The treatment of writers in Hollywood always mystifies me. Without a script, there is no movie. Without a *good* script, it’s almost impossible to make a good movie. However, writers always get a raw deal despite their key contribution. Funny how it’s the opposite situation to the music industry, where the songwriters often get more royalties than performers.

Samuel, Joe: What I wished to express in my comment was that you can’t stick the remuneration of “factory workers” to a “Script Writer” (“Manager,” “Researcher” etc). whilst expressing no stance on whether the current remuneration system is good or bad. — I just thought that the fixed monthly payment that the factory worker gets just wouldn’t work for script writers (and the rest). — Indeed, as for Samuel’s argument I would agree with you …

> Actors used to get regular paychecks from studios, John
> Wayne did … Actors rebelled and wanted freedom,
> it wasn’t until the late 60’s and early 70’s that actors
> started receiving residuals…

The decline of the contract actor/studio system was certainly part of the demand for residuals, but an even bigger reason was technological.

In the heyday of movies, say the 1930’s to mid-50’s, once a movie had been through first- and second-run theaters, it was so much celluloid in a can. Residuals were basically irrelevant, because there essentially was no income after the movie had had its day on the screen, for the vast majority of films. Most of John Wayne’s movies from his prolific contract days were shown and forgotten during his lifetime.

It wasn’t until the advent of TV that the studios realized that they were sitting on a gold mine of old movies which hadn’t been shown in decades. That’s when residuals started to become an issue – the studios were making money renting movies for TV viewing, and the actors and writers wanted a cut. Even then, though, the number of times a movie would be shown was limited.

The second wave came when home video became possible with VCRs, videodisk, DVD, etc. For the first time, a movie could be sold over and over again, not just for one Monday Night Movie a year but every day in every town in America. All of a sudden people all down the chain began to view movies as ongoing day-in/day-out cash generators.

As someone who has a dog in this particular fight (I’m a burgeoning screenwriter and producer, so I’m playing both sides of the fence on this one) I’m fine with letting the market decide what my services are worth. I’m still confused as to why Intellectual Property should be treated any different than Real Property; if I buy a lot and build an apartment building on it, should I only be allowed to collect rents for 14 years per the Constitution, then anyone who wants to can use my building however they want? If I create something, then I own it, and I should be able to legally negotiate control of if and how it’s used – I can sell it complete and outright, I can create it paid hourly as a work-for-hire, I can sell first publishing rights to a magazine for an article but retain all other rights – it’s my creation, I should be able to exploit it however I want, with the given that the marketplace of buyers can also decide how it wants to compensate me (short of outright theft.) A free market works with buyers and sellers agreeing on what something is worth, be it the WGAw and AMPTP hammering out residual agreements, the studios selling their content to the marketplace, or the engineer selling his skills by the hour to the corporation. You engineers want residuals? Negotiate them! This discussion particularly belongs in Techdirt, because the underlying reality of this whole negotiation is that AMPTP doesn’t want to give up any of that juicy revenue stream that waits around the corner if/when someone figures out how to effectively monetize digital distribution of filmed content on the Internet … but the bottom line is that the WGAw will get royally screwed as usual (no condom, no KY Jelly) because they’re a eunuch who always caves in; and the fate of the AMPTP isn’t far behind because they’re still entrenched in the old way of thinking of revenue generation which is increasingly irrelevant in the digital age. Now the really important question is this: can someone explain to me how to afford a house in Bel Air as a screenwriter in the new millennium?

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I don’t think that is what he was saying at all. They are two different fields. Where software developers or web developers or graphic artists are concerned there are no royalties because this is a primarily corporate 9-5 job with steady income. The writing of a script play or book is different because it takes a while to create something of this matter that is less technical and more about relation to others enjoyment and art. My husband write and does graphics. So I have first had experience of just how different the creation for each is. Plus I have friends and family in both fields. Authors or books get royalties. I think script writer should as well. This position is different and does not have steady income. Thus royalties. Every time a book is sold or a movie is broadcast they should get a piece. If the nature of the beast changed and script writers were in a corporate office just like developers I would not think the should deserve or need royalties. Like I siad it is just the nature of the beast.

Wow.

So, first of all, obviously, this thread is OVER a decade old… I know. Lol. Still, I found the debate here VERY fascinating, enough to want to add something to it 😉

The thing that fascinated me the most? … Tons of people argued FOR residuals in entertainment, often because it was “different” than other types of work; and tons of people argued AGAINST residuals, because “[other job type] is NOT so different, and they don’t get paid repeatedly so why should [actors, screenwriters, etc]” ……….. But what I DIDN’T see, until finally within the very last FOUR posts (Calix & SkaterGirl), was the obvious THIRD (really, first!) argument, which kept coming back to my mind the whole time I was reading this thread:

Rather than each side argue that actors/writers/etc should or shouldn’t get a SMALLER piece of the massive pies… How about we argue that other job types get MORE of the massive pies they’re helping make?

No, many jobs AREN’T so terribly different than entertainment industry jobs in terms of the money-generating potential. Especially these days.

It isn’t about whether one job is harder or easier, longer or shorter, more or less steady (employee vs contract), etc.

The REAL questions it tends to come down to are actually about, one, the potential it has for making hefty profits repeatedly (especially with low overhead costs [little ongoing risk] after initial investment… a big advantage “intellectual property” projects – like movies, music, or patentable stuff – often have over most kinds of physical products, and even MORE so now that digital content is becoming more ubiquitous)… and two, the type of role you had in it (that is, how much did YOUR specific contribution add to the overall financial success of the project? Were you the inventor? The author? Anyone who could be partially credited with the very EXISTENCE of that “product,” in some integral way?). Of course, if the project isn’t designed or intended to make money, then the creator can’t and shouldn’t expect residuals – like a web app For a nonprofit, with no ads or subscriber fees (but if they ever switch from nonprofit to money-generating? Just make sure you had that in the contract!)

For example……

Somebody said here that they write articles for websites, and they just get paid 1 time and move on, and their argument was basically that everyone should accept submitting to the same pay scheme. Why?

The websites you’re contributing to (yes, even 10 years ago, but especially now) probably plaster advertisements ALL over your articles’ page, as most sites would… Maybe they even have paid subscribers… and they undoubtedly charge something when content from their websites (such as, YOUR article, if you grant them copyright terms by posting there) is requested in commercial projects (like an advertisement).

But those websites’ admins also have endless statistical data showing which articles are getting the most visitors, which article’s ads are getting the most clicks, etc. So they know EXACTLY who and what are bringing in the most eyeballs and generating the most profit for them. As such, all their statistical data also means they could easily figure out a fair way to profit-share. Advertisers pay them every time your article is viewed and/or their ad is clicked… the website can pay you a percentage of every ad-dollar generated on YOUR content page(s). Or if they’re subscriber-based, they can easily determine which authors deserve what share of the subscription pool profits each month based on whose articles cumulatively got the most traffic (to least traffic), again easily being able to equitably compensate the people (without whom their sites would be nothing) based on fair metrics.

They have costs (servers, offices, etc), so they deserve something for hosting your article on their “popular” platform, without which your article might never have been seen… And without your fascinating writing style luring in readers, the person searching that topic may have defaulted to a different website (losing the host that ad revenue and/or subscriber). So they get money from your work “perpetually” (for as long as people visit a particular article) – why SHOULDN’T you? (They can always add in caveats to keep their admin costs reasonable, like “Host will only issue checks when residuals reach at least $50” – thus not sending checks every month to an author making $3/mo in residuals… Also incentivizing more, higher quality articles!). Granted, there might be a trade-off, in that writers might make less upfront (per word or article), but they might also make more in the long-run (but all that is part of negotiating and deciding on terms).

Guess what that “residual” model would tend to do…? It incentivizes people (article writers, in this instance) to put real time, thought, and quality into their work… Because if their article is good enough (unique, or well-written, or thoroughly researched, etc), it might gain a big audience… And if it becomes popular, the writer could cash in big (now individual bloggers branch off into their own sites to do much the same thing)…

Right now, instead, most websites pay pennies per word for article writers (if that). And what does THAT incentivize? Barely (if at all) researched, often poorly edited, low quality litter that only pretends to be the answer to your query while really just displacing more useful answers (say, because it happens to be posted to a site which OVERALL has enough popularity to push its pages to the head of the line – deserved or not – or because they’re really good at SEO but not actual content). It encourages people to pump out a constant stream of vapid garbage instead of meaningful content (every minute researching is a minute unpaid!).

But other jobs could also be treated similar ways… A programmer who signed on to create a freemium app could negotiate a percentage of profits. A team of researchers who are hired to create a patentable drug could negotiate a share of that, too.

Why NOT make residual income on something you’re largely responsible for making happen (if your employer will make money), other than because the workers of a given industry haven’t stood together to demand it yet…? (I saw someone complain about price gouging and blame residuals – no, companies will charge whatever the market will bear, residuals or none… Might as well make residuals!)

It’s ultimately not about merrit, skill, specializations, or lack thereof in any of those, or almost any other arguments I saw here… It’s about what we, the creators, are willing to put up with or fight against and the norms we’re willing to submit to, on one hand – and the money-generating power of our “product” on the other. If everyone across multiple industries started demanding that they get paid for the same product the company continually makes money on, and refused to take no for an answer, more industries would have to bend to that demand and spread the profits around to the people who make it happen. Negotiation IS an option – even for people besides entertainment industry. Even the factory workers could, technically, band together: “we make 1 million toys per year, so we want 15% of the averaged profits from 1 million sales to be split among this factory’s workers based on hours worked”… Or create a % company-wide to benefit ALL at EVERY location, or whatever……. The only hard part with factory workers being that they’d have to band together in HUGE numbers to prevent secret option #2: fire the “trouble makers” and just find someone else (harder to fire if it were hundreds of people – which is why unions are effective… To be truly effective, it either has to be individuals who are irreplaceable, or a massive group).

But in the end, Who says ANYONE (whose output is responsible in a large way for the money that company is making) should resign themselves to making peanuts, while the company gets billions for the product YOU designed or assembled? Ultimately, you decide that for yourself, if you believe in the “get a check and move on to the next gig” thing or buy the ridiculous idea that a livable wage is too good for someone of “low skill” or “no education.”

The part I find saddest is how brainwashed many are into thinking that the only ones worthy of profiting, beyond being paid (usually as little as possible) for the initial output, are the corporations… Yet without you all creating and assembling stuff, what would the corporations sell? Who would buy ads? Why would anyone subscribe?

The world needs to deprogram their peon-trained brains, and wake up to the new world of profit-sharing potential, made possible by algorithms and statistical software and all kinds of nifty stuff.