the altar of wealth and privilege.

From starbucksunion.org:

As a recipient of support from TWU Local 100 members on our picket lines, it is with great honor that we express our total solidarity with striking transit workers in New York City. We know you are striking not only for your families but also for every working New Yorker.

Corporations, public or private, are concerned with two things: money and power. Since the MTA's last-minute bargaining demand would have saved less money than two day's worth of overtime for cops to patrol struck stations, it follows that power was the element at issue. The two-tier pension scheme the MTA tried to impose had the singular intent of weakening the union. By dividing senior workers from newer workers, two-tier schemes undermine solidarity within a union. They also provide an incentive for the bosses to concoct pretexts to get rid of more senior workers to save money. The supermarket bosses imposed such a two-tier contract on 70,000 striking and locked out grocery workers in 2004. But in 2005, TWU Local 100 and affiliated unions said, "No."

It had to happen eventually.  The working class in the United States of America has been tkaing it in the gut for half a century without effectively mounting a significant counter offense in the class struggle.  Now it looks like the rank & file members of TWU Local #100 in New York City have finally declared that now is the time to declare "Ya Basta!" (Enough is Enough!).

While it is far too early to tell how this will all play out in the upcoming days, the indications are that the defiance of overwhelmingly repressive threats from the capitalists in NYC is a bold step that may be just the shot in the arm that we wage slaves need to finally awaken from a slumber that has lasted far too long already.  As a transit worker myself, I am guardedly optimistic at this point. 

Disclaimer:  Eric Lee's article is reposted here not as an endorsement for iww.org as Labourstart Website of the Year--although iww.org is a candidate, and is mentioned in the article.  It is posted here to emphasize the growing impact that the Internet, labor websites, and labourstart.org have on organized labor.  The Internet--while currently dominated by capitalist interests nevertheless hold enormous potential for those of us fettered by capitalism (at least 99% of humanity) to emancipate ourselves from its yoke.

For the ninth year in a row, LabourStart is once again organizing the Labour Website of the Year competition.