Paris (AFP)
They fill the main strike fund by playing video games: the members of the collective "Le Stream Reconductible" take turns on a live broadcasting platform to collect funds, already more than 130,000 euros, in support of employees mobilized against the reform retirements.
In front of their webcam, these "streamers", mostly from YouTube, discuss the news with humor.
Debates, music, testimonies ... The videographers vary the content and interact with the Internet users of the "chat". They send their comments directly and can make donations to the main strike fund, that launched by the Info'Com-CGT union.
"The idea was born from a tweet suggesting a kind of Telethon to support the strike," rewinds Quineapple, a 33-year-old youtuber in charge of communication for the Stream Reconductible. "In two days, we got organized".
The Twitch site allows the live broadcasting of video games and discussion with Internet users. The Renewable Stream channel (twitch.tv/recondustream) was launched there on the first day of mobilization against the pension reform, on December 5. Word-of-mouth does the rest: "a hundred volunteer videographers and technicians" participate today, says Quineapple.
- Precarious "Sims" -
Benjamin Patinaud, 33, is best known as Bolchegeek on YouTube. For the "Recondustream", he plays "trying to have a little political approach, to provoke discussion. For example, when we played a multinational undercover game, we acted as if we were infiltrating BlackRock", the asset manager that the strikers erected as a symbol of funded retirement.
He likes to animate debates with the "cat": "we are talking about the different movements in which people participated, police violence, precautions to take in demonstrations ..."
Another videographer, the Sunday Developer, launched a game of "Sims", a simulation video game, playing as an elderly and poor person who has to make do in a wealthy neighborhood.
Guile, graphic designer, joined the Stream Renewable because "the organizers are friends who knew (his) political sensitivities, rather from the left". He specializes in sculpting 3D models. "We made a caricature of Emmanuel Macron, and an old Pif the dog demonstrating for his retirement," he said.
This 30-year-old emphasizes that "while we are participating in the Renewable Stream, we are putting the break on our usual livelihood, which is to + stream + on our own channel. We are participating in the strike".
- More than 130,000 euros collected -
Met on the channel's "cat", "RJ", 29, watching the Renewable Stream "from the start of the mobilization". He has already sent "once two euros and once three euros".
"It's like going on picket lines: I stay a few minutes, I chat with people," said the man who had never donated to a social movement before. For him, the Renewable Stream has a "direct" impact, because it allows "isolated people, like me in the Vaucluse, to participate in the discussion".
According to the Stream Reconductible website, more than 130,000 euros were raised on the crowdfunding platform uTip. They will be donated to the interprofessional fund of the Info'Com-CGT union, the largest according to the Twitter account @caissedegreve which makes the census.
"They have made a donation of 103,444 euros for the moment (January 13), we will have the rest after. But it is already the biggest donation we have received since the launch of the movement", situates Romain Altmann, general secretary of the Info'Com-CGT union. He appreciates "the entry into the struggle of young people who challenge a reform in which they are said to have little interest".
The videographers "stream" Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and during days of events. Until when? "It will stop when they stop," said their Twitter account.
For Bolchegeek, this self-managed tool "has exceeded all expectations and can be re-mobilized. Like any social movement, it has created links that can be reactivated for other causes, and we will not fail to do so".
© 2020 AFP