Los Angeles Acting blog by David August: Web is Unstruck

Monday, December 10, 2007

Web is Unstruck

The studios have little to lose by stonewalling, since it's all too clear that they can win any prolonged strike. Their pockets are too deep, their weaponry too strong. But at what cost? Even many studio supporters admit that squashing the WGA after a prolonged strike would be something of a pyrrhic victory. If network TV turns into a 24-hour reality TV and game show channel, it will simply accelerate the trend of young viewers deserting the tube for the Internet.

For the writers, their best defense now is a good offense. As I've argued before, their future lies in becoming more entrepreneurial. This would also be good strategy for future strike negotiations. With the studios stuck churning out reality sludge, the barriers for entry for an outsider are lower than ever. What's to stop Google, Yahoo or Mark Cuban from striking a deal with a top TV show runner who has a proven ability to create characters and stories that would bring eyeballs to the Internet?

and the LA Times also wrote on Saturday:

With no fresh episodes, networks stand to lose tens of millions in ad revenue as they are forced to give free commercial time to sponsors to make up for a shortfall in ratings. They could also see a further exodus of disaffected younger viewers to the Internet and other forms of entertainment, eroding the networks' market share

(emphases added, from Los Angeles Times). This echoes two things Bob Fraser said in June (and had earlier said in 2005): the [TV] audience has left the building and the entertainment industry really belongs to the entrepreneurial artist.