Not looking good.  

He also said this in a later post:

The thread: http://www.donmurphy.net/board/showthread.php?t=23434

 

Feh.

 

I understand that writers who are members of the guild cannot do any work for the studios during this time, but do the studios have to use members of the guild to do the writing or could they, say, pay me a few grand for a script and use that instead?

 

fucking strikers....

 

Yes, because the rights of these people aren't as important as a Transformers film. How dare they strike to get an adequate paycheck!

 

I'm conflicted because on the one hand I want to see TF2 asap but on the other hand the writers are extremely justified in their striking and demands. Alas!

 

Can someone break it down for me what this strike is all about again?

The Wikipedia article on this confuses me. @_@

 

I believe it's to do with the lack of credit and residuals for content on DVDs and online among other things.

Then they'd be using scabs. The Hollywood guilds are very powerful, and to use non-union writers would probably mean the studio (or at the very least the production and the producers/directors involved) would be blacklisted by not only the writers guild members, but possibly members of other guilds.

 

Edit: thanks for replying btw  

Is that really how it works?

Seems a bit odd to me that the company behind a film cannot choose to use a script from a non guild member. I wonder how that particular rule came about?

 

SCAB! SCAB! SCAB! SCAB!

sorry, i just love saying that.

 

Yeah that's the part that confuses me, what do they mean by residuals? Traceability?

 

The power of unions, yo.

 

I don't quite understand the full story behind the strike but I get the gist of it. I feel sorry for the writers =/ I'd hate to have my work have only a small amount of credit in the final project.
Well I really do hope things can be sorted out soon. I know a solution will present itself because a lot of people will suffer financially and emotionally. The question is when. =/

 

'Residuals' are what they call the little bit of money they would be contractually entitled to every time the movie/show/whatever is shown, downloaded, sold on DVD, etc. Right now, when you buy a copy of a DVD movie or download a legal video, the writers get zilch.

--Moony

 

This information may be outdated and applies mainly to actors, a basic guide to american guild residuals work like this:

When an episode, movie or whatever is rerun for the first time, you get paid about 75% of your initial daily fee times the number of days you worked on the production. The third, fourth and fifth reruns of a given episode or production pay fifty percent each. The sixth rerun pays ten percent, and the seventh and each subsequent rerun pay five percent.

For nationally broadcasted television shows, the residual payment is based on the production company's licensing national rebroadcast rights for a particular episode, not for each time that episode is run on a local station.


The basis for the residual system is that as long as the production company (or whomever owns the rights) continues to make money from a given production, then those people most responsible for creating that production should share in the company's earnings. Back in the old days they only paid performers for the first thirteen reruns of each episode, which is why the system was changed so there is no limit on the number of reruns for which residuals must be paid.

I'm not EXACTLY sure, I may be wrong.

I think it's because the productions made with the large, mainstream studios are guild-approved. Most of Hollywood's professionals belong to the various guilds.

There are exceptions, such as Lucasfilm, which is an independant non-guild studio (Lucas left the guilds in a huff before of his lack of credits in the opening titles of Empire Strikes Back and the director's guild was looking to punish Irving Kershing for it). In fact, Gary Oldman pulled out of voicing General Grevious in Revenge of the Sith because he was a SAG member and didn't want to offend or betray his fellow members.

Hopefully somebody will correct me if I am spreading disinformation.

 

Oooh, now I see. Thanks for the info.

 

Also, Writers want to get paid for 'new media' content, such as viewings of shows on the Web or via mobile phones. Considering how much that this area could explode in the next few years, this is a very smart thing. the writers kinda got screwed with the DVD explosion, where lots of other people were making money off their creations, but not them.

Now, as for me, I might start working on those scripts that have been percolating in the back of my head.

 

Yeah, while the rabid free-market capitalist in me isn't a fan of unions, they have a very legitimate concern here, and they're being sensibly proactive about it.

There's not a whole lot at stake money-wise right no, but the unwillingness of studios to budge at all is kinda proof-positive how much they'll be worth down the road.

I'm in no rush to see the film, anyways. If nothing else, the delay might give ILM a chance to take it even higher with the special effects.

 

wasnt Lucas kicked out of the directors guild and black listed when he wanted to make star wars episodes 5 and 6 on his own.

 

Meh. It's not like Transformers as a whole is going to fade away just because a second movie has to wait a bit.

Animated and Classics can tide me over till then.