| Writers should receive fair compensation (12/07) | | Print | |
| Written by Anna Vignet | |
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I love television. Watching The Office is often a highlight of my week. I love it so much that when I don’t have time to watch an episode, I’ll watch it streamed online instead. More and more people are turning to websites like YouTube (www.youtube.com) and BitTorrent (www.bittorrent.com) to watch television; as a result broadcast television networks are losing viewers. To me, the Internet’s label as “new media” might as well be “old media,” because I can’t remember a time when the Internet didn’t exist. Though it seems like the Internet has been around forever, merging it with television is a fairly new idea, and the Writer’s Guild of America (WGA) strike represents the television and movie writer’s attempts at securing pay from this new medium. On November 5, the WGA went on strike because the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) didn’t want to pay the writers residuals, or royalties for television episodes viewed on the Internet. Writers are pushing for a 2.5 percent increase in royalties for streamed episodes, which the networks claim is for promotional use and doesn’t generate any revenue. Writers are also proposing a 12% salary increase for episodes that viewers pay to download. Historically, writers receive royalties whenever their material is broadcast or distributed. Their current negotiation is an attempt to extend these compensations to the Internet. Notable network executives like Sumner Redstone and Rupert Murdoch said in news interviews with Charlie Rose that the Internet is crucial to the future of television, yet at the bargaining table networks told the writers that they were unsure of the Internet’s power to generate profit. Corporate owned news stations have not covered the strike in detail, so strike captains have created blogs like United Hollywood (www.unitedhollywood.com) to get support for their cause. Ironically, this “new media,” the same media being fought over, has gotten writers tremendous public support. One endeavor by writers to mobilize fan support is the Pencils2MediaMoguls campaign. A visitor to the United Hollywood Web site can show his or her support for the writers by sending an environmentally conscious pencil box to network executives for one dollar. The idea is to bombard studios with truckloads of pencils. As of December 5, the website had sold 463,272 pencils, and posted pictures of the packaged pencils getting loaded on trucks. The current strike builds on a sense of disappointment from the 1988 strike, when writers felt like they were not fully compensated for the sales of VHS tapes. Just like the 1988 strike resolution, whatever contract today’s writers agree to with the AMPTP will set precedent for future Internet content distribution. Compensating writers for their creative work is an important idea to establish in this “new media” before the expectation that creative efforts should be paid disappears completely. Because more and more people are choosing to get their entertainment from the Internet, it is important for the writers to secure fair pay now. I support the strike and the issues the writers are fighting over and hope they can compromise with the AMPTP soon. The AMPTP and WGA agreed to resume talks on November 26. If renewed attempts in achieving a deal aren’t fruitful, networks will run out of fresh episodes to air by January and you’ll probably be left with cheap reality fare flooding your television screen. As you turn off your TV and shake your head in disgust at whatever horrible reality concoction is currently airing, remember the writers, on strike for better pay and fighting for the rights of future generations. |
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to listen.
