I was fired from a shop that made a game backend and asked workers to continually crunch, work long hours on salary with no overtime. There were some big bonuses, but it didn't make up for the bad planning and management.

I refused to work over 45 hours a week. I worked one 13 hour Sunday and said no to the 2nd one and was fired. Another dev/ops person left two weeks later.

The others: almost all of the team is still there, working over a year later, with the same crazy hours (80+ for 6~8 weeks at a time) and same constant crunch. I really really really wish I had at least used the word "union" in a meeting or e-mail while there, so I could claim I was fired based on trying to organize. I've even considered taking a day or two off, standing in front of the building and handing out unionization pamphlets, just to see if I could help make a change for the people left there.

Everyone else let themselves and continue to let themselves be exploited. I honestly don't understand why many of them haven't gotten new jobs yet. Do they not realize that type of work isn't normal? I've worked at a lot of places and maybe I can just see bad management when others can't?