Television Writers Strike Now Costing Billions And Wrecking Havoc On Tv Shows

Whenever we turn on our television sets on we expect to be able to see our favorite shows. We have network channels, cable channels, and satellite channels to choose from.

We wait from one season to the next to see the many shows that we love to watch. This year we have hit a little snag with some of these shows due to the writer's strike.

The writer's strike has been going on now for weeks and weeks. It started back in November and though some progress has thought to have been made, it is not over yet. If you are an average person who just wants to watch television, the issues concerning the strike might not interest you that much.

It does interest the more than 12,000 writers that decided to strike because they want better terms. They are members of the Writers Guild of America East and West. These are labor unions and they represent writers that work on television as well as radio and films.

They are striking against The Alliance of Motion Pictures and Television Producers. This alliance consist of many big production company names like Warner Brothers, Walt Disney Productions, MGM, and many more.

The writers want to strike until their conditions are met and the AMPTP will not negotiate until the writers stop striking. This has created a deadlock.

NBC nightly news reported that combining everyone that has been affected financially, the cost of the strike is about one billion dollars.

These financial aspects of the strike trickles down to all kinds of workers associated with the shows and movies affected. Cast and crew members, caterers, costume companies, and even janitorial services are all being touched because of this strike.

After reading this much, you now might be curious as to what exactly the writers want. One issue is the residuals that come from the marketing of DVD's. The DVD home video market has become a huge business, and to make a long story short, writers think they deserve a bigger and fairer piece of this pie.

New media like that which can be viewed over the internet and on cell phones and union jurisdiction over reality program and animation writers are both issues that are also being argued over. The Writers Guilds normally renegotiate issues with the AMPTP every three years, but because of these three problems, no contract could be reached this time.