the main point of this strike is over DVD sales. The bulk of the money made is in DVD sales, studios cook their books to guarantee that writers (and actors to a certain degree) don't see any money for this medium.

But that said, last time the contract was negotiated the internet content and dvd arenas were not such a huge factor.

Is only fair for the writers (and actors) to be compensated for their work in all mediums it is distributed in.

Hmmm, $130K seems like a comfortable living, but not in NYC/LA, and ccertainly not when the actors for a show are making that amount per episode!

When the cut that each writer receives of a DVD sale was determined back when VHS was the primary format, it seems inappropriate to keep that same cut now that DVD is the dominant format.

I support the WGA strike--ladylike or not. :)

"Not ladylike"
 

It is ironic this is on Greekchat - so many of our sororities were founded at a time when it was considered "unladylike" to attend college! Our founders were progressive pioneers who weren't content to merely sit by the fire and do needlework. They sought an education, equal to that given to men, ladylike or no.

I saw some photo of the strike-- one of the LOST writers was picketting. One his sign were the words: Don't you want to know the truth about the island?

LOL-- if that isn't motivation to end the strike, then I don't know what is?

Here's an op-ed from the head-writer of Lost from Sunday... I think Kristin on E! announced that ABC IS in fact going to show the eight episodes they have come February though.

An excellent point. Not only that, several GLOs were founded in a protesting reaction to prejudices / incidents of racism. (For example, AOII got started up in response to a Jewish girl getting denied a bid to another GLO, on the basis of religion.)

I believe that was actually the creator and showrunner that had that sign!

Kinda trashy? Like in production values or are you making a "class" judgement here?

No, AOII was not founded because of discrimination. She was founded because all of our founders wanted to be in the same organization as they were friends. It wasn't like, "Oh I'm Jewish and I got denied, let's start our own!"

From our website: "Barnard College, in the late 1890’s, was the first separate college for women to be affiliated with a great men’s university such as Columbia University. AOII’s four Founders were in the class of 1898, young, and unlike most of the women who had entered Barnard in previous years. They were friendly, adventurous, frank and merry, and enthusiastically devoted to each other and to the class of ‘98. Determined to make a democratic, unostentatious society, the four women, Stella George Stern, Helen St. Clair, Elizabeth Heywood, and Jessie Wallace climbed a little winding stair into the stackroom of the old Columbia Library. This little room was rarely used and stored Anglo-Saxon tomes and ancient vellum manuscripts. While the four sat in a deep window seat, pigeons outside and snow lightly falling, they pledged one another at the beginning of the year 1897."

ETA (this post from an old thread on GC in which irishpipes posted): AOII has a connection to Kappa Kappa Gamma. Barnard College (of Columbia University) was founded in 1889. Kappa chartered a chapter there in 1891. The classes were very small, and because the entrance requirements included knowledge of Latin and Greek, in addition to may other rigorous subjects, most students were slightly older than the traditional college students because they had to study after prep school in order to pass the entrance examinations. Since the classes were small, Kappa traditionally admitted to membership the entirety of each class. The class preceding the class of our founders was significantly larger and Kappa could not take everyone. As a result, the College needed a new fraternity. This need, along with other conditions, led to the founding of AOII. Our founders pledged themselves in December 1896 and officially became Alpha chapter of AOII on January 2, 1897.


So no, we were not founded because one of our founders was denied entrance to Kappa.

Back to your regularly scheduled thread...

I guess the strike has stopped affecting me since I've not had TV since we moved to our new house. :) It's amazing the amount of stuff you find to do instead of watching TV.

I saw on the news yesterday that the strike is costing Hollywood $80 million A DAY! Also, the broadway writers are joining them. Wow.:eek:

That's interesting. I wonder if it's mainly for moral support. I can't imagine that there's a constant demand for fresh Broadway scripts like their Hollywood counterparts. But, I'm pretty far removed from the Broadway scene, so I have no idea how much new material there needs to be.

I hope the writers' strike ends soon, but it doesn't look promising. :(

Word from my friend who works on Law & Order - the scuttlebutt is that the producers aren't interested in bringing the strike to a close because the actors and directors' agreements are coming up for renewal soon, and if they settle the writers' strike it will set a precedent. So they are more than willing to just sit tight. This really is awful for everyone who works on these shows and will be without a paycheck when production closes down - not to mention the audiences of these shows. They are predicting 6 - 10 months for the strike (course they are just guessing).

The stagehands for Broadway all went on strike last week because their union couldn't reach an agreement with the producers.

^^^ Yeah, I knew about that. Smiley21, however, said that the Broadway writers were also going on strike.

IMO, and again, I'm not familiar with Broadway's particulars, it's easier to deal without writers (on Broadway) than stagehands. Without writers, they can simply not put new shows out there... but if they don't have the labor to help with production, then they're outta luck.

That's why I wondered whether the Broadway writers' strike was mostly for moral support for the Hollywood writers.

^^^ I'm guessing that smiley21 got Broadway writers and the Broadway stagehands confused. I can't find any news anywhere about Broadway writers being on strike, and like you, I can't imagine what that would accomplish.

Yeah, the blog from Jenna Fischer mentioned the actors contract is up in 2008 and they want the same residuals so it is in everyone's best interest to get them.. except the crews.

I haven't read enough of the particulars of this strike to make an informed opinion, but I do like what one comedian said, "Don't you think that the striking writers' picket signs should be blank?"

There are a LOT of writers in Hollywoodland who don't make one-tenth of what they're truly worth. Unfortunately, there are dozens of BAD writers for each of the good ones. My feeling (again, not knowledge) is that many of those against this strike are reacting to those silly writers who demean any intelligence by pandering to the laugh machines, and are not reacting to the writers of quality material.

Give the writers their 4 cents and bring back the shows! :mad:
If my Thursday night line up screws up, I will not be a happy camper.

All I have to say is that they better not mess with my Gossip Girl or I Love New York...at least not until Ball season is over!

Wait - so in a job that is only market-regulated in terms of salary (the union handles residuals, etc), you're really going to claim that the "bad" writers are holding back the good from profiting off their own works?

This really seems completely ignorant of how a market works - and either way, they're asking for a cut of the sales of their own products, regardless of your perception of quality. Somebody has to buy it to get paid - this really obviates any "quality" arguments completely.

My logic is this.. if they aren't good writers then they probably wouldn't sell many DVDs of the show anyway, so they wouldn't get much money. This would reward the great writers (like the ones on Grey's Anatomy).

Oops and that's what KSig RC just said...

ETA: What I'm missing already are the Grey's writers' blogs. No new comments from readers either since they are screened by the writers before being posted.

hijack
OMG YES!!! I need my blog from last week!!

/hijack

I definately feel that the writers should be more compensated for the DVD sales, since hello that is how the shows are released.

But someone said earlier in the thread that writers "make a show", that can go both ways. I think writers can break a show. Take CSI for example. The show has been tanking in the writers for the past 2-3 seasons. I don't think it has anything to do with the actors, they are just acting with the scripts given to them. I truly believe that it has been the writing. The episodes have been beyond stupid and the long term storylines (i.e. Grissom and Sara together) are just out of the blue and just plain dumb. Where you sitting there scratching your head saying WTF?

It probably doesn't help that Grey's Anatomy is in the same time slot, but honestly if the writing was superb and the episodes were awesome, people would still be watching. But there not, the shows gone completely downhill. IMPO.


Anyways, my point is writers can also break a show. And that a studio's main goal is to have viewers and to make money. If they see a show tanking in the ratings, I'm sure they will take a step back and think "WTF is going on?"

As far as the Broadway stuff goes, I was just repeating what I heard on CNN...so who knows how credible that is.

I think there's some bad information here. To the best of my knowledge, the Writers Guild of America does not represent "Broadway writers."

What are "Broadway writers" anyway? Generally a play or musical is written by a playwright -- right? Or something is taken from a book. The closest I can come between the two is a play or musical that is taken from a movie. Even those are written by authors or the like. Right?

It's not like Broadway shows premiere or are updated weekly.

The WGA represents entertainment, news and new media writers.

And, by the way, it appears the Writers Guild may strike CBS News soon.

ETA: Broadway Stagehands (and many TV stagehands as well) are represented by IATSE, The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, not the Writers Guild.

In addition, even the name of this thread is incorrect. This is not a "Hollywood" writers strike. The Writers Guild West, and The Writers Guild East -- collectively called The Writers Guild -- are both on strike.

Good link, Jen.

It's the effect on people like the guy in the story that are lost in the "big picture" of any strike or work stoppage.

We tend to only hear about the $130K people -- not those on the outside, as well as those in the other trades that are affected by a union or company action.

As I said, nobody really wins in a strike.

At least that's my opinion.

How is 130k look compared to Letterman's 30 million. On top of the compensation the actors also get residuals. I think it is funny that the actors are walking the picket line saying the writers should get more money. Where do they think the money is going to come from? The way I see it is there is pie isn't going to get bigger. If the writers get more money then someone, probably the actors are going to get less.

You're talking pennies per DVD, and very small percentages. The actors are picketing because next year they want the same deal in their contract. They're not seeing their own slice of the pie shrinking either.

Isn't the pie already getting bigger due to these new technologies that the writers are trying to get a small piece of?

I thought that was the reason for the strike. If the producers get a piece of the new income, shouldn't they share it as they share other income?

Seems to me that the precedent is already set.

I think if everyone ends up getting what they want. The pie won't get cut up anymore. They'll just pass the expense on to us...

http://www.thehawaiichannel.com/ente...78/detail.html

The picketing's reached the island. :(

Has anyone else been tuning in to the Tonight Show this week? They've been playing OLD Leno episodes, and I gotta say I'm enjoying it way more than the present-day Tonight Show episodes.

Earlier this week he had Tom Hanks (promoting A League of Their Own), the next night it was his first interview with Julia Roberts, then last night it was Matt Damon right after he won the Oscar for Good Will Hunting. Tonight's guest is Jennifer Aniston from back in 1995. So far the monologue jokes have included Kato Kaelin, OJ Simpson, Pauly Shore, Sharon Stone and teachers seducing students...I guess some things don't change.

ETA: OMG, he just said, "This has gotta be the hottest new show of the season, this 'Friends' show..." Wow, bet no one thought back then that the show would last so long!

Hopefully, there's an end in sight to the strike:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071130/...5Z2tb4yl934T0D

According to the article, we won't find out anything until maybe Tuesday, but I hope the proposition, if fair, is accepted.

word on the street is the new offer is a total slap in the face and the writers have turned it down.

I am being totally selfish here, but I want to strike to end soon so that I can see the grand finale of Scrubs!

Oh, and for all the caterers, restaurant workers, etc. that make their living off of "Hollywood". They don't have a strike fund to fall back on!

YES!!! and the musical guests. Lovin it...

From CNN today:

If members of the Writers Guild of America react favorably to the proposed deal, the guild's board could vote Sunday to lift the strike order and the industry could be up and running Monday. This month's Oscars ceremony, which has been under the cloud of a union and actors boycott, also would be a winner.

Thank goodness. I was dreading the day when the last LOST episode aired and I had no more new TV to watch. There is hope again! :)

They were saying on the news today that some shows might not presume production for this season but that the big name ones (they mentioned Grey's Anatomy specifically) will begin working immediately for new shows in the spring. Woot!