The Writer's Strike

I’m surprised that nobody has mentioned this.

http://kevinmccullough.townhall.com/g/61045a67-e063-4fc3-9838-ce9d63da3aee

Take a look at the video at the end. I fully support the strike, and I hope that they get what they’re after. I’m especially supporting the staff of The Office, which is perhaps houses the most brilliant writers in Hollywood.

“The internet is just a promo”. Ha, that’s a good one! The video was impressively non whiny (and shiny -ooh hollywood shineshine)

I fully support the writers.

Granted I don’t watch much TV, not like I used to, and the only shows I’m really going to miss are The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, but I also support the writers.

I know if I were in their position, I’d want to be reimbursed for DVD and internet profits.

Absolutely. And they totally deserve a cut of that.

That being said, expect to see a lot more [STRIKE]Unionbusting[/STRIKE] “Reality” Television programs, even though we already have too many.

I barely look at my TV when I’m not playing on my PS2, but yeah, I’m pro-writers here.

I’m pro-writer.

By the time Europe would run out of backlogged episodes they’ll have paid off the writers. Excellent.

I am pro-studios, anti-writers.

Yeah. What. <!-- I’m lying. -->

Okay, I’ll bite. Why?

Keep in mind however, that this isn’t as cut-and-dry as it seems. By doing a strike, a lot more people are effected; thousands of people who depend on the television industry as their livelihood are now without any job. These are the people that are in worse situations than the writers - the blue-collar tyrpes that work as caterers, who delivery messages between the stuidos, lots of folks really.

There’s also the fact that the corporation I work for isn’t too happy about this either. If the strike goes on for too long (personally, I doubt it’ll come down to the wire, the GM strike lasted what, a week?) it will begin to have an overall effect on the quality of movies. Hate on the movie industry all you like about the current crop (although American Gangster did seem quite good) but trust me, it can get much worse if we don’t get the writers who really do know how to, you know write, back to their job.

All in all, I forsee a distinctly prryhic victory here if it lasts too long. New television shows that were hitting their stride or beginning to capture a general audience are going to have a hard time coming back. Let alone those shows like K-Ville that are struggling against competition like Heroes. Secondly, as a general rule, a hiatus is never a good thing from what I’ve seen. Heroes is supposedly finding a way to wrap up the year nicely from what I’ve heard, a Plan B if you will in case the strike happened, but Desperate Housewives will just stop. ABC’s new comedies are frankly doomed. Friday Night Lights, a superb series with suffereing ratings, is not going to gain anything from this. Let alone the fact that I’ll have to wait until freaking April for Battlestar Galactica to come back on the air…

I didn’t watch the video, maybe tomorrow.

i’m pro educated white males who make more than 99% of the country and fully support both their quest to make more even more money and the amount of attention the media is giving to their noble, noble cause

So the money -that would otherwise feed the poor and widows in America- should go to the even richer CEOs and studio owners. overlooking the 99% hyperbole

It seems someone missed something in my post.

This is the main problem with many strikes, and something a responsible union would use some of its financial resources from Union Dues to help with while it was able.

This is sorta the idea. These people who, “you know, write,” the movies, and without whom they would suck, aren’t getting the working situations and pay they should. Roylaties from DVD and internet sales of written would really are owed to the writers. While it’s a very small deal, you yourself pointed out how shitty movies could be without real writers. I think that’s worth about three words worth of space on a movie poster.

Writers don’t make nearly as much money as you think they do, even screenwriters. Sure, I might get a good amount of money for writing a screenplay or teleplay, but that will likely be budgeted over several years (IE- until someone else buys another one of my screenplays).

Furthermore, the writers are NOT being greedy, the producers are. For example, NBC.com has several of their shows online available for download. When there is an advertisement, the producers get paid, but the writers don’t get anything at all. All they want is fucking four cents per click, that’s it!

You might also want to watch this. Note what they say about the “promotion.”

EDIT: Also, the writer’s strike is likely to last much longer than a week. In 1988, they had one that lasted 5 months.

Or, to make it simpler, just think about the numbers of shows per season. Now think about the number of available writers. There’s a bit of an imbalance there, it’s not like the same twenty guys are called for a new show each season just as they finished the last one, some of them may go for years without a steady gig while they futilely try to jam scripts and screenplays into random producers’ pockets.

I’m rooting for the writers as well. They don’t get anywhere near the recognition they deserve.

Nice to see that Kelsey Grammer, Ray Romano and other TV celebs joined the picket lines. Paying a little respect to the scribe community is the least they can do.
And maybe stock up on a free publicity as well.

From what I’ve seen in the news so far, it does seem like the writers are right, not only are they being denied royalties but the studios (or at least the people who negotiate for the studios) tried to sucker them into signing a contract by telling them they would accept sharing the Internet broadcast royalties if they dropped the demand for the DVD ones. the WGA did so only to find the contract they were offered was basically “sign here, we’ll figure the details later.” Now both sides are farther apart than ever.

My favorite shows are already affected. The Tonight Show is in repeats (:bowser: I want my Lenooo!) and the entire writing cast of the show has been told to return by this week or they’ll all be fired. Since Leno backs the writers, NBC is planning on using guests hosts and no comedy skits (just guests and music) to keep the show going. (Leno is being forced to retire in 2009, so I don’t think he cares much.)

Heroes will last only until December 3, but they are wrapping up the current "chapter’ then anyway (the next chapter starts when the writers return.)

Chuck will also last like 3 more episodes. THIS show I’ll really miss; I found it to be surprisingly clever and moving. I like it better than Heroes this season, actually. (Heroes has gotten too dark.)

The strike has also resulted in several movies being rushed to production so the studios will have something to show next year. Unaffected: Iron Man, Justice League. Affected: the next Harry Potter movie. Not sure: Hulk 2, Transformers 2, Alien vs Predator 2.