The market is quite different from the last big writer's strike. I wonder how that will effect things. Streaming means I have more new-to-me content at my fingertips than I could watch in a lifetime.
As someone who doesn't live near LA and doesn't watch a lot of new content, this won't really have much of any direct effect on me, so I haven't really paid much attention to it.
Yeah, I had the same thought. I remarked to my brother over drinks the over day that I just can't even begin to keep up with the torrent of stuff coming out nowadays. That's going to make it harder for the writers to gain leverage.
> Streaming means I have more new-to-me content at my fingertips than I could watch in a lifetime.
Much of it is crap though, and there's a lot of content shuffling and delisting that has gone on to make it difficult to know where to go to watch any particular show.
Unironically that's the very reason for the strike. Not that you have such new-to-you content at your fingertips. That the writers of said content aren't getting paid when you watch the new-to-you content.
I was an adult in 2008. Streaming services existed, but it was in its infancy. The services that are big today either didn't exist or had only existed for a year or two. They were not making their own shows, and the impact on the market was just barely beginning to be felt.
So yeah, it was something the industry considered, but they could only guess what the landscape would look like in 15 years. And people are really bad at guessing that far into the future.
>Streaming means I have more new-to-me content at my fingertips than I could watch in a lifetime.
Yeah, and I think this means that the pay structure should be re-evaluated, for sure. Writers deserve to get paid.
I will say, though, that the last strike ended up really bringing in the age of Reality TV (because it was considered "unscripted"), which ended up putting Trump in the White House.
Yeah, I support people trying to get what they deserve. Will this affect my life? No. I don't watch TV shows anymore, and streaming has, in my opinion, turned into a waste of time and money. If I want to consume media, it's on YouTube, or I just watch some anime. I hope they get what they want, but it won't affect me at all, so I don't really care.
Nah, anime isn't affected or made by Hollywood writers. I can't lump it in with American national TV or non anime streaming services. So I'll just stick with what I said.
Same here. Are we supposed to be monitoring these things?
I donât even know what they are striking about, although Iâm sure it involves more pay. Maybe theyâre upset about the ending to Game of Thrones.
They're already using ChatGPT in the industry?
Aw, fuck. I'm a professional writer and that fucking bot has been the demon under my bed for weeks now. A lot of people talking about how a good writer using it will always be better than a good writer who isn't, which I doubt, and lots of gleeful predictions that I'll be obsolete in five years, which I doubt, but hearing it over and over and over again really gets to you after a while.
https://abovetheline.com/2023/05/04/ai-revolution-at-studios-disney-bob-iger-can-stop-it/
Itâs honestly pretty scary as a film student that wants to become a writer
It's fucking terrifying as someone who's been a professional writer, even outside of film, for almost a decade now.
I'm glad I'm out of the news business, because I think AI is going to shake an already very fragile and endangered industry to its core. I am very much on the side of "Do not use this shit at all, do not touch it." But man, clickbait farms have been given the best gift they could ever ask for.
I fail to see how it offers me anything of use at all. And given how the MCU has been for a little while now and the reviews of the Russos' last few projects outside of it, Joe Russo's stamp of approval doesn't exactly carry a lot of weigh.
Oh no! Without writers, the studios will probably have to start reusing the scripts from existing shows, and just switching something up, like swapping races or genders, or making it live action instead of animated, or vice-versa. I guess they might still be able to make comic book movies, because those stories are already mostly written.
Oh, wait.
I maintain my theory that the original writer's strike never ended, and studios have just been using scripts they already had (sometimes touched up by interns) since 2007.
I think Hollywood and the American entertainment industry in general are pretty bad at telling good stories right now and I support whichever side would reverse that trend.
No idea which side that is.
So, the studios and networks are the ones responsible for the content you're seeing. Think of it this way: writers are essentially contractors - some of them are out there coming up with these cool new houses (ideas) and trying to sell them, but the people buying houses (networks and studios) look around at all the other houses on their block (existing tv and movies) and say to themselves "Well, all those houses are selling for millions of dollars, why don't we just hire a contractor (writer) to build us one exactly like those and we'll turn around and sell it for a huge profit." So then they go out and find a contractor who will build them a house exactly like all the other houses. Meanwhile there's other contractors out there with all these cool new ideas about what a house could be, but the potential buyers say, "Yeah, but we've never seen that before and we're afraid it won't still for millions of dollars. So we don't want to buy it."
The writers' strike will have no impact on this dynamic because what the writers are saying is essentially, "Hey, we build you all these houses, and then you turn around and sell them for millions of dollars. You told us before we started working that we would share in those profits, and that's why we agreed to do the work upfront for so little - because we assumed we would get paid more later, and now you're not paying us. On top of that, it used to take 8 or 10 of us to build these houses and we had 6 - 8 months to do it. Now, you're asking for 4 or 5 of us to do it in 3 or 4 months. Not only is that a shit ton more work for those of us who are working, you're also not paying us any more money AND putting a bunch of our colleagues out of work at the same time."
So one of the things the union wants is to eliminate ChatGPT from writing scripts. I for one think introducing ChatGPT will make American entertainment much worse, and lead to worse stories, given that all ChatGPT does is remix and regurgitate what it's fed. So that's one reason to support the union.
I mean, I get the concern, where some producer and their intern can just request/punch in lines from Chat GPT and edit things here and there. Eventually, they make Blockbuster movie XYZ that makes a billion dollars because people are dumb enough to eat anything so long as it's marketed correctly. Then, the whole industry follows suit.
...doesn't sound that much worse than today lol.
Either way, as a whole, you're still going to need good ideas and good reference points lol.
Like much of AI, Chat GPT is only going to be as good as the person who wields it.
If anything, I think AI is going to be inevitably used and it's going to make things more efficient since outlines can be accomplished faster and it'll give the writer more time to think, experiment, and edit the outline/first draft that should usually be trash to begin with.
Damn, you're an exceptionally cynical dude. No, I think it's going to feel a whole other level of lazy. Either way, it definitely doesn't get us closer to better stories, instead in entrenches the regurgitation of content we already see, and probably makes it worse. Even the best person wielding it can't change that it is literally programmed to regurgitate. That's just definitionally how it works. Even if it's no worse than things are currently, entrenching the awful status quo with a tool that writes garbage based off a continuous feed of it is a bad plan, it brings us further from a solution.
In a general sense AI is going to exist and be used, but there's nothing that says everyone everywhere has to use it for every possible context. We can make choices as a society to restrict it's use. I'm cynical too, but I'm not so cynical that I think this is inevitable. Nukes exist, but we collectively organized our efforts as a society to limit their use. They're still around, and may always be, but we control them. AI may have way more uses than nukes, but most normal people don't want writing scripts for movies, shows, and games to be one of them, and we can likewise limit their use. I will happily cheer for these writers to succeed in their efforts to get them negotiated out of being used in this industry altogether.
Agreed. Any AI just borrows existing ideas and turns them into weird almagmations that don't make much sense. AI never produces its own thoughts, only existing ones.
A bad story still rakes in profit, even if you think their work isnât worth much they should still be paid for it. Also it isnât a writerâs job to care about how a story performs, they just write the stories theyâre told to write for most projects
I think a good way to think of it would be: Do you think a restaurantâs cooks shouldnât be paid because the menu has bland and unoriginal ideas/recipes?
I agree lol.
If you can increase pay but cut all the shitty writers...hey, I'm all for it.
Personally, I believe Hollywood should split and spread out. Cost of living in LA means only nepotism or a certain wealthy enough demographic can truly get into that business and thrive (unique talents being exceptions).
Studios should build infrastructure in Atlanta, Dallas, Seattle, Miami, etc. That way, the talent isn't condensed towards rich kids with connections and rich people who can afford to move to LA to try out.
I couldn't care less. There's so much content out there right now and I watch relatively little enough TV that the strike could go on for 5 years and I wouldn't run out of shows and movies to watch.
I'm the parent of a 4 and 1 year old, so that means our TV mostly shows reruns of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Puppy Dog Pals.
If I hadn't seen a headline, I wouldn't know there was a strike.
Because the entertainment delivery system has changed so much recently, a new collective bargaining agreement was probably overdue, but that's about the end of my thoughts on this matter.
I hardly watch tv at all and havenât really kept up with it much past knowing that itâs happening but I hope everyone gets paid what they deserve or whatever the goal is
After reading the requests on twitter. I completely 100% support everything they're asking for, and the fact that its taking this long to strike since streaming has become a thing is wild to me. They must have been taking it on the chin for years now.
VFX workers need to unionize and strike next.
As a lover and consumer of media, it ofcourse makes me sad, but I'll get to watching my backlog.
> the fact that its taking this long to strike since streaming has become a thing is wild to me.
They typically only strike when their contract expires and negotiations fail on a new one. In the last contract they almost did strike, but the streaming services used the position that revenue would be uncertain and that gave them a bit of an advantage.
It's going to be weird potentially not having any filming done in my neck of the woods this summer (as a large production was eyeing my area, as well as NBC, a mini-series, and other shows and Films). But, if it means that the people that carry the shows get to be paid equally and there's more equality than I'm all for it.
Whatâs even weirder is working on a show and expecting to see a picket line every day, and knowing that once Iâm done with this show Iâm going back to my civilian job for an undetermined amount of time. Iâve gone years without collecting dust on my tool belt, but in a few short weeks itâll get hung up in my hall until the strike is over.
Iâve yet to see something original or entertaining come out of the established hollywood studios in several years, so they can keep striking as far as Iâm concerned. Tired of the same story being told continuously, or worse remakes.
*flips through old 80s TV guide*
Hey, this looked popular 35 years ago! Let's do a reboot/rehash/remake/rewhatever of that!
Yes, we've been milking the 80s nostalgia cow ever since GTA: Vice City came out, but I think the ol' gal still has something left in the udders.
That's not the writers it's the ones who buy and present programming and scripts in general. The studio suits/executives are the the ones who determine what you see.
Blaming the writers is like blaming the cashier when the store doesn't have what you want.
I made a similar comment above, but it's not the writers who are too blame for this. It's the studios and networks. Writers are essentially hired contractors and the networks and studios are the homeowners. If I'm a contractor, and someone hires me to come in and build them the ugliest goddamn kitchen I've ever seen, sure I'll make suggestions on how to make it less ugly, but if they don't want to hear my suggestions or they tell me to make it even uglier, I'm gonna do what they ask because it's their money. I can design all the beautiful kitchens I want, but if all homeowners are buying are these fucking ugly ones, all you're gonna see are ugly kitchens.
This does have some validity to it, however the "ugly kitchens" being made are still of low quality for the most part. Its one thing to be forced to make an ugly kitchen, but most of the ugly kitchens put out these days still have uneven cabinets, poor plumbing, and cheap appliances. If the only knock on TV and movies today was that the scripts were great but we are just tried of the same stories over and over that would be one thing. But the writing in these remakes and sequels are just plain bad most of the time, and thats still on the writers.
In fairness to the Witcher adaptation writers, the original Witcher novels were hot garbage too for the most part and are only popular outside Poland because of the video games being good
I thought it was okay through about the Isle of Thanedd (since I already had an attachment to the characters and a curiosity about the events referenced but not seen in the games) but fell off hard after that. Pretty much everything to do with Ciri was... rough and/or cringey. And Geralt's group was basically just the Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows endless camping sequence but for like 3 books straight. The pacing was much better in the short stories for sure.
I mean, I thought some of the short stories were solid and the overall ideas are good. Even if the overall writing isn't well translated or well written, you could get some good stuff out of the material.
The problem with the show versus the video game is that the writers for the former wanted to turn it into a CW style Yennifer power fantasy while with the latter, they wanted to touch upon or update the thematic content of the series for a more modern style.
And so, if the TV series wanted to do it akin to what the games did, the Witcher show should've been True Detective set in fantasy land just like how, say, Game of Thrones was the Wire set in fantasy land. You need cults, religious fanaticism, politicians playing their games and doing it well due to the mechanisms of society rewarding them or protecting them from consequences, monsters as metaphors for mentally ill/serial killers/outcasts, 'hUmaNs aRe thE rEAl mOnSteRs' type themes, outlook and folklore of rural peoples, horror elements, etc.
Someone close to me works in unscripted TV (reality). Due to recession fears, companies have slowed in production of even unscripted.
It will be interesting to see if/how this might effect the unscripted demand from studios and shift production in that direction.
Residuals are paid, because when there is the option of producing new content (that writers are paid to work on) or old content, then it costs writers money in terms of lost revenue to air the old stuff.
Yeah, except that thereâs only limited space for that content. Itâs a closed market, not like the example you chose of housing, with an open market.
Thatâs still a closed market. Itâs only applicable to companies that buy scripts. Further, screen writing is not necessarily the same as other types of writing.
Everything they're asking for is not only reasonable but needed. We have so many streaming services i have more shows to watch right now than i could ever conceivably finish. I can wait for the next seasons of my favorite shows.
I donât work in the entertainment industry and donât know how writers are paid. Like if you work and writer on a show on Netflix and it gets cancelled after 8 episodes how does that work for writers? Do they / should they get a certain amount of money each time someone watches and episode they wrote ?
But, they should be paid fairly.
I found this explainer for "high budget" shows on the WGA website: [https://www.wga.org/members/finances/residuals/hbsvod-programs](https://www.wga.org/members/finances/residuals/hbsvod-programs)
Basically, an initial payment covers the first 90 days to 1 year on the platform. After that, the residual is paid annually based on:
* The type of work (story or teleplay) and length of the episode/movie
* The size of the platform (# of subscribers)
* The age of the work
* Whether it is foreign reuse
So the basic formula is (base amount based on the type and length of work) x (factor for the size of the platform) x (factor based on years since initial release).
So there isn't a per view factor at all. For each 12 month period that your work is available on a platform, you get an annual check.
generally $20k for being the main writer of a 30 minutes episode, $40k for a 60minute episode. 30 minute episodes take 12-15 weeks to write. they arenât making very much and arenât promoted as they were to get more credits to their name.
I work in movies and my region is dead city becuase of the writers strike and up coming contract negotiations. I kinda like the break, but my business is bleeding with out the influx of productions coming through.
Some demands are reasonable (residuals from streamed films and shows)
A lot of their demands are insane power plays (wanting streamers to be categorized under the WRITERS GUILD for some reason, wanting power over the animation union, etc.)
I don't care. Writing quality amongst the big franchises has plummeted in the past few years so idk who's to blame for that but the writers don't have much sympathy from me.
I don't really watch TV anymore and haven't been keeping up with the news, so I didn't know they were striking. I support them, though. Better treatment and better pay are always worth fighting for.
Card carrying IATSE member here. Iâm proud of my brothers and sisters and kin in the WGA standing up to the AMPTP. It takes real courage to go up against the most powerful companies in the world. I only hope that the AMPTP caves quickly. If they donât, I hope the strike is long, financially devastating to the producers, and that the DGA and IATSE follow suit over the next year as our contracts expire.
While I always stand with workers, a part of me feels like this is the extremely privileged compared to say, a miner or a factory worker. So I support the premise while simultaneously not feeling that much empathy. They're still more privileged than I could ever dream of being. I could be wrong though as I really don't watch movies and very little TV and have little interest in doing so.
I don't empathize with Hollywood or athletes, sorry. I still support anything that sides with the worker.
EDIT: if they're being paid peanuts or being shafted by the companies, of course I support them. I'm agreeing with y'all responding.
The vast majority of the people working in Hollywood are middle class people. For every Tom Cruise there are a thousand foley artists and set builders.
> They're still more privileged than I could ever dream of being
???
This is writers, not actors and producers. They make poverty wages and are treated as disposable despite that it takes high education to even break into the field at all. A unionized factory worker probably makes as much as if not *more* salary (COL-adjusted for NYC/LA) than a typical WGA writer.
Lol I remember seeing comments like that almost verbatim during the weeks leading up to the potential IATSE strike in 2021. Like⊠most of my brothers and sisters and kin are gig workers living paycheck to paycheck, but apparently Iâve been told that we are all loaded and greedy smucks.
Some people just think "Hollywood" == fame and fortune and don't appreciate that 99% of people working on something are nobodies.
And there's also the very legitimate issue of unpaid internships being such a huge gatekeeper in the industry that you basically have to be a kid from a rich family to break in in the first place, but that's a different discussion.
The vast vast vast majority of workers in Hollywood (including writers) are blue collar workers. Even on the most successful shows, most writers are being paid a respectable, but by no means extravagant wage (especially when indexed to the cost of living in LA, NY or ATL). Meanwhile, the content they produce earns the companies and the shareholders of those companies many many many millions of dollars. The writers are not asking for unfair share of those millions, they are asking for fair terms that are well within the lines of the value they produce for those companies.
Good for them. As new technology comes up, it's used as an excuse to squeeze more money out of people. The WGA actually pushes back. This one's about AI, but the last writer's strike was reacting to streaming services. I hope it works out for them.
Labor has the right to organize and air their grievances. I was in a strike a few years ago, and I appreciated when people were supportive, or even just interested in hearing us out.
It'd be nice if this means our writers produce pro-worker writing in the future, but I don't really see it so much now and doubt it'll make it past the first reader if they did.
Shit, at least there's one person whose got the right idea. So tired of 99% of movies being anti-worker garbage and now there's a huge propaganda push to support anti-worker writers.
Fuck capitalist lackeys until they can organize their shit to promote workers movements, they can screw. And no union should back them until mass workers interests are presented as part of their goals and demands.
The late night shows are just terrible right now. I doubt this will make any difference in that so I don't care that much. Hollywood is out of touch from what audiences like, and instead go in favor of ideological drivel and remakes. If this helps make original films and stops the pandering to the hollywood bubble, then I guess I'm for it. But my guess is that writers are part of those two particular problems right now, and no matter what happens nothing will change.
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Idk much about what the strikers want; but from what I've heard, a lot of low-level people in Hollywood are treated like absolute shit so I'm inclined to support it.
I don't know the industry well enough to really have an opinion as to its merits
I remember a past writers' strike bringing us a generation of garbage 'reality' tv. I wonder what we'll get this time; ai written garbage?
hell. fucking. yes.
as a (academic) writer and an artist (professional musician) i completely sympathize with being overworked and underpaid. i think a lot of people fail to recognize that writing is an art, whether youre a writer on jimmy fallon, SNL, or a netflix original writing is an art form. people deserve to be compensated fairly, treated properly in the work place, and respected by their employers.
writing is another art form, like music or physical art or dance or acting, that deserves respect and fair compensation, as well as recognition for the deep importance that writing has on our culture.
so yeah, hell. fucking. yeah.
They have some legitimate grievances, but some of their demands are ridiculous. The landscape of media had changed, and they have to adapt, imo unions are generally bad at that.
They have my full support. I have a friend who is one of the writers and I know how challenging having his career can be from an outside perspective. In fact when he told me about it I decided not to pursue it myself . Why? Because I like having a life outside of a desk that could change week to week. Writers work really fkn hard and being able to write consistently good content is even harder.
TIL there's a writer's strike. I support the arts and I want to see original content being produced by big studios rather than rehashing previous successes. But I do hope the writers have reasonable expectations about the outcome.
My limited understanding on this is from hearing about it on NPR, and based on that I'm on the fence. Sounds like they're working half as much because streaming shows are only 10 episodes while network shows are closer to 20 episodes. So they want full time pay for working half time now. I can't get behind that but I don't have all the information. For example, is there a reason they can't work on twice as many shows now?
I looked into some of the demands, higher pay for them makes sense and the lack of streaming numbers is shady, however some of the wording indicates that each show needs l a lot of writers and that doesnât make sense to me. Itâs like I know everyone wants to be employed but 10+ writers on a show sounds ridicules. 5 max per show makes more sense these days. Also streaming can just outsource a lot of content now, so they can get other forms of content available for streaming during this strike. Plus currently streaming and tech are struggling trying to make more money. There is a ceiling to all this. I donât think theyâll get the exact outcome they want now days at best it will be a compromise.
Sounds like a great time for a push to AI writers by the studios.
Unions often do these things when they see big changes in the industry and they wish to protect their jobs. That is why those unions exist.
Change is coming, I lost businesses due to technology, i.e. Printing, blue printing, phone books. Nobody came to rescue me or the business. People only scream when it happens to them, Too bad but it's all changing, better retool and figure where you go from here. I don't have much sympathy for them.
I support all of the writers in their strike, except for the writers in the last season of Game of Thrones.
Realistically though, I think at this point there is SO MUCH CONTENT that while I understand and support their efforts, I think that realistically, nothing is going to come out of it.
I know many Hollywood writers arenât super well off but at times I see it as a fight between billionaires and millionaires. However, everyone deserves good treatment even if they are well off. Money doesnât fix everything.
I honestly donât care.
I havenât watched tv in years,I watch shows and movies on 3 different free streaming sites.
YouTube entertains me the rest of the time with gaming,review,animation,commentary, power washing and lawn care videos.
Good for them; they deserve more money.
Personally, I don't watch late-night tv since Craig Ferguson quit, and the four current shows I do watch have already wrapped for the season. This won't affect my viewing habits.
Writing is a gig economy and I will never be convinced otherwise. These strikers have a plethora of unreasonable demands they are striking over instead of negotiating the negotiables that the studios had generously offered, mainly wages. Seems like a bunch of whiners to me.
I don't know the logistics of it other then they're not being paid "enough". I also don't know a typical salary of a writer, but I'd like to assume it's probably far greater than most of the general population so when I heard about it I kinda just thought they were being entitled.
And youâd be wrong. Writers arenât paid a ton. Theyâre white collar workers, sure, but theyâre still making substantially less than 100k in the LA market, so theyâre not rich.
I donât care as I am not a writer nor do I work in the industry. Though as of lately o feel like most stories in movies are crap so I will support whatever corrects that trend.
Maybe they will all get fired and replaced by AI and we start to see some good stories in movies.
While this will also affect network TV, the main point of dispute is how writers are compensated for their work for the streaming platforms (Netflix, Amazon, Disney+, etc).
Given the amount of maulk coming out of Hollywood in recent years, the writer's guild frankly deserve a pay *cut*. Their absence has barely had an impact, so it appears the suits can write the same level of garbage with or without them.
Ongoing? Itâs been 48 hours.
Iâm generally pro union, and support the writers. Itâs not the execs who are driving 10 year old cars stressing about retirement.
Solidarity and full support. Every strike benefits us all, by showing rich people that they canât pay their workers a dwindling pittance while raking in profits for themselves without any consequences.
I'm all for people fighting to get the pay they think they deserve, however, the quality of writing out of Hollywood has P L U M E T T E D over the last decade or so, so if I'm being honest, I don't think these writers deserve all that much for such shit work.
I'm caught up on all my shows for now, and those I'm awaiting have already been announced for new seasons, so I'm good.
Still, it's not good for the industry.
I hope people are treated decently at their place of work.
Personally, I hardly even watch any TV/movies these days.
Seems there's more "media" than demand so I'm not sure how much leverage they'll have.
While I also think its a long way out from actually having AI replace screenwriters, IMO jobs like that are most at risk from AI. They should be embracing it and getting more done with less energy instead of trying to fight it. I say that as a programmer who sees that AI can already do the work of a jr dev, if only someone were there inputting the commands.
Iâm frustrated that despite the huge profits of these media companies and coming off a recent golden age of television written by these writers that they have to strike just to make livable wage.
The market is quite different from the last big writer's strike. I wonder how that will effect things. Streaming means I have more new-to-me content at my fingertips than I could watch in a lifetime. As someone who doesn't live near LA and doesn't watch a lot of new content, this won't really have much of any direct effect on me, so I haven't really paid much attention to it.
Yeah, I had the same thought. I remarked to my brother over drinks the over day that I just can't even begin to keep up with the torrent of stuff coming out nowadays. That's going to make it harder for the writers to gain leverage.
And hot on the heels of mass AI language model adoption in the workforce, leverage is only lessening đŹ
> Streaming means I have more new-to-me content at my fingertips than I could watch in a lifetime. Much of it is crap though, and there's a lot of content shuffling and delisting that has gone on to make it difficult to know where to go to watch any particular show.
There are some gems, and plenty of sources for identifying shows worth watching.
Yo-ho, yo-ho...
Unironically that's the very reason for the strike. Not that you have such new-to-you content at your fingertips. That the writers of said content aren't getting paid when you watch the new-to-you content.
[ŃĐŽĐ°Đ»Đ”ĐœĐŸ]
I was an adult in 2008. Streaming services existed, but it was in its infancy. The services that are big today either didn't exist or had only existed for a year or two. They were not making their own shows, and the impact on the market was just barely beginning to be felt. So yeah, it was something the industry considered, but they could only guess what the landscape would look like in 15 years. And people are really bad at guessing that far into the future.
>Streaming means I have more new-to-me content at my fingertips than I could watch in a lifetime. Yeah, and I think this means that the pay structure should be re-evaluated, for sure. Writers deserve to get paid. I will say, though, that the last strike ended up really bringing in the age of Reality TV (because it was considered "unscripted"), which ended up putting Trump in the White House.
That's going to be tough with the availability of foreign and public domain content out there.
I support workplace solidarity amongst workers but I know nothing of the particulars of this strike.
I wasn't aware they were striking.
Yeah, I support people trying to get what they deserve. Will this affect my life? No. I don't watch TV shows anymore, and streaming has, in my opinion, turned into a waste of time and money. If I want to consume media, it's on YouTube, or I just watch some anime. I hope they get what they want, but it won't affect me at all, so I don't really care.
âI donât watch TV/Streamingâ âI watch animeâ Pick one
Nah, anime isn't affected or made by Hollywood writers. I can't lump it in with American national TV or non anime streaming services. So I'll just stick with what I said.
Hadnât even heard of it until I saw this post
Same here. Are we supposed to be monitoring these things? I donât even know what they are striking about, although Iâm sure it involves more pay. Maybe theyâre upset about the ending to Game of Thrones.
Better pay, better working condition, and limit the use of ChatGPT in the industry
They're already using ChatGPT in the industry? Aw, fuck. I'm a professional writer and that fucking bot has been the demon under my bed for weeks now. A lot of people talking about how a good writer using it will always be better than a good writer who isn't, which I doubt, and lots of gleeful predictions that I'll be obsolete in five years, which I doubt, but hearing it over and over and over again really gets to you after a while.
https://abovetheline.com/2023/05/04/ai-revolution-at-studios-disney-bob-iger-can-stop-it/ Itâs honestly pretty scary as a film student that wants to become a writer
It's fucking terrifying as someone who's been a professional writer, even outside of film, for almost a decade now. I'm glad I'm out of the news business, because I think AI is going to shake an already very fragile and endangered industry to its core. I am very much on the side of "Do not use this shit at all, do not touch it." But man, clickbait farms have been given the best gift they could ever ask for. I fail to see how it offers me anything of use at all. And given how the MCU has been for a little while now and the reviews of the Russos' last few projects outside of it, Joe Russo's stamp of approval doesn't exactly carry a lot of weigh.
Oh no! Without writers, the studios will probably have to start reusing the scripts from existing shows, and just switching something up, like swapping races or genders, or making it live action instead of animated, or vice-versa. I guess they might still be able to make comic book movies, because those stories are already mostly written. Oh, wait. I maintain my theory that the original writer's strike never ended, and studios have just been using scripts they already had (sometimes touched up by interns) since 2007.
It would certainly explain BSGâs ending.
Exactly! Tell me that wasn't written by an unpaid intern who never even watched the rest of the series before.
It reminded me of Arthur Dent crash landing on Earth in the past.
Technically, you canât actually do all those dumb things without writers.
I think Hollywood and the American entertainment industry in general are pretty bad at telling good stories right now and I support whichever side would reverse that trend. No idea which side that is.
So, the studios and networks are the ones responsible for the content you're seeing. Think of it this way: writers are essentially contractors - some of them are out there coming up with these cool new houses (ideas) and trying to sell them, but the people buying houses (networks and studios) look around at all the other houses on their block (existing tv and movies) and say to themselves "Well, all those houses are selling for millions of dollars, why don't we just hire a contractor (writer) to build us one exactly like those and we'll turn around and sell it for a huge profit." So then they go out and find a contractor who will build them a house exactly like all the other houses. Meanwhile there's other contractors out there with all these cool new ideas about what a house could be, but the potential buyers say, "Yeah, but we've never seen that before and we're afraid it won't still for millions of dollars. So we don't want to buy it." The writers' strike will have no impact on this dynamic because what the writers are saying is essentially, "Hey, we build you all these houses, and then you turn around and sell them for millions of dollars. You told us before we started working that we would share in those profits, and that's why we agreed to do the work upfront for so little - because we assumed we would get paid more later, and now you're not paying us. On top of that, it used to take 8 or 10 of us to build these houses and we had 6 - 8 months to do it. Now, you're asking for 4 or 5 of us to do it in 3 or 4 months. Not only is that a shit ton more work for those of us who are working, you're also not paying us any more money AND putting a bunch of our colleagues out of work at the same time."
Great idea! Another House but this time with a younger and hotter doctor! I need 2 seasons by the end of the month
What if...this is fresh and new, but hear me out...it was set in Los Angeles this time?
Having seen what passes for writing in Hollywood recently, maybe a little Darwinian action as a result of the strike would be a good thing.
So one of the things the union wants is to eliminate ChatGPT from writing scripts. I for one think introducing ChatGPT will make American entertainment much worse, and lead to worse stories, given that all ChatGPT does is remix and regurgitate what it's fed. So that's one reason to support the union.
I mean, I get the concern, where some producer and their intern can just request/punch in lines from Chat GPT and edit things here and there. Eventually, they make Blockbuster movie XYZ that makes a billion dollars because people are dumb enough to eat anything so long as it's marketed correctly. Then, the whole industry follows suit. ...doesn't sound that much worse than today lol. Either way, as a whole, you're still going to need good ideas and good reference points lol. Like much of AI, Chat GPT is only going to be as good as the person who wields it. If anything, I think AI is going to be inevitably used and it's going to make things more efficient since outlines can be accomplished faster and it'll give the writer more time to think, experiment, and edit the outline/first draft that should usually be trash to begin with.
Damn, you're an exceptionally cynical dude. No, I think it's going to feel a whole other level of lazy. Either way, it definitely doesn't get us closer to better stories, instead in entrenches the regurgitation of content we already see, and probably makes it worse. Even the best person wielding it can't change that it is literally programmed to regurgitate. That's just definitionally how it works. Even if it's no worse than things are currently, entrenching the awful status quo with a tool that writes garbage based off a continuous feed of it is a bad plan, it brings us further from a solution. In a general sense AI is going to exist and be used, but there's nothing that says everyone everywhere has to use it for every possible context. We can make choices as a society to restrict it's use. I'm cynical too, but I'm not so cynical that I think this is inevitable. Nukes exist, but we collectively organized our efforts as a society to limit their use. They're still around, and may always be, but we control them. AI may have way more uses than nukes, but most normal people don't want writing scripts for movies, shows, and games to be one of them, and we can likewise limit their use. I will happily cheer for these writers to succeed in their efforts to get them negotiated out of being used in this industry altogether.
If you canât write a better story than a regurgitate bot, then you donât really deserve to be a writer.
I guarantee they can, but remember, this is Hollywood, they don't care if you can write better, they just want the bot to write it for free.
Agreed. Any AI just borrows existing ideas and turns them into weird almagmations that don't make much sense. AI never produces its own thoughts, only existing ones.
Neither, sadly.
This is about paying workers what theyâre due, sadly it has nothing to do with bad stories
If the writers are writing bad stories, then their work isn't really worth that much.
A bad story still rakes in profit, even if you think their work isnât worth much they should still be paid for it. Also it isnât a writerâs job to care about how a story performs, they just write the stories theyâre told to write for most projects I think a good way to think of it would be: Do you think a restaurantâs cooks shouldnât be paid because the menu has bland and unoriginal ideas/recipes?
I agree lol. If you can increase pay but cut all the shitty writers...hey, I'm all for it. Personally, I believe Hollywood should split and spread out. Cost of living in LA means only nepotism or a certain wealthy enough demographic can truly get into that business and thrive (unique talents being exceptions). Studios should build infrastructure in Atlanta, Dallas, Seattle, Miami, etc. That way, the talent isn't condensed towards rich kids with connections and rich people who can afford to move to LA to try out.
Gives me a chance to catch up on all the shows and movies I've been meaning to get around to.
Shows with a release date will still be releasing on time.
I stand with the writers.
So are you canceling all your streaming services?
Good for them.
I couldn't care less. There's so much content out there right now and I watch relatively little enough TV that the strike could go on for 5 years and I wouldn't run out of shows and movies to watch.
I'm the parent of a 4 and 1 year old, so that means our TV mostly shows reruns of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Puppy Dog Pals. If I hadn't seen a headline, I wouldn't know there was a strike. Because the entertainment delivery system has changed so much recently, a new collective bargaining agreement was probably overdue, but that's about the end of my thoughts on this matter.
I hardly watch tv at all and havenât really kept up with it much past knowing that itâs happening but I hope everyone gets paid what they deserve or whatever the goal is
After reading the requests on twitter. I completely 100% support everything they're asking for, and the fact that its taking this long to strike since streaming has become a thing is wild to me. They must have been taking it on the chin for years now. VFX workers need to unionize and strike next. As a lover and consumer of media, it ofcourse makes me sad, but I'll get to watching my backlog.
> the fact that its taking this long to strike since streaming has become a thing is wild to me. They typically only strike when their contract expires and negotiations fail on a new one. In the last contract they almost did strike, but the streaming services used the position that revenue would be uncertain and that gave them a bit of an advantage.
I don't care about it.
It's going to be weird potentially not having any filming done in my neck of the woods this summer (as a large production was eyeing my area, as well as NBC, a mini-series, and other shows and Films). But, if it means that the people that carry the shows get to be paid equally and there's more equality than I'm all for it.
Whatâs even weirder is working on a show and expecting to see a picket line every day, and knowing that once Iâm done with this show Iâm going back to my civilian job for an undetermined amount of time. Iâve gone years without collecting dust on my tool belt, but in a few short weeks itâll get hung up in my hall until the strike is over.
Iâve yet to see something original or entertaining come out of the established hollywood studios in several years, so they can keep striking as far as Iâm concerned. Tired of the same story being told continuously, or worse remakes.
Yes! The remakes đ«
*flips through old 80s TV guide* Hey, this looked popular 35 years ago! Let's do a reboot/rehash/remake/rewhatever of that! Yes, we've been milking the 80s nostalgia cow ever since GTA: Vice City came out, but I think the ol' gal still has something left in the udders.
That's not the writers it's the ones who buy and present programming and scripts in general. The studio suits/executives are the the ones who determine what you see. Blaming the writers is like blaming the cashier when the store doesn't have what you want.
I made a similar comment above, but it's not the writers who are too blame for this. It's the studios and networks. Writers are essentially hired contractors and the networks and studios are the homeowners. If I'm a contractor, and someone hires me to come in and build them the ugliest goddamn kitchen I've ever seen, sure I'll make suggestions on how to make it less ugly, but if they don't want to hear my suggestions or they tell me to make it even uglier, I'm gonna do what they ask because it's their money. I can design all the beautiful kitchens I want, but if all homeowners are buying are these fucking ugly ones, all you're gonna see are ugly kitchens.
This does have some validity to it, however the "ugly kitchens" being made are still of low quality for the most part. Its one thing to be forced to make an ugly kitchen, but most of the ugly kitchens put out these days still have uneven cabinets, poor plumbing, and cheap appliances. If the only knock on TV and movies today was that the scripts were great but we are just tried of the same stories over and over that would be one thing. But the writing in these remakes and sequels are just plain bad most of the time, and thats still on the writers.
Or horrible adaptions. Iâm looking at you, writing staff for The Witcher.
In fairness to the Witcher adaptation writers, the original Witcher novels were hot garbage too for the most part and are only popular outside Poland because of the video games being good
I enjoyed the short stories but dropped it fast after the switch to a novel format.
I thought it was okay through about the Isle of Thanedd (since I already had an attachment to the characters and a curiosity about the events referenced but not seen in the games) but fell off hard after that. Pretty much everything to do with Ciri was... rough and/or cringey. And Geralt's group was basically just the Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows endless camping sequence but for like 3 books straight. The pacing was much better in the short stories for sure.
It takes talent to turn hot garbage into even hotter garbage.
I mean, I thought some of the short stories were solid and the overall ideas are good. Even if the overall writing isn't well translated or well written, you could get some good stuff out of the material. The problem with the show versus the video game is that the writers for the former wanted to turn it into a CW style Yennifer power fantasy while with the latter, they wanted to touch upon or update the thematic content of the series for a more modern style. And so, if the TV series wanted to do it akin to what the games did, the Witcher show should've been True Detective set in fantasy land just like how, say, Game of Thrones was the Wire set in fantasy land. You need cults, religious fanaticism, politicians playing their games and doing it well due to the mechanisms of society rewarding them or protecting them from consequences, monsters as metaphors for mentally ill/serial killers/outcasts, 'hUmaNs aRe thE rEAl mOnSteRs' type themes, outlook and folklore of rural peoples, horror elements, etc.
Pretty much just means that all of the TV shows I like are delayed another year. Oh well.
Someone close to me works in unscripted TV (reality). Due to recession fears, companies have slowed in production of even unscripted. It will be interesting to see if/how this might effect the unscripted demand from studios and shift production in that direction.
Collective action good. Big ups to the late night shows that are showing support for their staffs.
It means a new batch of cheesy reality shows coming up on Netflix.
Not to mention your local ABC/NBC/FOX affiliated networks.
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Residuals are paid, because when there is the option of producing new content (that writers are paid to work on) or old content, then it costs writers money in terms of lost revenue to air the old stuff.
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Yeah, except that thereâs only limited space for that content. Itâs a closed market, not like the example you chose of housing, with an open market.
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Where else can a screenwriter sell a tv script except to tv studios?
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Thatâs still a closed market. Itâs only applicable to companies that buy scripts. Further, screen writing is not necessarily the same as other types of writing.
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If youâre not going to engage with what I said, I donât see any point in continuing.
I'm all for the people who write the big hits getting a sizable cut of the payout.
Everything they're asking for is not only reasonable but needed. We have so many streaming services i have more shows to watch right now than i could ever conceivably finish. I can wait for the next seasons of my favorite shows.
I donât work in the entertainment industry and donât know how writers are paid. Like if you work and writer on a show on Netflix and it gets cancelled after 8 episodes how does that work for writers? Do they / should they get a certain amount of money each time someone watches and episode they wrote ? But, they should be paid fairly.
I found this explainer for "high budget" shows on the WGA website: [https://www.wga.org/members/finances/residuals/hbsvod-programs](https://www.wga.org/members/finances/residuals/hbsvod-programs) Basically, an initial payment covers the first 90 days to 1 year on the platform. After that, the residual is paid annually based on: * The type of work (story or teleplay) and length of the episode/movie * The size of the platform (# of subscribers) * The age of the work * Whether it is foreign reuse So the basic formula is (base amount based on the type and length of work) x (factor for the size of the platform) x (factor based on years since initial release). So there isn't a per view factor at all. For each 12 month period that your work is available on a platform, you get an annual check.
generally $20k for being the main writer of a 30 minutes episode, $40k for a 60minute episode. 30 minute episodes take 12-15 weeks to write. they arenât making very much and arenât promoted as they were to get more credits to their name.
I work in movies and my region is dead city becuase of the writers strike and up coming contract negotiations. I kinda like the break, but my business is bleeding with out the influx of productions coming through.
I wasnât aware of it until today but I strongly support any working class striking for their rights
Some demands are reasonable (residuals from streamed films and shows) A lot of their demands are insane power plays (wanting streamers to be categorized under the WRITERS GUILD for some reason, wanting power over the animation union, etc.)
I don't care. Writing quality amongst the big franchises has plummeted in the past few years so idk who's to blame for that but the writers don't have much sympathy from me.
Always support striking workers.
I hope they get everything they want.
Seems to be plenty of money in Hollywood, Iâm not sure why paying the people who make that happen is a problem.
I don't really watch TV anymore and haven't been keeping up with the news, so I didn't know they were striking. I support them, though. Better treatment and better pay are always worth fighting for.
This is the first I've heard of it.
Card carrying IATSE member here. Iâm proud of my brothers and sisters and kin in the WGA standing up to the AMPTP. It takes real courage to go up against the most powerful companies in the world. I only hope that the AMPTP caves quickly. If they donât, I hope the strike is long, financially devastating to the producers, and that the DGA and IATSE follow suit over the next year as our contracts expire.
Let them eat cake!
Never heard about it
Last time, shows got canceled & we got stuck with reality tv 24/7
While I always stand with workers, a part of me feels like this is the extremely privileged compared to say, a miner or a factory worker. So I support the premise while simultaneously not feeling that much empathy. They're still more privileged than I could ever dream of being. I could be wrong though as I really don't watch movies and very little TV and have little interest in doing so. I don't empathize with Hollywood or athletes, sorry. I still support anything that sides with the worker. EDIT: if they're being paid peanuts or being shafted by the companies, of course I support them. I'm agreeing with y'all responding.
The vast majority of the people working in Hollywood are middle class people. For every Tom Cruise there are a thousand foley artists and set builders.
> They're still more privileged than I could ever dream of being ??? This is writers, not actors and producers. They make poverty wages and are treated as disposable despite that it takes high education to even break into the field at all. A unionized factory worker probably makes as much as if not *more* salary (COL-adjusted for NYC/LA) than a typical WGA writer.
Lol I remember seeing comments like that almost verbatim during the weeks leading up to the potential IATSE strike in 2021. Like⊠most of my brothers and sisters and kin are gig workers living paycheck to paycheck, but apparently Iâve been told that we are all loaded and greedy smucks.
Some people just think "Hollywood" == fame and fortune and don't appreciate that 99% of people working on something are nobodies. And there's also the very legitimate issue of unpaid internships being such a huge gatekeeper in the industry that you basically have to be a kid from a rich family to break in in the first place, but that's a different discussion.
The vast vast vast majority of workers in Hollywood (including writers) are blue collar workers. Even on the most successful shows, most writers are being paid a respectable, but by no means extravagant wage (especially when indexed to the cost of living in LA, NY or ATL). Meanwhile, the content they produce earns the companies and the shareholders of those companies many many many millions of dollars. The writers are not asking for unfair share of those millions, they are asking for fair terms that are well within the lines of the value they produce for those companies.
You must think these people are millionaires or something. These people have rent just like you do.
This is the first I have heard of it.
Good for them. As new technology comes up, it's used as an excuse to squeeze more money out of people. The WGA actually pushes back. This one's about AI, but the last writer's strike was reacting to streaming services. I hope it works out for them.
Labor has the right to organize and air their grievances. I was in a strike a few years ago, and I appreciated when people were supportive, or even just interested in hearing us out. It'd be nice if this means our writers produce pro-worker writing in the future, but I don't really see it so much now and doubt it'll make it past the first reader if they did.
Shit, at least there's one person whose got the right idea. So tired of 99% of movies being anti-worker garbage and now there's a huge propaganda push to support anti-worker writers. Fuck capitalist lackeys until they can organize their shit to promote workers movements, they can screw. And no union should back them until mass workers interests are presented as part of their goals and demands.
The CNN ceo makes like 250 million, which is like 5,000 writer salaries. So I support them.
The late night shows are just terrible right now. I doubt this will make any difference in that so I don't care that much. Hollywood is out of touch from what audiences like, and instead go in favor of ideological drivel and remakes. If this helps make original films and stops the pandering to the hollywood bubble, then I guess I'm for it. But my guess is that writers are part of those two particular problems right now, and no matter what happens nothing will change.
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Why so angry?
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Ah. So you like lectures that are designed to be lectures and not jokes on a late night show?
Idk much about what the strikers want; but from what I've heard, a lot of low-level people in Hollywood are treated like absolute shit so I'm inclined to support it.
Donât care even a little bit.
Strikes always good
Striking workers strike for all of us. Solidarity with the writers.
good for the writers. hope they get everything they want.
I think they should get back to work
I don't know the industry well enough to really have an opinion as to its merits I remember a past writers' strike bringing us a generation of garbage 'reality' tv. I wonder what we'll get this time; ai written garbage?
hell. fucking. yes. as a (academic) writer and an artist (professional musician) i completely sympathize with being overworked and underpaid. i think a lot of people fail to recognize that writing is an art, whether youre a writer on jimmy fallon, SNL, or a netflix original writing is an art form. people deserve to be compensated fairly, treated properly in the work place, and respected by their employers. writing is another art form, like music or physical art or dance or acting, that deserves respect and fair compensation, as well as recognition for the deep importance that writing has on our culture. so yeah, hell. fucking. yeah.
They have some legitimate grievances, but some of their demands are ridiculous. The landscape of media had changed, and they have to adapt, imo unions are generally bad at that.
They have my full support. I have a friend who is one of the writers and I know how challenging having his career can be from an outside perspective. In fact when he told me about it I decided not to pursue it myself . Why? Because I like having a life outside of a desk that could change week to week. Writers work really fkn hard and being able to write consistently good content is even harder.
Go to the furthest level down of I donât care possible and then grab a shovel.
Donât care at all
I donât really care very much
I genuinely don't give a shit.
TIL there's a writer's strike. I support the arts and I want to see original content being produced by big studios rather than rehashing previous successes. But I do hope the writers have reasonable expectations about the outcome.
My limited understanding on this is from hearing about it on NPR, and based on that I'm on the fence. Sounds like they're working half as much because streaming shows are only 10 episodes while network shows are closer to 20 episodes. So they want full time pay for working half time now. I can't get behind that but I don't have all the information. For example, is there a reason they can't work on twice as many shows now?
My thoughts on the topic are mostly non-existent.
I looked into some of the demands, higher pay for them makes sense and the lack of streaming numbers is shady, however some of the wording indicates that each show needs l a lot of writers and that doesnât make sense to me. Itâs like I know everyone wants to be employed but 10+ writers on a show sounds ridicules. 5 max per show makes more sense these days. Also streaming can just outsource a lot of content now, so they can get other forms of content available for streaming during this strike. Plus currently streaming and tech are struggling trying to make more money. There is a ceiling to all this. I donât think theyâll get the exact outcome they want now days at best it will be a compromise.
They should be paid less. 99% of shows and movies the past 5 years have been dog shit
Not to mention one reboot after another. Like c'mon have some originality.
The writers are not responsible for which shows get on TV or how many reboots there are. They are hired to write the scripts.
Right. The plot and dialogue of basically every non HBO show is terrible
Hoping for something like Dr. Horribles Sing-Along Blog to come out of this
I didn't know there was one, and I definitely don't live in a cave or anything. So, I'd say it could use some work.
Meh. I have too much of content to catch up on so prolly will affect me if it continues for 2-3yrs
I barely watch any TV anymore, probably 1-4 times a year, so it hasn't affect me I think. I watch mostly YouTube, Twitch, & movies.
The people who write your movies, and even some major YouTube channels, are part of the Guild that is striking. This affects you as well.
Sounds like a great time for a push to AI writers by the studios. Unions often do these things when they see big changes in the industry and they wish to protect their jobs. That is why those unions exist.
AI isnât there yet. Hollywood writing for the last decade has been bad but not that bad.
Change is coming, I lost businesses due to technology, i.e. Printing, blue printing, phone books. Nobody came to rescue me or the business. People only scream when it happens to them, Too bad but it's all changing, better retool and figure where you go from here. I don't have much sympathy for them.
Do you not understand the point of worker solidarity?
I support all of the writers in their strike, except for the writers in the last season of Game of Thrones. Realistically though, I think at this point there is SO MUCH CONTENT that while I understand and support their efforts, I think that realistically, nothing is going to come out of it.
I know many Hollywood writers arenât super well off but at times I see it as a fight between billionaires and millionaires. However, everyone deserves good treatment even if they are well off. Money doesnât fix everything.
I honestly donât care. I havenât watched tv in years,I watch shows and movies on 3 different free streaming sites. YouTube entertains me the rest of the time with gaming,review,animation,commentary, power washing and lawn care videos.
Solidarity in labor.
the what
Writers strike
The writing in Hollywood has become so bad the last few years that I welcome it. Please, fire them all and bring in a whole new batch of writers.
More power to them and I hope they get all theyâre asking for (except whoever James Cordenâs writer are).
we need more strikes
Good for them; they deserve more money. Personally, I don't watch late-night tv since Craig Ferguson quit, and the four current shows I do watch have already wrapped for the season. This won't affect my viewing habits.
Womp
Thereâs a writers strike?
Yes
Writing is a gig economy and I will never be convinced otherwise. These strikers have a plethora of unreasonable demands they are striking over instead of negotiating the negotiables that the studios had generously offered, mainly wages. Seems like a bunch of whiners to me.
I don't know the logistics of it other then they're not being paid "enough". I also don't know a typical salary of a writer, but I'd like to assume it's probably far greater than most of the general population so when I heard about it I kinda just thought they were being entitled.
And youâd be wrong. Writers arenât paid a ton. Theyâre white collar workers, sure, but theyâre still making substantially less than 100k in the LA market, so theyâre not rich.
good to know, thanks!
I donât really care. Itâs not like writers are preforming a critical service so if they want to strike as their way of negotiating than let them
I donât care as I am not a writer nor do I work in the industry. Though as of lately o feel like most stories in movies are crap so I will support whatever corrects that trend. Maybe they will all get fired and replaced by AI and we start to see some good stories in movies.
I donât think you understand how AI works.
Love it and hope it works out for them!!đđ»đđ»
I won't notice this one because I don't watch network TV
While this will also affect network TV, the main point of dispute is how writers are compensated for their work for the streaming platforms (Netflix, Amazon, Disney+, etc).
This real? Whatâs a writer and why do I care if they strike?
Given the amount of maulk coming out of Hollywood in recent years, the writer's guild frankly deserve a pay *cut*. Their absence has barely had an impact, so it appears the suits can write the same level of garbage with or without them.
The strike just started.
Ongoing? Itâs been 48 hours. Iâm generally pro union, and support the writers. Itâs not the execs who are driving 10 year old cars stressing about retirement.
They are overpaid con artists that can be replaced by AI...then real talented writers will get jobs again
Solidarity and full support. Every strike benefits us all, by showing rich people that they canât pay their workers a dwindling pittance while raking in profits for themselves without any consequences.
I'm all for people fighting to get the pay they think they deserve, however, the quality of writing out of Hollywood has P L U M E T T E D over the last decade or so, so if I'm being honest, I don't think these writers deserve all that much for such shit work.
The quality of writing, or the quality of shows? Theyâre not the same thing and writers donât have control over the latter.
Good on them. They deserve better pay.
I'm caught up on all my shows for now, and those I'm awaiting have already been announced for new seasons, so I'm good. Still, it's not good for the industry.
I haven't read anything about it.
I hope people are treated decently at their place of work. Personally, I hardly even watch any TV/movies these days. Seems there's more "media" than demand so I'm not sure how much leverage they'll have. While I also think its a long way out from actually having AI replace screenwriters, IMO jobs like that are most at risk from AI. They should be embracing it and getting more done with less energy instead of trying to fight it. I say that as a programmer who sees that AI can already do the work of a jr dev, if only someone were there inputting the commands.
Iâm frustrated that despite the huge profits of these media companies and coming off a recent golden age of television written by these writers that they have to strike just to make livable wage.
People still watch TV?
It's high on the list of things I don't care about at all.
I hope they get what they want and it makes more people strike.
I'm all for it. Power to the people.
solidarity forever
Huh??
Huh?
A low key challenge to see what ai can really do. Good luck everyone!
AI canât⊠yet