The strike is upon us. The New York Times reports that just a few hours ago, writers and teamsters declared their intent to embark on the first industry-wide strike in almost twenty years.
The writers’ union said it would inform its members no later than Friday afternoon as to when the strike would begin, according to a person who attended a union gathering Thursday night at the Los Angeles Convention Center.
The leaders of the Writers Guild of America West and the Writers Guild of America East were expected to order their roughly 12,000 members covered by a contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers to stop work and be assigned picket duty when the strike begins.
Although this has been looming for some time, that it has actually happened will come as a shock to many consumers who figured everything would resolve itself. Unfortunately, resolution did not come and the strike is now very much a reality.
The strike call follows more than three months of contentious negotiations. Ultimately, the two sides gridlocked over the writers’ insistence on a sharp increase in their residuals payments for the re-use of movies and shows on DVDs and on new payments for the distribution of such works on the Internet, over cell phones and elsewhere. Producers refused to boost the DVD payments and rebuffed demands related to electronic distribution, arguing that industry economics and still-shifting technology made accommodation impossible.
