Polter-Cow

One of accounting tricks that the studios have used to minimize payment of royalties relies on the fact that studios are not just production houses, but part of much larger media empires. When we talk about FOX, for instance, the FOX production studio is considered a separate legal entity from the FOX network and the various FOX cable nets.

The example I remember was that on Murder, She Wrote, JMS was a writer and I think Universal was the production house. Universal was selling the episodes to Lifetime, another branch of the corporate empire. One day they realized they were charging themselves money to sell episodes in the larger corporate sense. So they sell themselves episodes for a dollar. Since payment to the creators is derived from sale price, then the creators get paid pennies for the rebroadcast of an episode, even if it is the first rebroadcast. I think NBC and Sci-Fi have the same corporate parents, so when NBC showed Battlestar Galactica eps a year or so back, the writers (along with everyone else who got a percentage) get maybe paid enough to buy a coffee.

This is perfectly legal under the previous contracts. The networks are technically separate companies and thus are not signatories, even though they are owned by the same people in the end. Everytime the contract has been up for renegiotation since the beginning of media consolidation, the AMPTP have refused to revisit the issue, saying sales to separate corporations, even if they share the same owners, are sales to other non-signatory corporations, so better learn to suck it up and move on.

I suspect its inclusion into the talks as an attempt to have something to bargain with, but I am no expert. That being said, I don't think this is something that will get much traction with the man on the street. The consolidation of production and networks works against the AMPTP here. Ask the man on the street if he thinks FOX Studios and the FOX network are separate companies with no relationship to each other, he will look at you as if you are crazy. Plus the fact that many networks require to have an equity position in the shows that they air only adds to linkages.

Thanks, CaBil. Just another way the writers (and everyone else) are getting screwed, I see.

If there's no money to give, what's the harm of signing 2.5% of it away?

I think the problem in this argument is the assumption that the writers want 2.5% of the net profits, and I think they want 2.5% of the gross profits. So yeah, it's feasible that if expenses run too high, a percentage of gross profits can end up losing money for the entity paying it out.

I also saw somewhere that directors get the same measly percentage of DVD sales that writers do. If this is true, I wonder why we haven't heard anything from the DGA on that issue. Or maybe they're being quiet because they plan on screwing the writers over again.

I also saw somewhere that directors get the same measly percentage of DVD sales that writers do.

Yep. Writers and directors get 4%, and actors get 12%.

Well, these are the base rates that everyone agrees will be the floor. It is that for writers rarely have the ability to negotiate a deal better the base rate. Usually a writer gets the big bucks for becoming a hyphenate (writer-producer) and the big bucks come from the producer half of their duties. As a theoretical example, Joss Whedon gets paid for every Buffy DVD out of several different payment pools, one being for the writers of the episodes and another for producers. I am willing he makes more money as a exec producer per episode than what he makes as a writer. Heck, I am sure that his cut for being a director of an episode is more than the writer's cut (assuming that there is DGA minimum for TV)

I think individual directors are in much better position to get more money than writers. So while the base rate is the same, the typical DGA member is a much better position to negotiate a better rate for himself than the writer ever is. So the DGA as an entity has not fought for bigger pie slices.

As for the difference between net and gross. If you don't get gross percentage, it's not worth bothering. Virtually every film you care to name has lost money according to net accounting, along with most TV shows. I am sure that if the writers accepted net points, they would get nothing.

So while the base rate is the same, the typical DGA member is a much better position to negotiate a better rate for himself than the writer ever is. So the DGA as an entity has not fought for bigger pie slices.

This makes perfect sense, thanks.

As for the difference between net and gross. If you don't get gross percentage, it's not worth bothering. Virtually every film you care to name has lost money according to net accounting, along with most TV shows. I am sure that if the writers accepted net points, they would get nothing.

So the argument that paying writers a percentage of unknown profits in new media is a win/win for writers and studios is somewhat disingenuous. In fact, gross percentages can make the difference on whether a project has a net profit or not. (This doesn't mean that the studios don't lie about the net accounting and make gobs and gobs of money anyway, just that the argument is not so simplistic.)

[link] I don't know who the girl standing next to Gunn is (and I'll feel extra silly if it's someone I should know) but I also own the shirt she's wearing and so it's kinda like I was there! Which I totally would have been if I still lived in LA.

ETA: That's totally Amy Acker, isn't it? Hee!

Isn't that Amy Acker?

Bwah! We share a name and good taste in clothes!!

I didn't recognize her in another picture when she was walking with Joss. I had an 'oh wow, that's amy acker' moment too.