Gregory's Server
When I say that the current story in the news cycle about extending the strike until people go homeless feels like cheap fearmongering in support of a simple bluff, I'm basing that on years of studying workers movements, and examining previous media industry strikes.
For the studios, this is professional. For the writers, it is both professional and personal.
For the studios, it's about their bottom line. For the writers, it's about the roofs over their heads and the food on their tables.
This recent bit of fearmongering is about convincing the writers that they have more to lose that the studios.
Here's the thing, though, that's simply not true.
Studios absolutely depend on new movies and television shows to survive.
In this vertically integrated world of streaming services, this is because new content retains current subscriptions and attracts new ones.
These studios also have huge backlogs of content that they can depend on to generate some small amount of revenue. They can make endless remakes. They can reissue the same tired and staid movies and television shows again and again.
Eventually, these things run out, and the studios will have to start paying interest on their loans.
Netflix, for example, is probably in a hole too deep to climb out of.
Studios absolutely depend on new movies and television shows to survive.
In this vertically integrated world of streaming services, this is because new content retains current subscriptions and attracts new ones.
These studios also have huge backlogs of content that they can depend on to generate some small amount of revenue. They can make endless remakes. They can reissue the same tired and staid movies and television shows again and again.