WGA Strike: On the Internet, Everyone Knows You're a Hyphenate

Idle hands are the devil's playthings, and writer's hands are no exception. That's why some of them have occupied their time on the Internet, creating short films about the strike, and, in some cases, seeking deals to make Internet content for pay. If this trickle becomes a flood, it could herald a sea change for the industry, as Thom Taylor argues in an LA Times Op-Ed. (Water metaphors are on my mind after the torrential weekend rains here)

But there's an irony that may have escaped notice -- writers are claiming their digital destiny at the cost of their core focus: they're becoming directors and producers as well. Now, that's not unusual; it seems like everyone's mixing in each other's business today. Apple was a computer company; now they're also a music distributor. Microsoft was a software company; now they're gamers as well. Google was a search company; today they're a video network (by virtue of owning YouTube) and a lot of other things. On an individual level, print reporters now make Internet videos as well, and all sorts of people are bloggers (even attorneys).

Yet, it's a big change for many writers, who are often not managerial or entrepreneurial, unless they're already hyphenates: writer-producers (such as television showrunners) or writer-directors (about 10% of the Writers Guild), for instance. There are even a few writer-actors, such as Matt Damon and Ben Affleck- - indeed, the latter's now a triple-hyphenate, as he's now a director as well (Gone Baby Gone).

Still the irony remains: the strike, in part, is about claiming respect, and fair compensation, for writers as writers -- but to attain that respect writers may have to do something other than write. It's a sad world that way, or an exciting one, or maybe both.

Comments

[DLSteinhardt]

I'm not even in WGA, but I'm benefiting from the content drought: CNN interviewed me tonight about a video monologue--

http://youtube.com/watch?v=HlwNhQ0wK3A

--that I'd submitted to "I-Report" in response to their call for late-night-style jokes.

[thetvdecider]

craig's back...why isn't this guy "in the room" repping the writers?

http://artfulwriter.com/?p=314

On Leno, The East…and The Beginning Of The End?
By Craig Mazin on Jan 6, 2008 in WGA Issues


Sometimes the rules and regulations we have to follow are inconvenient. Annoying, even. One of my recent posts was about the interim deal the WGA made with Letterman (and now UA), and how it ought to be ratified by the membership.


No doubt it would pass in the 90 percent zone (all the more reason to do the vote, I’d think), but sure…it involves printing ballots, mailing them, counting them…


…caring about the constitution…


…giving a shit what the membership actually thinks…


Annoying stuff like that.


One of my problems with our leadership is that they have a tendency to be a bit cavalier toward our constitution and our MBA. For instance, they pushed through a constitutional amendment to rearrange our relationship with the WGA East. Part of that deal was a requirement that the two guilds either decide upon common membership standards, or have an arbitrator do it for them. They did neither.


Even though we did vote on that one.


Similarly, I was there when Patric Verrone told a room full of hundreds of reality TV employees that if our organizational effort was successful, the WGA would waive their initiation fee entirely. Only problem with that is that our constitution says that the Board of Directors can only reduce the initiation fee to an amount no less than $500.


But hey, who cares, right? It’s just a bunch of silly rules.


Then there’s the strike rules, which, unlike the constitution, we are all meant to take VERY VERY SERIOUSLY.

(more follows...including questioning why the wga is spending it's time worrying about jay leno when they could be trying to end the strike.)