Employee Gift Sag
Mon, 08 Mar 2010 02:45:06 +0000
Forget Jay Leno in the cat food aisle. Now the CBS marketing team has found an even more unusual way to flog its new fall series The Good Wife: by offering to bribe journalists just to consider mentioning the show. This would be pathetic if it weren't so hilarious. (Note to Les Moonves who's at the Cronkite memorial at Lincoln Center this morning: a $20 Amazon gift certificate isn't gonna cut it with me. A new Benz, maybe.) Amy Morales, a "Community Activator" for the YouCast Corporation working for CBS, emailed me overnight thusly, after I deleted all the promotional bullshit:
Dear Deadline Hollywood Daily Editorial Team,
I know I just emailed you recently about CBS's Three Rivers - I don't mean to stalk your inbox - but I didn't want you to miss out on The Good Wife either! ... My goal in writing to you today is to see if you’d be interested in sharing this information with your readers. As a thank you for considering the story I would love to send you a $20 Amazon Gift Certificate...
I look forward to hearing from you!
Best,
Amy
So I looked for her Three Rivers email but found no bribe offer in that message. Poor Amy had to up the ante to flack The Good Wife to me. That can't bode well for the show, can it? So Amy, since I didn't just consider a story, I actually wrote one because of you, here's what to do with that $20 Amazon gift certificate -- stick it where the sun don't shine, you asswipe.
The membership, through their vote, agreed to “commence negotiations for successor agreements to the Agreements beginning no later than October 1, 2010 and continuing through November 15th, 2010. It is understood and agreed that neither party shall be obligated to reach an agreement during said time period; however, all parties agree to conduct such negotiations in good faith with the intent of reaching agreement.”
Within the next month President Rosenberg will be arranging a series of summit meetings with elected leadership from the DGA, WGA, IATSE, the Teamsters, and AFTRA in preparation for October 2010. One of the many goals of these summit meetings is to share anecdotal and actual data regarding the changing trends experienced by other talent unions.
To be thoroughly prepared for Oct. 2010, SAG staff and elected must reach out to the members who will be working under the conditions of this new contract. Especially in the area of New Media. SAG’s chief negotiator, Interim NED and the majority of SAG’s board has assured the members that by ratifying the contract, SAG members will finally get back to work. Also the union assured its members that by ratifying the contract, SAG will be in a better position to stop shows going to other unions. SAG has predicted, following the ratification of this contract, a surge of work coming to our members and it will be exceedingly important that SAG staff and elected begin reaching out to our members to collect empirical and substantiated information to assist in early negotiations. It will be strongly suggested to SAG staff that when appropriate, SAG should consider holding monthly caucuses to allow members to freely discuss any changes they may be experiencing under these new contract conditions prior to our wages and working condition meetings. Although difficult in the past, SAG must find a way to communicate with our members who have personal service agreements with studios and/or networks, that in order to confidently tract and discuss changing trends with regard to wages and working conditions, it would be helpful to provide SAG copies of those personal service agreements in order to collect needed information regarding new deals, especially in the area of Original Product Made For New Media, clip consent, product integration and other areas now considered conditions of employment, where negotiations are between the actors’ representative and his/her employer, without the interference of the Guild.
It was stated to the National Board in April that with ratification of the contract, SAG will more than likely be in first position with regard to negotiations in 2011. If that is indeed the case, it is imperative that SAG rely on the information provided by our members, not from the AMPTP, whose intention is certainly not to assist SAG in securing stronger contracts, if we are to be thoroughly prepared based on the Sunset Clause, to start from scratch in the area of New Media and to improve or regain in areas we may have lost ground.
This past week, Pam Fair and I traveled to D.C. to meet with representatives of the house and the senate to discuss the importance of the Employee Free Choice Act. Joined by our lobbyist Eric Huey and WGA President Patric Verrone, we had the opportunity to meet representatives from the offices of Senators Feinstein, Specter, Schumer, Landrieu, Lincoln, Murkowski, Nelson, Collins, and Snowe. Lastly Pamm Fair, Eric Huey and I met with Kareem Dale, Special Assistant to the President for Disability Policy. It was a very fruitful meeting concluding with the agreement that SAG and President Obama will create ways in working more closely when it comes to the specific concerns of artist in America. All and all, we got a lot done in less than 24 hours.
