In the case of Lost, that number would be about 5% of an average live broadcast audience.  And since it’s spread over an entire month, really it’s a drop in the bucket.  However, let us remember a couple of things.  First, these figures don’t include sites like Hulu.com.  As far as I am concerned, Hulu features a viewing experience far preferable to any of the network sites, and in cases where it doesn’t just forward the viewer to the network, is probably representative of a comparable number of views.  Meanwhile, in December when these measurements were taken… Lost wasn’t on yet!  The numbers reflect people getting excited to remember all the plot twists before the show returned in January.  We should expect January numbers to be much higher, and February (which would be the first month to have a new episode each Wednesday) to be higher still.

Now recall that, per the 2008 strike settlement, writers make zero dollars during the first seventeen days following network broadcast.  The studios claimed they needed a “promotional” period (never mind that the “promotional” period follows the broadcast…)  They claimed revenues currently are so small that they cannot possibly share.  It is far too early, they said, to know how the internet will play out, or to discuss paying any money to the people who created the content they’re using to forge a new revenue stream for themselves.  Well, I caught Grey’s via the net recently, and I watched Jack-in-the-Box wheeled into a hospital multiple times.  I not only didn’t (couldn’t) fast forward through the commercials like on my TiVo, but–due to the obnoxious repetetiveness–I still remember what the commercial was for, a week later, and I sorta feel like having a Meaty Breakfast Burrito.  Someone made some money, and the writers deserve a percentage.  It doesn’t matter if that percentage is small, but it does matter that there’s a percentage.

Joss Whedon recently spoke about the economics of  Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog, a pioneering effort to develop new content for the internet, and to redefine the business model of production.  In a Wharton interview, he summed up the strike’s results nicely:

We can’t accept anything remotely like [our current situation] with the studios.

When the studios talk about the difficulty of monetizing the Internet, they’re not lying. There are a lot of paradigms wherein you aren’t making that much money. But it’s all pure money for them because they have these libraries they can just put on. They’re really not interested in putting on original stuff because they can just throw the libraries on and make free money off of that. None of us is in that position.

For [the studios] not to offer the creative community a percentage of what they make — they say, “oh, it’s too difficult” and “we’re not going to make any money” — is disingenuous to the point of criminality. What they’re making is pure profit. For them to shut out the people who actually created the content is something that should be looked into by a federal investigatory committee.

That really says it all.  Whatever money you’re making, networks, share.

Skip the first two paragraphs and get to the meat of a great article:

TV 101: An Open Letter to TV Executives About Why You Should Stop Worrying and Learn to Love PIRACY

Of course, from the moment producers made the call to give hosting responsibilities to the five nominees in the new category of reality show host, failure was written on the wall. Those personalities promptly proved how unworthy they are of the responsibility (and of having a category) by intentionally opening the show unprepared. Really? Following a major writers’ strike, you’ve chosen to slap that portion of the industry in the face? Their plan tanked, of course. Thanks, at least, for proving that there is a REASON that performers have chosen for centuries to have something prepared before stepping onto stage or screen.

There was a time when awards shows ran long, partly out of too many thank-yous to agents and moms. Somewhere in the last decade or so, someone implemented the orchestra cut-off technique. But let’s ask ourselves: Has this been an improvement? Certainly not in the case of this year’s Emmys, at least. Certainly not when conversations of free speech are truncated, yet skits from the reality crowd are allowed to run forever.

Other thoughts.

• Jeremy Piven is good on Entourage. But three years in a row?

• Amy Smart? Samantha Who? is decent, but her selection above Amy Poehler or Kristin Chenoweth?

• Steve Carrell managed to be the best part of the Emmys again, again without winning anything.

• Thank goodness the 30 Rock crowd is starting to get their due. Here’s hoping some viewer numbers follow.

• The Josh Groban theme song medley was lame. Obviously he’s this amazing singer, and he pulled of some pretty excellent vocal acrobatics in his attempt at comedy. But several years back, when Jason Alexander did the same damn thing, only funny, there was a wink. No wink, no funny. Nostalgia and recognition don’t equal entertainment. That’s why the whole Epic Movie franchise fails to offer a bit of substance. What can we expect, I guess, from show producers who OK-ed an opening with no script?

• Tommy Smothers was sharp. The Laugh In reunion, however, was cringe-worthy. Both were presentation by personalities 40 years past their heyday. So perhaps there’s something to be learned about the aspect of comedy that will allow one to survive a generational shift. It’s not about jokes, but about timing.

At the second I write this, I’m looking at the first delegate estimate that puts Obama ahead of Clinn-ton (you have to say it like a Simpsons alien) in the delegate count. This is despite the insider advantage over superdelegates that has kept her (artificially?) in the lead until now. She’s still polling better than he is, but check the scoreboard:

Democrat delegate count

Note the almost 3-to-1 results in my home state of Washington, thenkyaverrmuch! Meanwhile, polls are supporting what he’s been saying about being the best candidate against McCain:

Clinton vs. McCain
Obama vs. McCain

A couple of weeks ago, I randomly predicted to some of my students that it would be Texas that put Obama over the top. If momentum is as important as they say, I might just wind up looking like a freakin’ political genius.

Dear Writers,

I have good news. I have lots of good news. In fact, I have way too much good news.

The strike is almost over. A resolution is days away. Weeks. Friday. Valentine’s day. Two weeks exactly from whenever my manager/agent/lawyer told me. Yes, after talking to writers and actors all over town, I’m happy to report that the strike is going to end every single day until March. Huzzah! All of this entirely reliable information means that at last the dream of the writing community has been realized: the Oscars will be saved.

Let’s step back.

The Oscars seem to be the point of focus for a lot of this speculation. That either they must be preserved, or that the studios feel they must be preserved, and therefore this terrible struggle will end. There is an argument to be made for wanting the show to go on: it showcases the artists with whom we are bonded (there’s no award for Best Hiding of Net Profits), and it provides employment and revenue for thousands in the community that has been hit so hard by this action. Having said that, it’s a f%$#ing awards show. It’s a vanity fair. It’s a blip. We’re fighting (fighting, remember?) for the future of our union, our profession, our art. If that fight carries us through the Holy Night when Oscar was born, that’s just too bad.

And the studios? Well, the Oscars provide advertising revenue and a boost for the films that win. But the studios have shown impressive resolve in ignoring short-term losses in order to destroy us. I don’t hear any knees knocking in the Ivory Towers over that night of programming. Hey, I wish I did. I wish, like a lot of people, I could hear anything from in there besides that weird clicking sound Predator makes.

I ask you all to remember: the studios caused an industry-wide shutdown. They made a childishly amateurish show of pretending to negotiate, then retreated into their lairs (yes, they have lairs) to starve us out. They emerged just before Christmas to raise our hopes, then left in a premeditated huff. They Force Majoured with gay abandon, cutting deals and ‘trimming the fat’ (I’ve met a couple of ‘the fat’ on the picket lines. Nice guys.) and made every selfish, counter-intuitively destructive move in the Bully’s Bible. They met with the DGA and resolved quickly, as expected.

We have been advised to tone down the anti-studio rhetoric now that a deal might be progressing. Our negotiators have the specific task of forgetting the past and dealing only with the numbers before them. Their ability to do that impresses me greatly, but I maintain that it’s their job to treat the studios like business partners and it’s our job to remember who they really are. The studios are inefficient, power-hungry, thieving corporate giants who have made the life of the working writer harder from decade to decade. They are run by men so out of touch with basic humanity that they would see Rome burn before they would think about the concept of fair compensation. I maintain that they have never revealed their true agenda in the causing and handling of this strike, and to expect them to now is cock-eyed optimism of the most dangerous kind.

I have heard people both in and out of the industry say, “But that’s enough now, right?” I have seen the thing I fear most: that whatever their agenda, they are beating us down. With hope. With rumors. With Time. The mindset seems to be shifting to one of relief and even unspoken gratitude for their return, instead of flaming indignation that they ever (illegally, do you recall?) left the table in the first place. It’s the mindset of the victim. The lethargy of limb that strikes the fighter as he unconsciously lets himself lose. The studio strategists have worked this scenario as carefully as they have everything else. It is so crucial that we outside of the talks remember that, and let them know we do.

This is not over. Nor is it close. Until the moment it is over, it can never be close. Because if we see the finish line we will flag and they are absolutely counting on us to do that. In the room, reason. On the streets, on the net, I say reason is for the ‘moderates’. Remember what they’ve done. Remember what they’re trying to take from us. FIGHT. FIGHT. FIGHT.

I have been mugged an embarrassing number of times, even for a New Yorker. I’ve been yelled at and chased, beaten down and kicked, threatened with a gun and the only mugger who still hurts my gut is the one who made me shake his hand. Until there is a deal – the right deal, not the DGA deal – held out, let’s keep our hands in our pockets or on our signs. Let’s not be victims. Let’s never.

In solidarity,
Joss Whedon

P.S. YES, there is going to be a Blonde & Blonder III!

But if I can help point even a few people at some of the aspects of the issues that are commonly overlooked, I’d love to do that.  At the moment, the big talk is that the DGA has made its deal, and the expectation is that the WGA should follow.  After all, the studios have made concessions, and therefore the writers should be happy.  What people don’t understand about this is that most of the members of the Directors Guild are below-the-line staff, 1st ADs and such, which means that they aren’t likely to have royalties factored in to their contracts anyway.  As a collective, they are much happier to accept a deal that with decent minimums and smaller or no royalties.  It doesn’t affect the below-the-line directors, and the more powerful movie directors can negotiate their own deals that are better than the minimum contract.  In order to produce a movie, I must pay all my day-to-day workers, including the directorial support staff, a fixed daily amount.  However, I can defer some of my financial risk by paying a writer less than what his intellectual property would otherwise sell for, in exchange for the promise of royalties.  For this reason, writers depend on royalties in a way that other filmmaking staff do not. But you rarely hear that.  Instead, you hear the spin provided by the expensive PR factory used by the studios.  Ain’t they clever.

If the suspicions of many writers are to be believed, this PR engine has been tasked with creating feelings of disunion among the Writers’ Guild.  One interesting response to this phenomenon comes from writer/director Paul Haggis.  His posting at United Hollywood is well worth the read.