2008 Woodie Awards
Media Darling: Please don't feed the writers
by Caitlin Birch
Issue date: 11/13/07 Section: Mosaic
American author James Norman Hall once said, "Loafing is the most productive part of a writer's life."
If Hall was indeed correct, approximately 12,000 television and film writers are currently experiencing their peak levels of productivity en masse. As of 12:01 a.m., Monday, Nov. 5, all 9,000 members of the Writers Guild of America, West and 3,000 members of the Writers Guild of America, East went on strike, making them a loafing line Hall would admire.
The entertainment industry's writers have emerged from their lonesome lives of artistic solitude (undoubtedly every writer lives such a life - I myself am writing this from a friendless cell of isolation) and banded together in a rare strike for a bigger piece of the profit pie.
The writers' message is somewhat cryptic, but it appears they want to actually be paid for their work. This seems a little presumptuous. Writers historically work for free, subscribe to starvation diets and adopt eco-friendly lifestyles by living in homes of cardboard. The entertainment industry's writers have simply been blinded by those glitzy Hollywood lights, and are temporarily outside their minds.
For example, the unreasonable demands they made in negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers leading up to last week's strike surround two main issues. First, writers are dissatisfied with the payment they receive each time a DVD that uses one of their scripts is sold. Apparently, when the studio charges $19.99 for the DVD and the writer makes 4 cents, that's not enough.
Second, writers are riled up about the Internet. They think the information superhighway is swell, but when studios release television show episodes or movies on the Internet and fail to pay writers anything, feathers get ruffled.
According to the Writers Guild of America, East's Web site, studios post the episodes and movies and then take advertisements, saying they have to fund the project. However, posting the shows and films doesn't cost much and the advertisements end up as revenue - $4.6 billion over the next three years, to be exact.
If Hall was indeed correct, approximately 12,000 television and film writers are currently experiencing their peak levels of productivity en masse. As of 12:01 a.m., Monday, Nov. 5, all 9,000 members of the Writers Guild of America, West and 3,000 members of the Writers Guild of America, East went on strike, making them a loafing line Hall would admire.
The entertainment industry's writers have emerged from their lonesome lives of artistic solitude (undoubtedly every writer lives such a life - I myself am writing this from a friendless cell of isolation) and banded together in a rare strike for a bigger piece of the profit pie.
The writers' message is somewhat cryptic, but it appears they want to actually be paid for their work. This seems a little presumptuous. Writers historically work for free, subscribe to starvation diets and adopt eco-friendly lifestyles by living in homes of cardboard. The entertainment industry's writers have simply been blinded by those glitzy Hollywood lights, and are temporarily outside their minds.
For example, the unreasonable demands they made in negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers leading up to last week's strike surround two main issues. First, writers are dissatisfied with the payment they receive each time a DVD that uses one of their scripts is sold. Apparently, when the studio charges $19.99 for the DVD and the writer makes 4 cents, that's not enough.
Second, writers are riled up about the Internet. They think the information superhighway is swell, but when studios release television show episodes or movies on the Internet and fail to pay writers anything, feathers get ruffled.
According to the Writers Guild of America, East's Web site, studios post the episodes and movies and then take advertisements, saying they have to fund the project. However, posting the shows and films doesn't cost much and the advertisements end up as revenue - $4.6 billion over the next three years, to be exact.
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