Streaming services will pay screenwriters for replays of serials
It is difficult to argue with the fact that the series, which are removed the last 5 years and continue to be created now, have become more cinematic. No, the movie has not yet lost the series, but it has a very worthy alternative. Moreover, the schemes of content consumption have changed: if earlier many users who wanted to watch one or another series went to the TV or to torrent trackers, now the faces of the viewers are turned in the direction of the streaming services.
Cable television is also going through hard times. Every year the number of viewers spending the evening in front of the TV is rapidly decreasing. All these changes in one way or another affect both the industry as a whole and its individual elements. Most of all, these factors affected the writers, who had less work: the shortening of the seasons of the show and the delay in fees due to the increased duration of the shooting of individual episodes hit the authors' wallet noticeably.
More recently, such tension in the atmosphere nearly turned into a regular strike by members of the Writers Guild of America ( WGA). During negotiations with the Union of Film and Television Producers, representing the interests of major studios and independent producers, the WGA wanted, in addition to raising the authors' average salary and other things, to streaming services to pay the remnants - fees for reruns - along with traditional broadcasters.
The first wave of negotiations failed, and the Guild intended to repeat the previous strike of 2007, seeking support from its members. The talks resumed on April 10 and, apparently, the parties reached a consensus. May 2, 2017 Writers' Guild of America introduceda preliminary three-year contract whereby streaming services wishing to produce original movie series will have to pay scriptwriters more for each episode in a high-budget project. The new WGA contract, unanimously approved by WGA West and WGA East, is now sent to guild members for final ratification.
According to the new contract, the amount of payments will vary depending on the number of episodes and the amount of work that the scriptwriters will perform. On average, the range of the amount the screenwriter will receive for each episode as part of the contract varies from $ 3,448 to $ 34,637. The
new formula for calculating balances works for services with a million or more subscribers in the United States and Canada. After the first 90 days of broadcasting, screenwriters will receive 35% of the minimum specified in the contract. The new contract also spelled out certain levels of the number of subscribers, which determine the residual amounts for programs or serials written under the new license agreements (after May 2, 2017).
Netflix with more than 45 million subscribers over three years will pay writers for every half-hour episode of the high-budget series for $ 19,058 more than it was under the old contract. Amazon with 20-45 million subscribers - another $ 10,004 for every half-hour and $ 18,180 for an hourly series.
Changes in the new contract - a step towards a peaceful settlement of the revolutionary mood that arose after the failure of negotiations between the Writers Guild of America and leading studios. A great contribution to the discord was made by popular streaming services, which for the most part work by subscription and refuse to provide reliable information about the views, which makes it difficult to develop an objective formula for the residuals.