Along comes Bob Iger, crowing that Disney’s online revenue is going to match NBC’s. It’s reasonable to expect that Warner Brothers can’t be far behind. After all, they just announced that they’re reviving the WB brand as an online portal.

This is of course great news for the shareholders, but something the actors need to keep in mind as SAG and AFTRA go into negotiations with the AMPTP. While DVD revenues still far outstrip the Internet, and will likely be more important for the next two to three years, the studios and networks are undergoing the same kind of transition the music industry faced. The latter got caught flat-footed, preferring to sue their customers rather than embrace a brave new reality. I’m guessing the movie and TV moguls have learned from those mistakes, as they are rushing headlong into online ad-supported streaming.

The Old Media revenue sources upon which generations of SAG and AFTRA contracts have been built are starting to crumble. If the new contracts do not embrace the new reality, the actors (including me) risk turning themselves into a non-unionized labor force, with the attendant lack of power.

But, still it took work for them to get this and I do thank them for that. I only wish I could be as happy when I get an AFTRA job as I am when I get a SAG job.

Peggy Lane O’Rourke

Undercutting? That’s what SAG did to win jurisdiction. Ask anyone why there are caps on BG or why we pay commission to our agents on scale fees. That’s something AFTRA members don’t have to do under the net code…that’s a 10% pay cut courtesy of your friendly local SAG undercutters. That’s how SAG took shows away from AFTRA, and now a few Hollywood has beens are upset that the AFTRA side isn’t taking it any more.

Well la di dah… don’t you just hate it when the facts bite you on the ass.

Oh-and if you’re in a must join situation, that means you’ve worked at least one AFTRA job and it’s more than 30 days ago. It means you can’t work a second AFTRA job until you join.

MeFirst runs Hollywood by terror, the rest of the union be damned.

The AMPTP knows full well that SAG under the Scab and the D-Lister are about as unified as Humpty Dumpty after the fall.

The MeFirsters think they can achieve unity by bashing AFTRA. They don’t get that the only people who’re buying that nonsense are the few thousand of them in Hollywood and a couple of expats in the RBD.

Show me someone who’d rather work on a SAG basic cable contract show rather than an AFTRA Exhibit A Cable show and I’ll show you an idiot who can’t do basic arithmetic.

Also not mentioned in the list of deal points is product placement, and the repurposing of series content in commercials. This has a demonstrated effect on an actor’s ability move seamlessly between series jobs and commercials. One example. Will Arnett was recently dropped as the voice of KITT because he voices commercials for GM, and Knight Rider is essentially a long-form Ford commercial. If it can happen in prime time, I’m sure it can happen in the soaps.

The timing of this announcement also raises suspicions, with the SAG/AFTRA joint bargaining with the AMPTP coming up and informal initial get-togethers already underway. The AFTRA/SAG pattern is eerily similar to the DGA/WGA pattern. The DGA was out of the box first with the announcement of a deal but with few concrete details. Upon further inspection, we learned the directors locked themselves out of a huge percentage of work for the Internet, essentially leaving the moguls free to pursue low-cost series pilots as Internet shows, thus avoiding having to pay a real director.

AFTRA, lamentably, has been in the business of undercutting SAG for awhile now, to the detriment of its members. Both the timing and the substance of this announcement does nothing to alleviate my concerns. I hope to be proven wrong by the details, but I fear I’ll be proven correct.

The only good news out of this is that it doesn’t cover prime time. Regardless of our opinions about the potential pitfalls of the AFTRA “Network Code” or AFTRA tactics (I am a SAG member who’s also been in some weird “must-join” limbo with AFTRA for years now), for the next few months the smartest course of action for SAG members is to fully support our leadership as they negotiate. The AMPTP needs to see that SAG is unified, and is ready to initiate, and prepared to sustain, an aggressive labor action in its pursuit of a fair deal.

Show me anyone on this board who says otherwise, and I’ll show you a producer in troll’s clothing.

Thank you AFTRA!

Like frickin’ DUH.

No mention of DVD rates changing I bet cha five dollars. This bullshit just undercut SAG negotiations. God damn the AFI-CLO.

Best wishes from a working SAG & AFTRA member!