It's all about games: enterprise and entrepreneurialism in digital games

Abstract

This article aims to contrast benign notions of ‘free’ and ‘creative’ work in the context of labour market conditions and employment relationships. Empirical research reveals the exploitative and precarious nature of work in the experiences of self‐employed digital game developers and charts the responses of developers to unstable and insecure working conditions. Building on work by P ongratz and V oß, Haunschild and Eikhof, and B ergvall‐ K åreborn and H owcroft, this study finds that a typical response to increasing instability in the labour market is to adopt more enterprising and entrepreneurial behaviour in order to find work. This article illustrates the consequences for developers by highlighting examples of self‐exploitation, which is fuelled by a passion for work and is where entrepreneurial practices lead to long working hours, unpaid work and a blurring of work–life boundaries.