Starving Artist shouldn't be a business model.

I mean, on the one hand I'm rooting for Disney in their fight with Ron DeSantis. Like, no question, he's a fascist and Canuck right off. Also, my autocorrect rendered "can fuck right off” as "Canuck right off" and I'm leaving it in. I think you'll agree that that's the correct thing to do.

"Yeah, Canuck right off!"

-a typical Canadian

"Living wages? It's like they don't even care
about creating value for shareholders..."

-Bob Iger

Anyway, less root-worthy is Disney's and other television and movie studios' stance that writers are being unreasonable in their demands that they be paid for their work and not have to fear that they'll be replaced with Chat GPT. There's an article in the Hollywood Reporter in which Disney CEO Bob Iger criticizes the Writer's Guild of America and the Screen Actors Guild for going on strike and frames everything in terms of content and distribution models. And yeah, he's a business guy and that's whatever. That's how they talk.

But still, it's not a great look in general to see the people who's businesses are based on the creative work of others leveraging their vast wealth and power to simply wait until the artists can no longer afford rent, mortgage, and you know, food. I don't understand the intricacies of how the digital distribution model works of the legal implications of digital technology when it comes to a performer's likeness but I mean, I'm on the side of pay your artists, right?

"Look, artists are talented and should be compensated for their talent. But
what were saying is that since our talent is to exploit their talent, we should be
compensated more. At least until we figure out a way to replace artists entirely."

-basically the studio's argument, right?

"What is this, the eighteen hundreds?"

-everyone

Yeah but so what? Who cares what we, the consumers of streaming media think? Well, no one. At least no one in positions of power at the studios in question. I mean, it's about data, right? Numbers. And that's not a criticism. Like, I think we're all resigned to the fact that capitalism is a cold, soulless system that will be the death of us all, but if we accept that, this is an option: we can cancel our streaming subscriptions. I know, I know, but then what are we supposed to do? Read?

Unrealistic, I know. But hear me out: according to the first answer that came up when I do an internet search for the average number of streaming services people subscribe to, it's two point eight. So let's say three. What if we all agreed to drop one? Doesn't really matter which, but any one of them sees even a--and I'm just making up numbers here--ten percent drop in viewers, surely that's enough to make them re-think the starve them out strategy when it comes to negotiating with their artists.

It's a difficult choice. Without actors and writers, TV and movie studios would
have nothing. But without TV and movie studios, what would actors and writers have?
Live theatre. And I think we can all agree that nobody wants it to come to that.*

*couple of things: one, I'm only picking on Bob Iger because he said the thing. All the studios are to blame here. Secondly, I'm just kidding, I'd love it if live theatre replaced TV. It will never happen, but I want to live in that world.