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I can't find a single thing you said that is factual. His music was sold with copies of Harry Potter DVDs, which I'm fairly certain were rather profitable.

Writers Guild of America members do not get paid exclusively based on profit, but rather based on the size of the budget of the production. See pages 1-4 of the document specifying their pay scale. They get a minimum pay for specific tasks for works with a budget under $5M USD, and a higher minimum pay if the budget is over $5M USD. They can negotiate a contract that additionally includes profit-sharing, of course, but they are guaranteed the minimum amounts, regardless of profitability of the work.

Similarly, actors who are in the Screen Actors Guild have a similar document with similar terms. Profit-sharing comes in addition to it, meaning that they should not face a situation where they go unpaid because the work was a flop.

And at this point, I'm too lazy to correct you for musicians, but it's the same deal there too. In fact, something like 90% of musicians lose money for the studios, yet they still get paid anyway. That's part of the cost of being a studio.

Now, that's not to say that all of those folks can't get screwed over by Hollywood accounting and other legalese, but that has to do with any pay that's in addition to the minimums specified in those documents. Their minimum pay is always guaranteed, and they always get paid.

The naming scheme of this add-on somehow reminds me of how certain countries like to add attributes such as "people's" and "democratic" to their official state designations...

I've always looked at it as a slur against the Writer's Guild of America.

W

"Dark Horizons shares a TV Guide blog that shows a chart/schedule since the end to the three-month-old Writers Guild of America (WGA) strike is imminent. The networks have quietly begun outlining plans to salvage what's left of the current television (TV) season. Keep in mind that the following information remains extremely tentative and is subject to change (and probably will). Check the Web page often to see the up-to-date information." From my site.

Yeah. As it is, those folks only make $75000 to $100000 a year. That's not much to live on.

They could have done something like the Stargate, except with controlled exit points rather than only to other gates.

GlaDOS wouldn't let them.

More ontopic, congrats to Doug Liman on his deal with the WGA.

W

(the pastry is a mistruth?)

Although frankly, if they want residuals in the games industry, they can get the fuck in line. Behind the programmers, artists, animators, fx guys, et al. (Same goes for the actors - fuck you! You want royalties on a performance that took you at most a week? We slaved over that game for over three years, working evenings, weekends, you name it).

A lot of speculation on eligibility for awards. The TFA has a link to the awards site that includes eligibility. Here are two excerpts:

"Work that was not produced under WGA jurisdiction may be submitted...."

"At the time the script is submitted, the credited writer(s) of the game must be, or apply to become, a member of the WGA's New Media Caucus...."

The writers work must be nominated, it sounds like typically by a writer. Since these aren't yet high profile awards, the writers who bothered to submit their games and apply for membership are the short list of nominees.

Here is the link to eligibility and submission procedures:

Close. A lot of people may work on a script but the final writing credit always goes to the person who is judged to have done the most significant amount of contribution to the film. If multiple writers get credit, then the listings are adjusted to indicate seniority. If two people write collaboratively, the credit will read -

written by
J. Random Bozo and Hank Slashdot

If once person writes a script and then someone else does significant revisions, the credit will read -

written by
Fred Linux
and
Herman Namespace

And naturally, every other person who works on a script makes this whole process more complicated. The Writers' Guild of America spends a significant amount of time every year moderating fights over credits.

http://www.wga.org/subpage_writersresources.aspx?id=1027

In the case of music licensing, you go to BMI or ASCAP. If you want to republish a book, you go to the publisher or the author and get a contract in writing. The writer's guild provides a standard contract for producers who want to hire a writer (work for hire) or buy their product (outright transfer of license).

Perhaps there needs to be a 3rd-party registrar where people can submit their material under particular licenses? It would be a great service for anyone looking for CCed material regardless, and could help to assure people licensing the material that they have someone to go to if there's a dispute.

Admittedly, this is patterned after the WGA's registry, only this version would be transparent-- that is, a registered material would be visible after it's uploaded.

Of course, validating that the submitter is in fact the original copyright owner is another issue, but that's not what the original topic was asking. (An interesting question though-- how do you know that someone who says "this song is distributed under the CC license" really owns the right to do this? Then again, the same issues all apply to the GPL. Is there a CC sourceforge?)

In the case of music licensing, you go to BMI or ASCAP. If you want to republish a book, you go to the publisher or the author and get a contract in writing. The writer's guild provides a standard contract for producers who want to hire a writer (work for hire) or buy their product (outright transfer of license).

Perhaps there needs to be a 3rd-party registrar where people can submit their material under particular licenses? It would be a great service for anyone looking for CCed material regardless, and could help to assure people licensing the material that they have someone to go to if there's a dispute.

Admittedly, this is patterned after the WGA's registry, only this version would be transparent-- that is, a registered material would be visible after it's uploaded.

Of course, validating that the submitter is in fact the original copyright owner is another issue, but that's not what the original topic was asking. (An interesting question though-- how do you know that someone who says "this song is distributed under the CC license" really owns the right to do this? Then again, the same issues all apply to the GPL. Is there a CC sourceforge?)

This is an industry-wide battle between creatives and network/studio execs that goes way beyond this one show. Most of the unions completely messed up years ago negotiating residuals for the home markets (VHS and DVDs especially), so there's a LOT of resistence to giving away the farm this time. (Many writers, for example, in movie animation get zero residuals.) Unfortunately, there's a lot of momentum and precedents that resulted from the previous mistakes, so it's kind of an uphill battle for the writers, directors, actors guilds. The future gets even more complicated when writers, actors, and other artists work directly for the Internet, for phones, for games, etc. and when "reality" shows claim to not have writers at all or won't allow their writers to organize. Plus there's the issue of residuals for older content that wasn't even imagined when the shows were produced in the first place.

So yeah, it's a mess, and there's gonna be conflict in this arena for a while.

This is an industry-wide battle between creatives and network/studio execs that goes way beyond this one show. Most of the unions completely messed up years ago negotiating residuals for the home markets (VHS and DVDs especially), so there's a LOT of resistence to giving away the farm this time. (Many writers, for example, in movie animation get zero residuals.) Unfortunately, there's a lot of momentum and precedents that resulted from the previous mistakes, so it's kind of an uphill battle for the writers, directors, actors guilds. The future gets even more complicated when writers, actors, and other artists work directly for the Internet, for phones, for games, etc. and when "reality" shows claim to not have writers at all or won't allow their writers to organize. Plus there's the issue of residuals for older content that wasn't even imagined when the shows were produced in the first place.

So yeah, it's a mess, and there's gonna be conflict in this arena for a while.

Which you would need to do anyway to register it with the WGA. Oh, wait, my bad. You can now register your screenplay online in whatever file format you wish.

The fee for non-members is $20. The fee for members is $10. Registration lasts for 5 years, and then may be renewed. Protecting your copyrights and getting a back up thrown in!

Seems like a no brainer if you're a screenwriter.

When I saw the headline, my first thought was, "If people don't like the Writers Guild of America, why would they sue Microsoft?" It can get confusing being a film geek on a website full of computer nerds.

Sadly, this kind of thing is common in other media as well.

Back when it first became apparent that videotapes were going to be a profit source for Hollywood, the WGA (the union for film and TV writers) sat down with the studios and hammered out an agreement, which said that the writers of a given movie would get 2% of the studio's profit on every videotape sold of that movie. However, since videotapes were a new technology, and production costs were still high, the studio's costs were defined as 80% of their income on every tape. And since the retailers kept about 50% of the cover price before passing the income on to the studio, this meant the writers got 2% of 20% of %50 of the purchase price of a movie on tape. If the consumer paid $30, about $15 might go to the retailer, $12 to the studio, and a little less than 5 cents to the writers. (I assume the DGA (directors' union) and SAG/AFTRA (actors' union) got similar deals, but I'm not sure; as a WGA member, I know more about the activities of my own union.)

This was not a lot of money for the writer, but at that point, it seemed fair. Of course, as VHS technology matured, the cost of production dropped, so that studios were spending a lot less than 80% on production. But that 80% figure was written into the contract, and writers were stuck with it.

And then DVDs came along, which are even cheaper to produce than a VHS cassette. But that 80% figure was still there. And now digital downloads are here. Guess which formula the studios want to apply?

The WGA has been pissed off about the unfairness of this formula for a long time, but the studios have dug their heels in, leaving the WGA with no way of forcing an agreement other than mounting a long enough strike to force the studios to cave. Unfortunately, the WGA hasn't been able to generate the willpower for such a strike. Ironically, much of the early resistance came from TV writers, who thought the only people with an interest in home video sales were film writers. Needless to say, the booming market for TV shows on DVD has made that stance seem rather shortsighted.

Fortunately, the WGA (and the other unions) have language built into their contracts that would give a better deal for certain kinds of digital download. But these contracts had to be written in a somewhat open-ended way to cover not-yet-invented technology, which leaves the studios wiggle room. The studios (of course) are claiming that, under the language of the contract, the iTunes store and similar digital delivery mechanisms ought to have the same 2% of 80% formula as DVDs; the unions (of course) are claiming that, under the language of the contract, the iTunes store is covered under a different formula that is more favorable to the writer. It seems to me that the WGA has the vastly stronger argument here, and the studios' argument is laughable--but then, I'm a union member, so I'm probably biased.

Perhaps the Writers Guild of America could link its screenplay Registry to the Prior Art Database or feed directly to the USPTO. Screenwriters routinely submit their manuscripts. In fact, almost no studio, production company or agent will look at an unregistered script. As of about 10 years ago there were around 7,500 scripts registered each year. That should cover just about any conceivable reductionist plot line. Perhaps we can make it so that these people will have to essentially write the full works in order to establish novelty.

...at the bottom of the page:

this site is not an officially supported site. it is an incubation experiment and doesn't represent any particular strategy or policy

And you're harping over the nbsp thing? Geeeez man. Shame on the poster for hyping it up so moch too. Sure it is an interesting curiosity in how it copycat's Google, but this start page thingie is basically this:

1. MS gets tax credits for taking on students/interns

2. MS runs out of spots on actual projects so they let the students (probably unpaid interns) fill their time honing development skills doing whatever they want

3. A couple of these interns are Google fans and so use VS.NET to make a copycat site (imitation is the sincerest form of flattery perhaps.

(and possibly in the future)

4. MS likes the idea and either gets their permament, paid staff to add "spit and polish", or they hire the students on contract for a short time to complete the work.

It looks to me to be Microsoft up to the same old tricks they've practised for years. MS is looking for the next "Solitare" that comes from a couple of junior staff/unpaid interns from which they can extract maximum benefits.

BTW--being an "incubator" project I'm sure it hasn't gone through much of a regression test, but according to the lead developer's blog they DID consously put effort into making it "firefox compatible". Curious goal if you ask me--I would've personally set the goal to be "standards compliant" instead. They probably didn't do that because then it wouldn't work well enough with standards-challenged IE.

Phew! I thought they meant the other one.

Like, the one that writes dialogue that actors get credit for.

They should. George Lucas quit the MPAA after they tried to fine him for not putting opening credits in Star Wars. It didn't seem to hurt his career!

This is completely wrong. The MPAA is a collective trade and bargaining group of major studios (read a brief history here. It was originally created to deal with protectionist issues overseas. Now it is the collective "face" of the studios who set standards for everything from how loud a trailer is allowed to be (notice, for example that they don't blow your ears out like they used to) to self-policing through the use of a rating system. It is also a lobbying group, which regularly responds to legislative concerns such as violence in movies and works to get favorable legislation such as the DCMA passed. When the MPAA acts or speaks, it is the collective voice of "the Hollywood studios", the "majors", or "the industry".

The MPAA also acts as a "shield" behind which to hide unpopular actions, just as the recording industry hides behind the RIAA when suing people. If Warner Bros. sued a musician for downloading their music, people would boycott WB. But because it's under the auspices of "RIAA", it deflects attention from the member companies.

From what I've heard, George Lucas quit the DGA (Director's Guild of America) after the credits fiasco in Star Wars. The DGA is a union (umm, I mean a "guild") that represents the interests of directors specifically in negociating with the studios. It has a standard agreement with its signatories (the large studios) that includes stuff like minimum wages, credit determination, etc.

Other film industry unions and guilds include the WGA (writer's guild), IATSE (cartoonists, grips, etc.), SAG (Actors guild), etc. Each of the Unions typically have their own awards ceremony each year with members voting for them. The MPAA sends screeners to these voters because they want to win early awards like the WGA award, which creates buzz for the Oscars.

Finally there is AMPAS, the "Academy" that people are always thanking when they win an Oscar. The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences is like an honorary organization of filmmakers. They are the ones who put on the Oscars every year.

If those people decided to jump ship and form their own movie collective, they could. Easily. Hell, many of them ALREADY have their own production companies and\or studios. Sure the MPAA technically controls distribution - but do you see any of the huge theatre chains saying 'no' to the latest Redford or Scorsese flick

I think this is a misunderstanding of how movies get made. The production companies that you allude to owned by these directors or actors typically have what's called a "development deal" with the MPAA member companies-- ie, the studios. In the studio system, a production company gets development money, which pays for a production company's offices, development executives, etc. in exchange for a "first look" at any scripts being developed by the production company. In fact, when a script is bought in the first place by the production company, it's typically paid for by the studio. It's rare for a production company to have it's own money. Self-financed production companies are out there, but they're rare. A production company with its own money is called a "buyer" -- they compete with studios to buy scripts...

When a production company that has a deal with the studio finally makes a movie, the films are usually 100% funded by the studio that is going to distribute it.

In short-- it usually works something like this. Bob the Celebrity has a first look deal with a studio. The studio gives Bob money to run his company. Bob meets with writer's agents to solicit "spec" (speculative) scripts. They also develop their own ideas in-house. They might also be looking at comic books or video games or listening to pitch

It's not a "standard contract". If you want to see a standard contract, go look at what the Writers Guild recommends. Or you can get an agent who agrees with the Guilds' policies towards writers

Ben Kingsley is an actor who says lines written by other people. In the case of Searching for Bobby Fischer, the book was written by Fred Waitzkin and the screenplay by Steven Zallion.

Attributing movie dialogue to the actors who say them is like giving Ellen Feiss credit for writing OS X. Please give credit where it's due.

You can if your Grandfather was smart enough to copyright and register his story treatment with the WGA before showing it to Disney executives, like this guy was.

HOWTO: here.

But he was right, it seems!!

blakespot

Take a look at the Writer's Guild website for more info.

This link shows the election results.

Take a look at the Writer's Guild website for more info.

This link shows the election results.

No you won't, cause you cannot libel the dead. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09210a.htm, http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/specials/w eblines/533.html, http://www.wga.org/WrittenBy/0401/essay.html,http: //www.freeadvice.com/law/5765us.htm,http://codoh.o rg/bbs/messages/1649.html as just a few references.

As some of you may be aware, in Hollywood there is an impending strike between screenwriters, represented by the Writers Guild of America, west (WGAw) and the film companies, represented by the Alliance of Motion Pictures and Television Producers (AMPTP) curiously made up of the same companies you'll find in such organizations as the MPAA.

One of the issues the writers are disputing with the megacorporations is over the Internet. Let me quote the WGA's report on the negotiations:

The AMPTP... have also proposed that for the reuse of motion pictures and television programming on the Internet they would pay nothing for any product produced before May of 2001. They expect to get them for free.

That's right. The film companies want sell movies on the Internet. They want to profit from it. But they're intending to compensate the writers of the movie....NOTHING. Sound familiar?

As some of you may be aware, in Hollywood there is an impending strike between screenwriters, represented by the Writers Guild of America, west (WGAw) and the film companies, represented by the Alliance of Motion Pictures and Television Producers (AMPTP) curiously made up of the same companies you'll find in such organizations as the MPAA.

One of the issues the writers are disputing with the megacorporations is over the Internet. Let me quote the WGA's report on the negotiations:

The AMPTP... have also proposed that for the reuse of motion pictures and television programming on the Internet they would pay nothing for any product produced before May of 2001. They expect to get them for free.

That's right. The film companies want sell movies on the Internet. They want to profit from it. But they're intending to compensate the writers of the movie....NOTHING. Sound familiar?

With the threat of writers and actors strikes looming this year, the real drama surrounding drama pilot season is the cliffhanger of whether any of the projects will be produced in time to launch the 2001-02 season on schedule in the fall.

Check out the Writer's Guild of America home page. It has page after page of details about the current negotiations to avoid an upcoming strike.