SAG-AFTRA(actors) Strike

[Forsher]

Again, the substitution value of Youtube over TV is a bit of a distraction from the fact that advertising to people watching Mr Beast in 2023 is enormously different to advertising to people who are watching... uh, The Fresh Prince of Be Air in 1993... but here's a think piece about the substitution value of Youtube and what it means for the strike.

A strange argument considering the decline being opined is of traditional linear TV accessed through cable, not TV shows more broadly.

Literally no-one is talking about that. What are you even on about?

[Nilokeras]

A strange argument considering the decline being opined is of traditional linear TV accessed through cable, not TV shows more broadly.

Literally no-one is talking about that. What are you even on about?

Yet a much more clear technological danger has been absent from much of the discourse around the writers’ strike. That is the rise and rise of user generated content, or UGC – in other words, video made for platforms like TikTok and YouTube. UGC consumes an ever-higher quantity of audience attention, particularly among younger and more diverse audiences.

The central plank of that article's argument is about how YouTube and TikTok are eating TV's lunch, while the figures show that broadcast TV is the thing that's declining - TV consumed via streaming platforms is doing fine, suggesting that the two media are not mutually exclusive.

[Ameriganastan]

Just a little history lesson: The last time these guys quit working, it sparked a boom of reality TV that resulted in TV cancer like those Real Housewives shows.

You know, fun trivia for anyone still supporting these guys. I mean if you want more shows like that...

[Terminus Station]

I hope the writers win. People should be paid appropriately for the work they do, and companies low-balling everyone in the industry to create artificially low salaries should not be tolerated in a capitalist system.

[Forsher]

Literally no-one is talking about that. What are you even on about?

Yet a much more clear technological danger has been absent from much of the discourse around the writers’ strike. That is the rise and rise of user generated content, or UGC – in other words, video made for platforms like TikTok and YouTube. UGC consumes an ever-higher quantity of audience attention, particularly among younger and more diverse audiences.

The central plank of that article's argument is about how YouTube and TikTok are eating TV's lunch, while the figures show that broadcast TV is the thing that's declining - TV consumed via streaming platforms is doing fine, suggesting that the two media are not mutually exclusive.

So there's nothing strange at all. You just think he's using a false premise due to bad facts.

[Nilokeras]

Just a little history lesson: The last time these guys quit working, it sparked a boom of reality TV that resulted in TV cancer like those Real Housewives shows.

You know, fun trivia for anyone still supporting these guys. I mean if you want more shows like that...

'Can We Really Blame Trump (and the Reality Boom) on the 2007 Writers Strike?' by Emily St. James, Vanity Fair

The beginning of the first writers strike in 15 years brought with it a reheated piece of received wisdom: The 100-day WGA strike of 2007–08 brought about the explosion in reality TV. It’s an idea that seems correct on its face. But I was on the TV beat for a local California paper at the time, and in reality, there’s very little truth to the idea. (Disclosure: I have since become a WGA member myself, thanks to a former job at Vox, and am currently on strike from my job writing television.)

First, let’s acknowledge what’s true about this idea. Every time there’s a major entertainment union strike, TV networks grab the cheapest programming they can find and slap it on the air. The 1988 writers strike, for instance, saw the TV networks papering over their thin fall lineups with sports, unscripted programming like the then new Cops, and political advertisements for the 1988 election.

The same happened during the 2007–08 strike. As original programming began drying up in the early months of 2008, networks started filling their lineups with programming from their sister cable networks (Dexter on CBS; Monk on NBC), game shows, and reality programming.

Yet if you look at the top 30 programs of the 2007–08 season, they seem barely different from the top 30 programs of the 2006–07 season or the 2008–09 season. If you’re looking for evidence of new hit shows put on air to thwart the strike, you’re left only with Fox’s “will you tell embarrassing truths about yourself to win money” game show Moment of Truth, which became a hit largely because it aired after American Idol. It landed at 13th in the 2007–08 season; by August 2009, it had ended its run.

Across the 32 shows in the top 30 for that year—there was a three-way tie for 30th—just 12 are unscripted, and that’s including multiple installments of American Idol and Dancing With the Stars (which take up the top five spots). What’s more, the unscripted shows in the top 30 are mostly mainstays like Survivor, 60 Minutes, and Sunday Night Football. The other 20 shows are scripted series like Grey’s Anatomy, CSI, and Desperate Housewives, all of which held firm in the top 30 despite taking several months off for the strike.

Almost all of the most popular reality shows of the 2007–08 season had been on the air for several years at that point. Survivor debuted in 2000, while American Idol launched in 2002 and Dancing with the Stars in 2005. If we’re counting 60 Minutes as a reality show (and we should), then it debuted on September 24,1968, a mere 14,286 days before the strike began on November 5, 2007. Needless to say, the strike didn’t have much to do with the popularity of any of these shows; they were already popular and remained so for several seasons thereafter.

...

You may notice that many popular reality show franchises debuted in the 2000s. The decade was not really the first for what we think of as “reality television,” as unscripted series have been around in some form or another since TV’s inception. But the first half of the decade saw major new reality franchises launching semi-regularly, along with flash-in-the-pan sensations like 2003’s Joe Millionaire. While it’s true that networks accelerated development of reality TV shows in response to the strike, many of those shows were already in development because reality TV was—and remains—really, really popular.

Notably, the mid-2000s is also when lots of cable networks who hadn’t previously aired their own programming got in on the reality game, realizing how cheaply some of it (though not all of it!) can be produced. Just a few weeks before the 2007–08 strike, E! debuted Keeping Up with the Kardashians, which went on to become a sensation. That cyclical trend, which was already in motion before the strike, likely contributed to the “reality TV exploded because of the strike” myth.

In truth, the years immediately following the strike were some of the most creatively fertile periods for scripted programming in TV history. From Mad Men to Breaking Bad to Community to Game of Thrones, the late 2000s and early-to-mid 2010s saw tons of terrific TV shows hit their creative peaks. Cable networks like FX, AMC, and USA greenlit challenging shows unlike any others in TV history, and streaming platforms began programming their first series.

So why does this myth persist? For one thing, it might be a tacit acknowledgement that the craftspeople who make reality television often have far fewer labor union protections than those who make scripted TV—if they have any protections at all. The people who make these reality shows are just as talented and necessary to their programs as people who make scripted shows, but they continue to be vastly undervalued and underpaid.

Much of that might be due to another reason this myth persists: We still think of too much reality TV as cheap, disposable junk. Yet this ignores the reality of how audiences actually consume TV. There have been unscripted shows as long as there has been television. Some of them succeed; most of them don’t. The best are terrific; the worst are terrible. It’s the same as any other type of art.

“Do you want networks to make more bad reality shows?” is a boogeyman, the same way “It’s time for scripts to be written by AI” is. Both ideas subtly prop up the studios’ party line by pretending that Hollywood’s labor unions should be grateful for the protections they have, and not ask for anything more.

These arguments also ignore all the human labor that goes into reality TV—or AI language learning models. Labor that isn’t protected by labor unions, but should be. The real lesson behind the myth of the 2007–08 strike isn’t about how writers should be scared; it’s about how all of us should be wondering how supposedly “cheap” TV got so inexpensive in the first place.

[Nilokeras]

Yet a much more clear technological danger has been absent from much of the discourse around the writers’ strike. That is the rise and rise of user generated content, or UGC – in other words, video made for platforms like TikTok and YouTube. UGC consumes an ever-higher quantity of audience attention, particularly among younger and more diverse audiences.

The central plank of that article's argument is about how YouTube and TikTok are eating TV's lunch, while the figures show that broadcast TV is the thing that's declining - TV consumed via streaming platforms is doing fine, suggesting that the two media are not mutually exclusive.

So there's nothing strange at all. You just think he's using a false premise due to bad facts.

He and you, by extension. It's a strange bit of anti-union agitprop that isn't particularly convincing - holding a flashlight under your chin and whispering 'user created content' while eliding the differences between platform and omitting figures.

[Forsher]

So there's nothing strange at all. You just think he's using a false premise due to bad facts.

He and you, by extension. It's a strange bit of anti-union agitprop that isn't particularly convincing - holding a flashlight under your chin and whispering 'user created content' while eliding the differences between platform and omitting figures.

As I have explained, my actual argument really has nothing to do with "people aren't watching television" (your representation of it) but "people aren't watching television at someone else's beck and call and therefore they're harder to advertise to and that change in advertising affects what kinds of movies can be made". Hell, shifting to entirely ad-less platforms like Netflix just makes my actual point stronger and gives quite an interesting perspective to how keen all these platforms have been to develop ad supported tiers (it's like they have an advertising problem!).

As to whether he's an anti-union agitprop. I really fucking doubt it... have a look at that website, which he founded. It is the smuggest fucking leftwing website you've ever had the misfortune to meet, even if it also loves sponsored content. And I do mean smug. It's unbearable. Particularly their cartoonist. However, the more relevant thing vis a vis anti union agitprop is that the website is leftwing. But, again, I warn you, you need a tolerance for smugness.

As to this article, I would, in particular, suggest that the figures I gave you yesterday borderline contradict the figures that he supplies:

In fact research agency Nielsen’s flagship Gauge chart now has YouTube as the single biggest channel in the US, with 8.1% of total viewing, meaningfully ahead of Netflix on 6.9%, and more than twice third-place Hulu on 3.3%. Perhaps more troubling again is the trend line. When the Gauge chart debuted in August of last year, Netflix had a handy lead over YouTube, meaning the UGC channel overtook its more conventional counterpart in a matter of months, even before the strike came along.

You will note that these figures don't relate to youth audiences from New Zealand (what I gave you yesterday) but, presumably, all audiences in the US. And you will further note that they demonstrate that, in fact, Youtube/UGC is now beating Streaming Video On Demand when it wasn't previously.

Of course, have SVOD channels lost audience? He does not say. But it doesn't matter to his point.

[Ifreann]

Whether you like it or not the billionaires are absolutely going to try and replace pretty much everything with AI. It's way cheaper long term than relying on human labor.

I wish AI would just be unplugged. If I could do it I would.

The AI isn't the problem.

---

Just a little history lesson: The last time these guys quit working, it sparked a boom of reality TV that resulted in TV cancer like those Real Housewives shows.

You know, fun trivia for anyone still supporting these guys. I mean if you want more shows like that...

The fact that television isn't very good without writers is one more reason to support the writers.

[James_xenoland]

Taking a big risk here.. I'm not sure what they can even threaten with.. No more writing? That wouldn't exactly be a bad thing, looking at the current state of media and writing. I'd be scared of getting replaced with monkeys with typewriters,... and AI is only a few steps away at this point.

Didn't the last time they were on strike help give rise to reality TV?

Let's hope that is just a myth because i'm scared to think about what the current year might spawn given what we got last time.

[Forsher]

Didn't the last time they were on strike help give rise to reality TV?

Let's hope that is just a myth because i'm scared to think about what the current year might spawn given what we got last time.

See:

Just a little history lesson: The last time these guys quit working, it sparked a boom of reality TV that resulted in TV cancer like those Real Housewives shows.

You know, fun trivia for anyone still supporting these guys. I mean if you want more shows like that...

'Can We Really Blame Trump (and the Reality Boom) on the 2007 Writers Strike?' by Emily St. James, Vanity Fair

The beginning of the first writers strike in 15 years brought with it a reheated piece of received wisdom: The 100-day WGA strike of 2007–08 brought about the explosion in reality TV. It’s an idea that seems correct on its face. But I was on the TV beat for a local California paper at the time, and in reality, there’s very little truth to the idea. (Disclosure: I have since become a WGA member myself, thanks to a former job at Vox, and am currently on strike from my job writing television.)

First, let’s acknowledge what’s true about this idea. Every time there’s a major entertainment union strike, TV networks grab the cheapest programming they can find and slap it on the air. The 1988 writers strike, for instance, saw the TV networks papering over their thin fall lineups with sports, unscripted programming like the then new Cops, and political advertisements for the 1988 election.

The same happened during the 2007–08 strike. As original programming began drying up in the early months of 2008, networks started filling their lineups with programming from their sister cable networks (Dexter on CBS; Monk on NBC), game shows, and reality programming.

Yet if you look at the top 30 programs of the 2007–08 season, they seem barely different from the top 30 programs of the 2006–07 season or the 2008–09 season. If you’re looking for evidence of new hit shows put on air to thwart the strike, you’re left only with Fox’s “will you tell embarrassing truths about yourself to win money” game show Moment of Truth, which became a hit largely because it aired after American Idol. It landed at 13th in the 2007–08 season; by August 2009, it had ended its run.

Across the 32 shows in the top 30 for that year—there was a three-way tie for 30th—just 12 are unscripted, and that’s including multiple installments of American Idol and Dancing With the Stars (which take up the top five spots). What’s more, the unscripted shows in the top 30 are mostly mainstays like Survivor, 60 Minutes, and Sunday Night Football. The other 20 shows are scripted series like Grey’s Anatomy, CSI, and Desperate Housewives, all of which held firm in the top 30 despite taking several months off for the strike.

Almost all of the most popular reality shows of the 2007–08 season had been on the air for several years at that point. Survivor debuted in 2000, while American Idol launched in 2002 and Dancing with the Stars in 2005. If we’re counting 60 Minutes as a reality show (and we should), then it debuted on September 24,1968, a mere 14,286 days before the strike began on November 5, 2007. Needless to say, the strike didn’t have much to do with the popularity of any of these shows; they were already popular and remained so for several seasons thereafter.

...

You may notice that many popular reality show franchises debuted in the 2000s. The decade was not really the first for what we think of as “reality television,” as unscripted series have been around in some form or another since TV’s inception. But the first half of the decade saw major new reality franchises launching semi-regularly, along with flash-in-the-pan sensations like 2003’s Joe Millionaire. While it’s true that networks accelerated development of reality TV shows in response to the strike, many of those shows were already in development because reality TV was—and remains—really, really popular.

Notably, the mid-2000s is also when lots of cable networks who hadn’t previously aired their own programming got in on the reality game, realizing how cheaply some of it (though not all of it!) can be produced. Just a few weeks before the 2007–08 strike, E! debuted Keeping Up with the Kardashians, which went on to become a sensation. That cyclical trend, which was already in motion before the strike, likely contributed to the “reality TV exploded because of the strike” myth.

In truth, the years immediately following the strike were some of the most creatively fertile periods for scripted programming in TV history. From Mad Men to Breaking Bad to Community to Game of Thrones, the late 2000s and early-to-mid 2010s saw tons of terrific TV shows hit their creative peaks. Cable networks like FX, AMC, and USA greenlit challenging shows unlike any others in TV history, and streaming platforms began programming their first series.

So why does this myth persist? For one thing, it might be a tacit acknowledgement that the craftspeople who make reality television often have far fewer labor union protections than those who make scripted TV—if they have any protections at all. The people who make these reality shows are just as talented and necessary to their programs as people who make scripted shows, but they continue to be vastly undervalued and underpaid.

Much of that might be due to another reason this myth persists: We still think of too much reality TV as cheap, disposable junk. Yet this ignores the reality of how audiences actually consume TV. There have been unscripted shows as long as there has been television. Some of them succeed; most of them don’t. The best are terrific; the worst are terrible. It’s the same as any other type of art.

“Do you want networks to make more bad reality shows?” is a boogeyman, the same way “It’s time for scripts to be written by AI” is. Both ideas subtly prop up the studios’ party line by pretending that Hollywood’s labor unions should be grateful for the protections they have, and not ask for anything more.

These arguments also ignore all the human labor that goes into reality TV—or AI language learning models. Labor that isn’t protected by labor unions, but should be. The real lesson behind the myth of the 2007–08 strike isn’t about how writers should be scared; it’s about how all of us should be wondering how supposedly “cheap” TV got so inexpensive in the first place.

[Ifreann]

Taking a big risk here.. I'm not sure what they can even threaten with.. No more writing? That wouldn't exactly be a bad thing, looking at the current state of media and writing. I'd be scared of getting replaced with monkeys with typewriters,... and AI is only a few steps away at this point.

I'd love to hear more about your ideas for an entertainment industry without writers. Please enlighten us.

[Ameriganastan]

The fact that television isn't very good without writers is one more reason to support the writers.

Yeah, no. It just makes me hate them more for this strike.

[Ifreann]

The fact that television isn't very good without writers is one more reason to support the writers.

Yeah, no. It just makes me hate them more for this strike.

You hate them for trying to prevent a future where all of television and movies is made exclusively by the people who brought us reality TV, without any input from anyone who made anything actually good.

You sure have painted yourself into a corner here.

[Ameriganastan]

Yeah, no. It just makes me hate them more for this strike.

You hate them for trying to prevent a future where all of television and movies is made exclusively by the people who brought us reality TV, without any input from anyone who made anything actually good.

You sure have painted yourself into a corner here.

I hate them because it's their fault TV is infested with shows like that because they quit doing their jobs. And now it's happening again.

[Ifreann]

You hate them for trying to prevent a future where all of television and movies is made exclusively by the people who brought us reality TV, without any input from anyone who made anything actually good.

You sure have painted yourself into a corner here.

I hate them because it's their fault TV is infested with shows like that because they quit doing their jobs. And now it's happening again.

Nah, you're just making up excuses to avoid admitting you were wrong.

[San Lumen]

I wish AI would just be unplugged. If I could do it I would.

The AI isn't the problem.

---

Just a little history lesson: The last time these guys quit working, it sparked a boom of reality TV that resulted in TV cancer like those Real Housewives shows.

You know, fun trivia for anyone still supporting these guys. I mean if you want more shows like that...

The fact that television isn't very good without writers is one more reason to support the writers.

It’s part of it.

[Ifreann]

The AI isn't the problem.

---

The fact that television isn't very good without writers is one more reason to support the writers.

It’s part of it.

It's not. You can tell because of the other strikes in the past.

[Forsher]

It’s part of it.

It's not. You can tell because of the other strikes in the past.

You can tell by the way they're specifically talking about AI. From the OP:

On the topic of AI, the WGA wanted to “regulate use of artificial intelligence on MBA covered projects: AI can’t write or rewrite literary material; can’t be used as source material; and MBA-covered material can’t be used to train AI.” The response from the studios was a rejection of the WGA’s proposal, and then a counter offer of “annual meetings to discuss advancements in technology.”

This is a strike that's happening now. I suggest you pay attention to it.

[Ameriganastan]

I hate them because it's their fault TV is infested with shows like that because they quit doing their jobs. And now it's happening again.

Nah, you're just making up excuses to avoid admitting you were wrong.

I never think I'm wrong.

[Necroghastia]

Nah, you're just making up excuses to avoid admitting you were wrong.

I never think I'm wrong.

Really working to earn that "incompetent critic" title, huh? Why does the blame lie with the writers for being fed up with mistreatment, and not the corpos doing the mistreating? Do you act the same way with abusive relationships? If someone dresses in a revealing manner, is it their fault if they get raped and murdered?

[Cannot think of a name]

Just a little history lesson: The last time these guys quit working, it sparked a boom of reality TV that resulted in TV cancer like those Real Housewives shows.

You know, fun trivia for anyone still supporting these guys. I mean if you want more shows like that...

I addressed this already on the first page.

[Cannot think of a name]

I never think I'm wrong.

Really working to earn that "incompetent critic" title, huh? Why does the blame lie with the writers for being fed up with mistreatment, and not the corpos doing the mistreating? Do you act the same way with abusive relationships? If someone dresses in a revealing manner, is it their fault if they get raped and murdered?

He has in the past demonized people who take intimate photos for their partners and not instead the people who distribute those photos without consent, so it would track.

[Ameriganastan]

He has in the past demonized people who take intimate photos for their partners and not instead the people who distribute those photos without consent, so it would track.

That person was a fictional character on a superhero show who was out to murder a guy. Just an FYI.

[Cannot think of a name]

So there's nothing strange at all. You just think he's using a false premise due to bad facts.

He and you, by extension. It's a strange bit of anti-union agitprop that isn't particularly convincing - holding a flashlight under your chin and whispering 'user created content' while eliding the differences between platform and omitting figures.

I mean, again...Quibi.

There is this pattern in media where each thing is supposed to kill the last thing. Radio, television, cable, the internet, 'UGC'...god, is that really going to be an acronym? For fuck's sake. The reality is that each medium has adapted and absorbed itself in because each medium fills or creates its own space rather than consuming the others. Sure, television eventually supplanted the radio drama (which has found its way back into existence by the thing that was supposed to kill radio dead finally, podcasting), things have changed and adapted as the borders have shifted. But the suggestion that the existential threat to scripted television is the guy who counted to 100,000 and now bribes his friends to do stupid stunts is absurd. Youtubers/Tik-tokkers etc. have indeed carved out a niche for themselves that fills a need but it's a supplement not a replacement. What people are getting out of Succession or Yellowjackets isn't going to be met by 'lets see what happens if we drop a hatchback on to a trampoline from atop a tower.'

I watch a fuckton of Reels. Far more than I should. But I also watch a fuckton of scripted content either at the movies (where i have a subscription to the theater so it's just as easy for me to watch The Little Mermaid premiere as it was to make a last minute decision last night to watch The Machine (eh)) or the streaming channels I subscribe to. One does not supplant the other nor is my engagement the same with each.

Going back to Quibi, if Reels asked me for a single dime I'd never watch another one again. But if I add up what I'm apparently willing to pay each month for access to long form scripted programing I'd probably cry a little.

And here's the big thing, the studios aren't suffering for lack of audience but for their own over-reaches, which are not the fault of the writers and there's really no argument that it's the writers or creators that have to take the hit for their decisions, especially when the people responsible for those decisions are making more than the what the writers are asking for as individuals.

People can wax on about new media or different outlets but the bottom line is that writers, like many many professions, have been asked to do more for less by people pleading poverty and stuffing their own pockets. The WGA is in a unique position to be able to put their foot down and say "Enough" with the vain hopes that it catches on.