The sorry state of streaming residuals shows why SAG and the WGA are striking.
As someone who works in the film and TV industry, let me go ahead and say whatever you do in America, whatever industry: you’re undervalued, underpaid, and your wealthy executives are getting fat on your hard work while you starve.
You spelled capitalism wrong. Social market economy makes it a bit better - but yeah earnings through work and capital gains are extremely off balance right now.
As someone in America I’m not undervalued, underpaid, or starving. Maybe you should stick to speaking for your own industry.
Keep licking that boot.
I don’t have to, I can afford my own
Found the executive
🤭 it’s funny because in my history of working in engineering, the guy (rarely gal) with this attitude is consistently the least effective or useful. I presume the same applies here, based on a number of factors you’ve politely lain before us all.
The attitude of “fuck them, I got mine” is a good way to get people to hate you. I hope you’re okay with that.
“I’m not struggling so therefore no one else is struggling”
Are you for fucking real?
That’s exactly the myopic thinking that put us in this situation, so you shouldn’t be surprised to find this person.
The thing is, he doesnt necessarily earn a decent wage…thats the real kicker.
Read the first comment though… it suggested that literally everyone is struggling
It’s fucking hyperbole. Obviously not literally everyone is underpaid (such as but not limited to CEOs). Like, if ya make a comment like what I responded to it comes off as a snarky and you will get shit on for it.
Ok but you attacked someone for saying that they personally aren’t suffering, even though they weren’t suggesting they speak for everyone either… unlike the other comment
I only said people are starving because some are, and it’s avoidable. But everyone in America is grossly underpaid compared to executive pay and corporate wealth.
“Um actually 🤓 ☝️”
Have some sense to not post something like this when you are aware of the plight of the average worker in America even if you are in the minority as a tech worker
(I’m also a tech worker)
Honestly even tech workers are not paid enough relative to executives. Shit is crazy out here.
And then lawyers be making like $1mil a year.
Engineer here - we’re undervalued too. We just happen to have more clout in the workplace at the moment, and so more individual bargaining power. That can change on a dime, though.
If that changes I’ll figure out the new way. Wouldn’t be the first time, don’t figure it’s gonna be the last.
What do you mean by the new way?
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I don’t really have issues there, either. I actually get in hot water if I don’t take at least 6 weeks of PTO a year, and the maximum is unlimited so long as my work gets done.
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And here we have the typical “Fuck you, I got mine” attitude. How lovely.
Bootlicker confirmed
Found the CEO…
If your CEO has money, you’re probably undervalued and underpaid. It’s how the incentive structure works.
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Hahaha, 😅 uhh you most certainly are, buddy! Hate to burst your bubble and bring you back down to reality… I know you hate it when we take the binkiboot out of your mouth to let your breath for a second, but you got to give it up eventually… you’re too old for that now…
Better they uploaded it on torrent and asked for donations
I’m a former musician and record label employee who’s been screaming “told you so” for years. I stopped paying attention to the pittance I get in streaming revenue because it impacts my life that little.
I hope the writers get what they’re owed, but don’t hold your fucking breath
I don’t understand how streaming isn’t just considered syndication. It seems like a dictionary definition of what it was, even if it didn’t exist when syndication agreements were made.
It’s a rerun of a show on a separate channel/platform. And the writers/actors should get the agreed revenue for it the same as if it were on TMC, nick at night or Netflix b
Indeed. an impartial judge wouldn’t let studios split hairs over words like this but as long as they’re appointed by politicians, they will side with whoever has the deeper pockets, because that’s what’s required for a continuing bright career.
You should support the actor’s and writer’s strike. That’s what I’ll keep bringing up here, do what you can to make things change.
What can we do? I don’t live by anywhere they are striking.
It’s small, but just talking about it and send a message of support on social media is appreciated.
Maybe they’ll even actually see it.
There’s a donation fund to help the strike continue. The writers aren’t calling for a boycott yet.
https://mashable.com/article/how-to-support-wga-writer-strike
I definitely will donate, thank you friend :)
refuse to watch, read, play, or otherwise engage with anything created by an AI… we just make it a fundamental demand… we don’t want any of that shit…
Donate to the entertainment community fund
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Actually boycotting ironically hurts in this situation.
Writers and actors are encouraging people to keep watching and taking about shows & movies because that underscores the value they bring and are trying to get recognition for, ultimately bolstering their case.
Keep watching anything and everything folks!
When are people going to understand that what you know, what you can do, value, truth, integrity and love have absolutely nothing to do with how much you get paid? The world makes much more sense if you stop assuming being a good person makes you rich. The opposite is true, being a psychopath is far more profitable.
If we placed the appropriate value on the people who reduced suffering the most, there would be statues of Edward Jenner everywhere and he would have been the richest person in the world.
There is an inverse relation between the wage a job pays and the contribution to society that the job makes, with a few exceptions like doctors. The highest paying jobs are very often parasites on society. This seems to originate from the Calvinist work ethic where meaningful work is its own reward.
~ paraphrased from David Graeber, Bullshit Jobs
Most doctors aren’t paid enough either, and the supply of doctors is kept low to keep the price of care high, the cost of becoming a doctor is inflated by, among other things, the amount of residency programs available is limited making them very expensive to get into.
The whole thing is engineered to extract wealth, not functionally deliver a supply of goods and services to those who do work.
with a few exceptions like doctors
Even then… Elective plastic surgeons make far more than virologists or ER techs. Radiologists can earn more by owning an MRI machine and charging for its use than by billing to interpret the machine’s results. Hospital administrators at big clinics earn more than staff physicians. Insurance company admins can earn more than doctors. Shareholders in medical firms earn most of all.
The fact that I had to look up who Edward Jenner was, and that I (unfortunately) immediately know who Kylie or Bruce Jenner is (to use the same last name), cynically proves your point.
Nurses and firemen should drive lambos, bankers should eat scraps. But alas, human nature rewards greed, but expects humanity.
“It’s Free Money” ~ Studio Executives
Gross. Writers should be paid fairly.*
Edit: Previously read “Shame on Neflix”. See thoughtful reply below.
While I don’t disagree with the general state, I don’t see how it’s Netflix. They didn’t produce or create Suits, nor were the initial broadcaster, so the contracts were set long before Netflix
How streaming doesn’t count as broadcasting is a tad too convenient for the studio to not be a deliberate loophole. Even when the language is tested in court the lobbyism favors the deep pockets asking to split hairs clearly in bad faith.
Ha, I didn’t understand that, but now I do. Thanks. And agreed that the general state is a shame. Writers deserve to be paid.
This is ignoring the history of how writers traditionally got paid. Residuals made it so that the longer the writer was in the game the more they were supported by the raft of their body of work similar to authors. Residuals were originally fought for by another strike ages past so that a writer was paid a little bit every time an episode was aired as a re-run .
Now re-runs barely exist because of on demand and writers for streaming get paid peanuts. Successful writers have to write like demons and face burning themselves out just to get by. All because the streaming platforms can technically say “it’s not a rerun”. We as a society respect creative IP… Until that creator is on the platform of industry content streaming because a narrow definition of what counts. If it were any other platform like a network it wouldn’t matter who originally contacted it- if you air it a writer gets a share. So Streaming platforms get a massive business advantage over everyone else by screwing over writers.
YouTubers get paid on a more respectable model for the content they produce on these same principles than industry writers.
What a weird measure of time for a show. It’s not a song. Why not use something more suitable, like views?
Edit: it’s 50 million hours. If each episode is about an hour long, then that’s about 50 million views. If there are 10 episodes per season, then that’s 5 million viewers per season.
It’s semantics, but the equivalent for a song would be plays. I think the problem with using views or plays for a metric like this is that they don’t account for people that take in the entire piece of media. It considers people that accidentally click an episode and then close it after some seconds, and people who watch an episode from start to finish, to be the same. One of those people are going to see a lot more ads than the other, thus making the company more money. Just my hypothesis tho.
in case you weren’t paying attention, musicians get paid shit too
I wasn’t implying they get paid better. The comparison to views vs plays was done to address the “It’s not a song” comment. How did you get that implication from my message?
“suitable” ha
If all content (all content) was paid for by tax dollars, it would not only be ad free, but there wouldn’t be huge companies standing in-between the artist and the consumer as far as getting the artists paid. And it wouldn’t cost that much. Like less than what you pay for having all streaming services simultaneously.
But imagine the controversy a government would receive broadcasting various kinds of content. People deride the BBC as a mouthpiece of whichever party is in power despite immense work making it as impartial as possible
Some years ago the BBC itself ordered a study by Nottingham University which did show that the BBC consistently was pro-whatever-party-was-in-Government, so not being pro a specific party but switching from one of the parties of the power duopoly in Britain to the other as they alternated in Government (funnilly enough giving very little airtime to the smaller leftwing-ecologist party and tons of airtime to smaller far-right parties like UKIP).
However that’s about the News, not the rest.
Mind you the BBC also does in it’s contents invariably beautify the view about certain slices of British Society and British History but that’s the same as the 100% private content producers in the US also do, so it doesn’t seem to be an explicitly “Public TV” thing.
I’m unfortunately not very familiar with the BBC other than Top Gear and some of their fabulous documentaries. Thank you for the insight!
Well, I lived in the UK for over a decade, having immigrated there from Portugal via The Netherlands, and was quite shocked after having been there long enough to start paying attention to Politics and Society as a whole, that my image of it that was formed when I was a kid in Portugal in the 80s was very different from the reality I found on the ground in the late 00s and beyond.
There is a huge “keeping up with appearences” strain in (mainly English, worse the higher the social class) British Society that would be seen as hypocrisy in, for example a place like The Netherlands, and that has a huge impact on the BBC because it’s always controlled (both via seats in its Board and those chosen as Editors) by people who come from the english upper classes, so you end up with the kind of things that are important in “Opinion Forming” of the Public (i.e. the News, politically relevant documentaries and such) being carefully managed to produce the “right opinion” (“rightness” being defined by that slice of English society that dominate the BBC’s Board and Editors, so for example they’re unabashedly pro-Monarchy).
Also the UK has Censorship, in the form of what’s called a D-Notice, where the Government can stop the publishing of certain stories if deemed “against the national interest”, plus things like Libel Legislation are extremelly broad and seem designed to stop whistleblowing, to the point that for example some years ago an Ukranian Oligarch sued in the UK an Ukranian newssite which had denounced actions of his in Ukraine, and the case was accepted by the British courts because “the website could be accessed from Britain”.
The result is that the creative and apolitical programs from the BBC are often top-notch whilst the rest is Propaganda, elegantly done and not at all in-your-face (mainly through half-throughts, false dichotomies, uneven selection of speakers for different sides and selective picking of things to report) but still done to “make opinion” not merelly “inform”.
Mind you, this is not just the BBC, though it does manage to be worse in this than the other TV channels in the UK.
Unsurprisingly the British Press is the Press least trusted by the locals in Europe.
Really interesting information! It’s a shame that they’re not as trusted as I thought in Europe, I revere their short-wave long range news broadcast worldwide. It’s an absolute tragedy Associated Press doesn’t do the same
I think having all art that can find an audience funded this way would help this issue more than hurt it.
And then we get into the weeds of how do we decide who gets grants? I’m a fairly enthusiastic watcher of Linus Tech Tips, and he discusses that the entertainment tax grants the Canadian Government gives out are so complex that only the largest companies (the ones who do not need the grants) can hire people to navigate the bureaucracy for the tax breaks. Is choosing artists going to be an America’s Got Talent competition? A random draw? What source do we get viewer/listener numbers from?
I would love to resume the federal government’s artist programs like under the New Deal, but the reality is that our culture is more niche and divided than ever. Rather than swing and jazz being unquestionably dominant for music in the days of yore, now we’d have to check and verify every SoundCloud rapper, YouTube artist, and pop-megastar.
Some of your questions are covered in the video I linked. Others are kind of indirectly answered.
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Lol. Lmao even. Have you never heard what happens to government funded research papers?
tell me you didn’t watch the video without telling me you didn’t watch the video
Jesus Christ, if my tax dollars were going to the absolute garbage content that’s being currently produced I would personally run for office to repeal that legislation.
And if the quality is so low when billions are on the line, I am terrified of what we would get when it’s government funded. Even now, you don’t need to look far to see how poorly our taxes are spent. Look into how construction companies take advantage of government contacts.
Then why aren’t you running?
Sounds like you oppose PBS? no? Or the taxes the FCC pays to media corps that come out of your paycheck?
When can I expect you to announce you candidacy?
Go run, big boy. See how many people agree with your ideology. I dare ya.
Government funded art has a tendency of being loyal to their patrons, i.e. the government, which stifles the very essence of the art itself. All content is not for every body, due to taste, and interest. You’re also talking about doing away with advertising, hahahahahahahaha.
You need to watch the film Cradle Will Rock if that’s what you think.
You should watch it anyway because it’s a great movie, but it’s also based on a true story about people getting government funding and using it to put on a socialist musical, which made the government freak out and shut the show down. That is what would stifle art- not artists being loyal, artists not being allowed to dissent.
Such a great movie. So many things to think about after watching.
Sadly whenever I tried to get people to see it, they took the government side. Spending my High School years in Utah was horribly stifling.
You are talking to yourself.
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they are not shill or bootlicker. they’re not backing up anybody but themselves. “if i was paid one time for my job why would they get more” the same mentality with “homeless people should just get a job” and “why would i pay for others Healthcare”. typical selfish american.
No, it’s just ridiculous that these well-off Hollywood writers are demanding special treatment. Practically every other profession works on a salaried basis, in practically every corner of the world.
They aren’t demanding that their colleagues who work behind the scenes like the set crews, editors and support staff get residuals.
No, their motive is entirely selfish and they come off extremely entitled when they place themselves above the rest of the people who are responsible for creating a product.
Well duh, the lower your incomr is compared to others the less of life’s pleasures their able to afford. If everyone else starts doing better then costs increase as demand rises and now I can’t afford shit.
Everyone’s paid shit these days it seems. I feel like teachers/healthcare workers/IT people need more raises too. Idk why we’re so focused on just writers…plenty more important people out there getting shit pay… especially teachers in America who have to deal with so much bullshit.
Solidarity, a rising tide floats all boats. The enemy is not at your side.
The writers are on strike at the moment. It’s really weird that you don’t think that’s of interest.
Because I put things in tiers of importance in my head and theres jobs that rank wayyyyy above writers that need our rally cry way more in my opinion.
De-valuaing others de-values yourself. Divided we beg for pittances from employers and the owners.
You know what you’re right. Thanks for the insight. I apologize for that comment.
I forgive you. I also appreciate your sense of self-reflection.
Assuming the current all you can watch flat fee model is unsustainable, how do you think a model like videogame (Steam, Epic, etc…) would be perceived? Lower monthly sub. Originals are included. Wanna watch something else? You can watch 2 episodes to start. If you wanna continue buy the season. Sort of like videogames where there are demos.
Netflix got 3 billion from one show, plenty sustainable to me.
You know Netflix doesn’t work that way right?
enlighten me
You said they got 3 billion as if they got 3 billion dollars. In reality Netflix paid for the rights to distribute a show and paid for the infrasture to stream 3 billion minutes of it in hopes that people keep renewing their subscription. It definitely made them a lot of money, but not 3 billion.
3 billion minutes watched does not equal 3 billion dollars paid to Netflix.
If those 3 billion minutes were watched non-stop 24/7 for the paying subscribers it would make at least $486,111.11 for Netflix assuming the subscribers paid for the cheapest subscription at ~$7. That’s still a lot of money, but they also pay for their own upkeep, servers and much more.
I know most people don’t have the cheapest subscription, and also that they don’t watch 24/7. But it puts into perspective that Netflix doesn’t earn that much on one series.
To add: they also make their own shows and productions and they pay to put shows up on their service that are not their own productions. I don’t know what a show like suits will cost to be put on Netflix, since they don’t produce the show, but I’d imagine that’s not cheap. And I guess the writers get a percentage of the money earned on the selling of those rights (depending on the contract they have with the original studio)
And the paying of the writers is in the hands of the studio selling the rights, not Netflix.
Yes, I agree with you. I’m saying assuming. I don’t think they’ll go… You know what? You’re right… We’re gonna start paying more. Something will have to give. I’m saying is there a diff business model?
3,000,000,000 * $15 (assumed Netflix plan/user) = $45,000,000,000
Damn! Just for one show?!
and no royalties? $3000, would be few, even for only one professional writer.
I’m watching suits right now… On Netflix.
I’d heard that the Duchess of Sussex used to be an actress, but I’d never seen her in anything. It was a little strange at first to see her playing a paralegal.
For me it was a little strange seeing an unknown actress playing a paralegal become some popular public figure in the UK.
You mean c-tier acres Meghan Markle?
Then you’re a part of the problem. Supporting billionaire corporations making stockholders richer.
Me too, as I type this. Getting to the end of season 3 for the first time!
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You should always care when labor goes against the plutocrats. And you should support it. That you don’t like the quality of the results is a product of said plutocrats putting chains on them.
Here’s a thread that puts it well:
Of course. It’s all about the bottom dollar. No gives two shits about how good something is.
Personally I have a music background, I love music and am a capable guitar player, I’ve studied theory and listened to everything (just about) under the sun. From bluegrass to polka. I like it all.
So when I hear the studio release of paparazzi by Lady Gaga I hear mediocre cookie cutter albeit will produced music. However I once saw a YouTube video of Lady Gaga performing the song on piano live and it was absolutely amazing she is a true musician. But that’s not what sells the studio version of the song is what sells. Nobody’s going to buy Lady Gaga playing the piano while singing. At least not at that point in her career.
So if that version of paparazzi sells let’s make 9,000 other paparazzi’s and sell them. That’s what makes money and everybody else can go to screw themselves.
I’ve literally only known about the strike bc it keeps getting mentioned on here. There’s just so many options of entertainment.
IP Laws need to change: Melancholy Elephants is a great Hugo Award winning short story about this train of thought.
