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For most people the greatest impact of the strike action taken by the Writers Guild of America will be seen in the stuff they don’t get to see. The autumn TV schedule is going to be cancelled or more appropriately, reprogrammed. Viewers won’t see the next installments of Lost or 24 because once any pre-written scripts are shot; nobody is going to be around to write continuations. At 12:01 Monday morning, over 12,000 professional writers walked off the job demanding a greater cut from the distribution of their work through the digital media.
The economics of the issue are fairly easy to understand but very difficult to settle. Writers need to be paid for their work but remuneration structures negotiated nearly 20 years ago do not properly cover the Internet which is quickly becoming the dominant means of distribution.
The writers want a larger cut of revenues derived from new media sources. The production studios, represented by the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, are said to be digging in their heels over royalties paid for productions made primarily for new media and over fees paid for promotional products (like free movies or TV shows) delivered via the Internet.
