The Picket Line Online: Creative Labor, Digital Activism, and the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America Strike

Abstract

During the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America (WGA) strike, feature and television writers turned to the digital sphere as a tactical strategy for representation, visibility, and promotion. While the growing interest in digital distribution was the impetus for this strike, it was also the medium that enabled writers to successfully communicate with each other, with the media industry, and with the general public. This article examines three major strategies deployed by WGA leadership during the strike that revitalized the Guild and facilitated their ability to work as a unified front during their labor struggle with the multinational corporations that control creative production in Hollywood.

Notes

¹In this article I speak of the WGA as a unified whole when their positions and strategies were aligned, but I will articulate the unique actions of the WGAE and WGAw where significant. While WGAE and WGAe were essentially in agreement regarding the 2007–2008 strike, it is important to distinguish between the two branches of the Guild.

²For more information about the 2004 MBA agreement, see Auerbach (2006).

³This happened with the Screen Actors Guild negotiations this year. The split among membership seriously weakened their negotiating position.

⁴Current showrunners were often joined on the picket lines with past showrunners, such as Norman Lear (All In the Family, Maude).

⁵Strike captain e-bulletins were sent out regularly.

⁶The AMPTP was born out of the AMPTP Alliance of Television and Film Producers, or ATFP, which was founded in 1960.

⁷The final deals the two unions made with the AMPTP were similar, with one important exception. Members agreed to a fixed payment for content streamed online for three years, but in the third year writers will get 2% of distributor's gross content in all years that the content is streamed (Nielsen, 2008).

⁸This is John Wells' second term as president of the WGAw. He served a prior term in 1999–2001.