Co-op Conversations: Using the Co-operative Model to Change the Game in the Creative Industry featuring Eileen Mary Holowka

On April 1st, join the Canadian Centre for the Study of Co-operatives for their next Co-op Conversations event, Using the Co-operative Model to Change the Game in the Creative Industry featuring Eileen Mary Holowka.

The Creative industry is consistently challenged with precarity. In traditional studios, workers are disposable – between 2022 and 2025, there were more than 35,000 layoffs in games (which equates to about 28% of the workforce in the past two years), with marginalized developers often first to go. Creative studios are also prone to starting up then dissolving; however, they rarely fail because of their creative work or ideas. They fail because of undefined governance, conflict, communication problems, and unsustainable working conditions. The co-operative structure can address many of these issues.

In this Co-op Conversation, join eileen mary holowka, co-executive director of Baby Ghosts, for an introduction to their work in building cooperative infrastructure throughout the Canadian video games industry through providing cooperative education to game developers and how this can be applied to other creative fields.

eileen (they/she) is a writer, game dev, and community organizer/advocate with a background in theatre, games, poetry, and patient advocacy. They have a PhD in communication studies from Concordia University and have published extensively within and outside of academia. They are a co-founder of both Weird Ghosts and Baby Ghosts with Jennie Robinson Faber, as well as a member of Gamma Space Collaborative Studio, where they work to make the games industry more sustainable and equitable.