What Did the Writers Win in the Agreement?

This was a negotiation with a particularly hostile partner (ahem, AMTP), but the WGA made sure they didn’t leave the table with nothing. Let’s look at some of the main pain points;

Most MBA minimums have gone up by 5% and will increase by another 4% in 2024 and another 3.5% in 2025. There is now also an increased health and pension contribution rate and brand new regulations on AI. Studios can no longer pass off AI-generated work as copyrighted literary material since it will not be considered source material under the MBA. If the writer and their company are in agreement, the writer can choose to use AI assistance, but the company can’t require the writer to do so, and the resulting work can’t undermine the writer’s credit. Foreign streaming residuals are going to have a 76% increase over 3 years, which is a huge bump up from the pennies writers were being given before. Plus, residuals are finally going to be calculated for streaming services as well.

I could spend this entire piece talking about the MBA, but I’ll stop here for both our sakes. You can read the full agreement or its summary on their site.

Other Strikes

The Writers’ Strike has started a pretty beautiful butterfly effect throughout the film industry. The sheer courage and willpower of so many creatives banding together has inspired other film industry professionals to demand better terms. Most notably the Screen Actors Guild—American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) started striking soon after the WGA, which ground the industry to a halt. SAG-AFRTRA also won better terms, many of which reflected the same concerns as the WGA. These include higher minimums, streaming bonuses and restrictions on the use of AI. Most Hollywood productions may have stopped for months, but it was worth it.

What Next?

Some unfortunate direct consequences of the strike include thousands of workers losing their jobs and the majority of big-budget American film productions stagnating. But needless to say; far more screenwriters will soon have something resembling decent working conditions. And in the long term, the writers’ strike has opened up an era of worker solidarity that Hollywood hasn’t seen in decades. Creatives are beginning to demand what they deserve from their labour, and it’ll be a lot harder for millionaire film executives to profit off the backs of writers who are barely scraping by.

And what do we, the general public, get out of it? Well; a writer who can afford to live is inherently a better writer, and better writers make better movies. If we want good art, we as a society need to continue to push for fair working conditions across all industries. And art aside, it’s just the decent thing to do.

Also Read: WGA Strike and the Future of Television

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In this article, we will look at the current state of streaming and try to determine if it has resulted in viewers having more or less choice when it comes to accessing their favourite films and TV programmes.

Swimming Through Streaming

The biggest streaming services are currently Netflix (around 232 million subscribers), Amazon Prime Video (over 200 million) and Disney+ (around 146 million).

Other popular services like Max, Paramount+, Hulu, Apple TV+, Starz, Peacock, ITVX and more also have sizable subscriber bases of their own. And more streaming services may be coming further down the line.

Positives

With so many streaming services, each offering original productions and access to a library of classic and modern projects it seems like there is a huge amount of choice available to customers. And there are definitely benefits to the current state of streaming. For example, it ensures many projects are available to wide audiences in accessible ways. And it has encouraged viewers to watch more international media. However, the industry has been accused of using many tactics that have negative consequences for customers.

The Illusion of Choice

The WGA West recently released a report into the anti-competitive practices of the biggest three streaming services. Although some of their critiques also apply to smaller streamers. The document lays out how Disney uses its industry position to constantly acquire new companies (it currently owns the ABC network, Pixar, Marvel, Lucasfilm, 20th Century Fox, and a majority stake in Hulu) increasing its market control. Resulting in an overall decrease in media output. It has also withdrawn content it owns from other streaming sites (something other studio-owned streaming sites are now doing). It limited the content shown on its platforms to mostly Disney-owned work. Also as a result of its market dominance, Disney has been able to pressure viewers to accept price hikes to retain access to their platform. 

The document also says Amazon has been able to disadvantage competitors by demanding fees to allow viewers access to their services through their Fire TV platform (one of the leading ways people access streaming). Thus depriving viewers of any choice that would not result in them collecting extra fees.

Netflix through increasingly making self-produced content rather than collaborating with third-party production companies, its acquisition of other production studios (increasing its market share), and its use of power to increase subscription prices while reducing investment in content is increasingly depriving customers of choices regarding projects and access plans.

There are also egregious examples of streaming services cutting content from their libraries. Leaving viewers no way to access them physically or digitally. As well as some companies restricting access to their site by cracking down on password sharing, not exactly providing a great amount of options for viewers.

What This Means?

If all practices outlined in the WGA report are accurate it’s clear that despite the number of streaming services increasing it has done little to give viewers more choice. In fact, it has taken away a lot of choice by restricting access to media, pushing up prices customers pay for access and increasing the subscriptions needed to access the same content.

What was once considered a disruptive distribution model that would give customers convenient access to a diverse array of media is fast becoming a gatekeeping exercise for big companies to retain control of their films at the expense of customers.

Also Read: How the Streaming Revolution Has Fuelled Movie Piracy

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Wait, What’s the WGA?

The Writer’s Guild of America (WGA) is used to refer to the joint operations of two affiliated labour unions founded in 1954; Writer’s Guild of America, East (WGAE) and Writer’s Guild of America West (WGAW). These two labour unions represent writers in television, film, radio and online media in America. They have headquarters in New York City and Los Angeles respectively, each administering its respective side of the United States. Although they are separate entities, they share certain functions like hosting The Writers Guild of America Awards, negotiating contracts and launching strikes.

So Why Are They Striking?

There is a common misconception that everyone in the film industry is rolling in money. It’s understandable, considering that Hollywood is often depicted as the land of glitz and glamour with films and TV shows raking in billions.

The thing is, not much of that actually goes to writers.

Of course, there are a select few screenwriters out there making big bucks but many of the brains behind your favourite shows are living paycheque to paycheque. This hasn’t always been the case, though. Writers simply aren’t being paid as much as they are used to.

One of the main reasons is the disappearance of residuals in the era of streaming. Residuals are a percentage of the profit received when media a person works on is syndicated, re-run or re-released. For decades, residuals have been an important part of a writer’s long-term income. However, the laws that governed residuals applied to traditional TV, not streaming. With most TV shows moving to streaming and studios grinding the minimum payments down to the ground, writers are making close to nothing. Writer Valentina Garza recently shared a tweet in which she received a residual cheque of only three cents (yes, three cents!) for her work on the hit show Jane The Virgin.

Another sticking point is the emergence of mini-rooms as opposed to fully-staffed writers’ rooms. Basically, many studios are hiring almost half the number of writers they used to on a short-term basis to bang out the structure of TV shows. Fewer and fewer writers are retained on long-term payrolls, and it’s making screenwriting as an industry shift from a full-time career to almost exclusively gig work.

Bottom line; the average Hollywood screenwriter can win an Emmy but still not know when next month’s rent is coming from. All of this is going on as studio execs are making increasingly obscene salaries. The strike is a direct result of the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) aka the union of America’s biggest movie studios, refusing to meet WGA’s reasonable conditions during negotiations.

What Does the Future Hold?

We can already see the immediate effects of the strike. Several productions have completely shut down as writers lay down their pens. This isn’t the first time a strike has interrupted Hollywood productions; the 2007 strike had Conan O’Brien spinning his wedding ring on The Tonight Show to fill airtime. A great deal of the Californian economy also relies on these shows to keep running.

But the short-term losses have potential for positive results for both writers and viewers. Not only will it give writers some semblance of financial stability to writers, but it will also probably lead to better TV. With fully-staffed writers’ rooms and regulations to curb use of AI to write scripts, we could see a drastic improvement in the quality of the TV shows produced. We’re all tired of dozens of Netflix shows that are cancelled after one season and look like they were written in the dark.

Want to Help?

Follow the hashtag #WGAStrong or join the picketing.

Also Read: Equal Writes: Why We Need More Female Writers

Your contribution to Big Picture Film Club will allow us to continue to produce content. No matter the amount your contributions are greatly appreciated.

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