In light of the acrid responses to the intellectual property clause discussed in my previous question, I have to ask: why don't we have a programmers' union? There are many issues we face as employees, and we have very little ability to organize and negotiate. Could we band together with the writers', directors', or musicians' guilds, or are our needs unique?

Has anyone ever tried to start one? If so, why did it fail? (Or, alternatively, why have I never heard of it, despite its success?)

later:

Keith has my idea basically right. I would also imagine the union being involved in many other topics, including:

• legal liability for others' use/misuse of our work, especially unintended uses
• evaluating the quality of computer science and software engineering higher education programs -- unlike many other engineering disciplines, we are not required to be certified on receiving our Bachelor's degrees
• evangelism and outreach -- especially to elementary school students
• certification -- not doing it, but working with the companies like ISC(2) and others to make certifications meaningful and useful
• continuing education -- similar to previous
• conferences -- maintain a go-to list of organizers and other resources our members can use

I would see it less so as a traditional trade union, with little emphasis on:

• pay -- we tend to command fairly good salaries
• outsourcing and free trade -- most of use tend to be pretty free-market oriented
• working conditions -- we're the only industry with Aeron chairs being considered anything like "standard"