Tuesday, November 13, 2007

The Strike


I am naturally averse to unions. I am. I dislike big groups of like-minded people who all seem to swim the same way.

This could be because I'm not like anyone else in my family and I like it that way just fine.

So I was distrustful of the Writers Guild of America strike. Surely these writers are making a gazillion dollars already. Surely they aren't squabbling over cents here and there.

But I started to think about why I was opposing it. Does someone who makes more than me deserve to be paid less just because they already have more money? No.

After doing a little research, I realized that these writers aren't rich. They are writers. They are probably paid better than Joe Freelancer, but they are good at their jobs. If you've laughted at a sitcom or cried at a late night drama, it's because of the writers.

And they deserve to be paid for their work. Non-writers don't always understand, afterall, most people don't create something and then expect that thing to continue to pay them. But that's what writers do. They create a script, a plan, an outline, a guide.... and then it's used to create something in a different medium. It moves from paper to real life. So when it moves from real life to the internet, that is a continuation. Someone is using that original piece - words on paper - to make money.

At the moment it's not a lot of money. But it will be. Watch this video to learn about what happened the last time writers reached this crossroad. They didn't stand up and to date they have collectively lost MILLIONS.





Or, we can break it down into numbers:



I support them. I hope you do too.

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