Well there were rumours flying around of a deal this week. Turned out to be horseshit. Here's the latest e-mail to members for those keeping up on this here strike.
I saw that. A $250 flat fee for a year's use of a streaming episode? The DVD (translation: VHS) rate applying to internet downloads may be my favorite, though. I can't decide. Damn, Reno, the studios must think you guys are beyond fucking stupid. My friend tells me the studios will have to come up with a real offer and settle before New Years or the ad agencies will come after them for those renegotiated upfronts and cash back. He says the networks will dick around until the last minute in the hopes that the WGA is, in fact, dumb as a post or until they get frustrated and lower their demands. How frustrated would the WGA have to be to accept that offer? Isn't that a rollback, Reno?
Ugh. Things will get tighter. January is usually when they start making new pilot deals. At this rate that won't happen. I know of 2 other screenwriters as well as myself who all got calls this week from prod co's trying to get us to scab. (I got offered gross points this week. Gross! Like I'm William fucking Goldman or something.) I'm damn sure we're not the only ones. But seriously the proposals on the table, we'd have to be certifiable to accept.
Ohhhh, don't scab, Reno. It's not worth it. I can't say I'm surprised to hear that the suits are desperate enough to try to get some scabs, though. Just settle it, you greedy dicks. Why drag it out until the last minute? To try and lowball the WGA. The pilots are another reason the AMPTP is nuts to drag this out. Not enough pilots means more lost revenue in the long run. Even reality means lost revenue in the long run because they can't make those sweet second run syndication deals and the reality DVDs aren't going to sell like scripted if they sell at all. The networks can't win by dragging this out. How much money are the advertisers going to want back? I imagine it's more than a couple of hundred bucks.
Are they going to break their own at the same time? I think one of the main reasons you aren't seeing the usual "RAGH UNIONS ARE EVIL WE MUST CRUSH SOCIALISM GAH" people being against the writers in this case is because the production companies are also in a union of sorts.
Meh. Writers. *pshaw* I can scab! Let me see... "A long long time ago, in a far far away land, it was a dark and stormy night..." What!?
Michael Ovitz got 140 million in severance pay from Disney for working and giving lousy ideas for a year and a half. The top CEOs' pay in this country is out of control and the disparity between their salaries and workers' salaries has never been greater. As was pointed out in a Nikki Finke comment column, the top three CEO's bonuses are worth more than what the WGA is asking for. If they can break the union's resolve, it's only going to get worse. The studios want the "freedom" to designate anything as "promotional use" and not pay the writers a dime no matter how many times its viewed online? That's beyond horsehit. The studios are still bargaining in bad faith. Three days of lovely PR, and they offer a rollback that will cost the writers money. It's unbelievable.
I'd sooner see TV implode, and go a whole season without first. Maybe the rebuilding from the rubble up would shake off all the riff raff that have gathered for the past 5 years.
Outta curiousity, what would happen if a writer becomes scab? It's not like other industries where the workers can block off the path to the factory. Do other writers come to their house, beat them up, and take away their pens and pencils?
You say you are "on strike", but what are you doing here now? Writing! You should just reply with blank posts. (Maybe a smiley or two...) Also, your picket signs should just be empty white boards. You people really need to take this strike more seriously you know.
They can however refuse to deal with them after the strike, and not being in the writers guild will make it extremely hard for a writer to find work once the strike is finished.
All major studios and Prod Co's are WGA signatory companies. What that means is that when they negotiate with writers for individual projects, they agree that the minimum contract requirements that they agreed with the WGA are offered as a baseline. Then depending on success, fame/infamy, lawyers agents, the terms of the contract improve from that baseline. If you're nobody but are a WGA member writer, you're at least guaranteed the minimum. As of right now there is no agreed contract with the WGA so in theory the studios etc are free to make deals with whoever on whatever terms they desire to give. The problem comes when the strike ends. The WGA can instruct all members to have no dealings with certain companies on an individual basis. these are called 'struck' companies and a list of struck companies are listed on the WGA website each month. This makes hiring the best talent for future projects very difficult for the companies concerned. For the scab writer, it means he or she crossed the picket line. He will forever not be allowed to join the WGA and will have none of the protections that come with membership. Furthermore, it's my understanding that the minimum agreement between the WGA and signatory companies specifies that they agree not to work with writers that crossed any picket line. When I joined the WGAe for example, I had to sign multiple affidavits stating that I never crossed picket lines for any strike dating back to when I was in nappies. So after the strike, it would be very difficult to work again as a writer. Of course there are legions of small non signatory Prod Cos making independent features all the time and they could work in this arena but the money here is tiny by comparison. And the projects that actually get made are small.
God, what a lousy and insulting proposal from the producers. I'm sensing that the WGA gets it when it comes to the coming changes in the marketplace and is prepared to fight this one out over the long haul. While everyone seems to be focused on the the fact that the two proposals are just $20 million apart over three years, the big difference is the structure. Writers need to get paid for their work — work that will increasingly be seen on the Internet. Broadcast TV, as we know it, is on life support, right there with movie theaters. Unfortunately, most of Hollywood does get that and hasn't come up with good revenue models (granted DVD, which many of them fought against is making the studios a pile now) and needs to rework its processes and share the wealth to allow for future growth. Hopefully, the WGA will drag this out until the producers and networks start seeing major advertiser pressure — not to mention a permanent loss of network viewers (the networks are already hemorrhaging viewers to cable and Internet) — and are able to get a fair, forward-looking deal.
That makes me think of what my former boss did when I told him I was leaving. We had a meeting and he proposed taking some of my work away and giving me more work from one of my other coworkers. The exact coworker who I had to cover for when she was out on vacation, her child was sick, etc. Needless to say I still quit. Moron!
