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Subject: Re: JMS: Re: Babylon 5 Universe Novels?
Date: Thu, 20 Oct 2005 04:05:43 +0000 (UTC)
From: jmsatb5@aol.com
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.tv.babylon5.moderated

Carl wrote:
>  wrote in message
> news:1129763371.988536.28150@g43g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
> >
> > As a producer, my revenue from the DVDs is tied to the overall profit
> > of the show, which is still showing $50 million in the red (thanks to
> > creative accounting), so I get zero off the sales of the DVDs as a
> > producer.
> >
> > As a small potted plant, I get even less.
>
> So the accountants (who are apparently fiction writers in their own right)
> make
> money on the DVDs and you don't.
>
> After so many years of this I would have thought that the various guilds and
> unions would have found away to make the process more honest.
>
> I'm not a big fan of unions, but this makes a case for some.
>

The history of this is...back in the 80s, the WGA had the chance to go
after a percentage of VHS sales, or push for something else (a handful
of magic beans, as I recall)...and they basically gave away the VHS
stuff on the theory that it would never be much of a market.

In the years since then, the video market has exploded, but the formula
has stayed the same, and the studios insisted that they also apply to
DVDs.  The Guild should have struck over this a long time ago, but the
last fifteen years or so in particular the Guild leadership has been
remarkably cowardly, and has not done what's necessary to correct this.
 (Won't change the B5 situation, because it wouldn't be retroactive.)
Now, I think there's a somewhat bolder bunch of guys who just got in,
and we'll see what they can do with it.

jms