Writers Strike: It's only the beginning

Wow! It seems this writers strike in Hollywood is getting serious. It's being reported, that NBC has fired all the production people on their hit show “The Office” and Jay Leno’s people may be next on the chopping block. There is also talk of layoffs at other major networks as well over this writers strike. In case you had missed it, here is the "Coles Notes" version (as they say): The Writers Guild of America's (WGA) contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers expired Nov. 1, and one of the key issues in negotiations is new media, over how much in residuals should be paid for downloads and whether writers should be compensated when their content is streamed on the Internet. From their perspective, producers today fought back in full page ads telling the public that writers were already paid for new media and a new plan was on the table before the strike. Personally, I think this is really starting to get ugly. Families, movie actors, tv actors and even Broadway actors are joining the strike. In 1988, the last time the WGA went on strike, it lasted 22 weeks and cost the industry 500 millions dollars. There is no doubt in my mind this will be longer and more costly. There is much more at stake this time around.