Too Much TV: Your TV Talking Points For Wednesday, April 17th, 2024

A bit of inside journalism talk

Here's everything you need to know about the world of television for Wednesday, April 17th, 2024:

WRITERS OF MTV'S 'RIDICULOUSNESS' VOTE TO JOIN WGA 
For all of the attention that was paid to the issues of WGA members during last year's strike, one under-appreciated issue is that for the most part, unscripted writers aren't in the union. Which means substantially less pay than their scripted brethren. There's no guaranteed health care, no retirement fund, no residuals. And yet, these are some of the shows that keep many linear networks on the air.

Ridiculousnessis a clip show that has become the mainstay of MTV. It's not just that reruns of the show regularly air more than 100 times a week on the network. The show is also producing a staggering 366 new episodes a year, using a staff of ten writers the production company describes them as "creative consultants" or "associate producers," not a writer. It's all an effort to keep costs low and late last year, the show's writing staff - each of which is responsible for writing an entire new episode per week - voted to seek membership in the WGA. Status that writers on shows such as America's Funniest Home Videos already have.

The writers enlisted the help of show host Rob Dyrdek, who supported their move. And now they have obtained an agreement that covers all writers on the long-running show, including Creative Consultants, Supervising Producers, and the Showrunner.

This news comes on the same day that representatives from the Actors' Equity Association and Disneyland Cast Members who work in the Parades/Characters department announced during a news conference that a supermajority of 1,700 CMs known as "Magic United" filed a petition with the (NLRB) for union recognition.

You are going to see more of these union actions, particularly in the animation field, which has notoriously weak union coverage and a notable lack of things such as residuals. 

A BIT OF INSIDE JOURNALISM TALK
Odds are that if you read this newsletter you likely read a few other ones. And I get it, it's annoying to have writers bugging you for money. I try not to do it often, but the challenge of writing online is that a lot of tried-and-true ways of making a living are going away. Ads are increasingly less effective, which is why you see the Penske media-owned trades amping up the ad load on their pages while cranking out more and more "shopping" guides filled with affiliate links.

Matt Pierce wrote a piece for the SF Chronicle about the death of hyperlinks and the need for laws like the proposed California Journalism Preservation Act. Google is threatening to remove links to California-based news outlets from its search engine. And as Pierce explains, it's because Google wants to be able to use AI to strip mine content from sites and provide AI-rewritten recaps for its search results. They want to keep making billions using content other people have written without having to compensate anyone:

Wicks’ bill has only become more urgent as Google experiments with generative AI, which also scrapes news sites but this time without any pretense that journalists might benefit. Some Google search responses already compile an AI-generated blurb that summarizes news stories.

Jim Albrecht, senior director of news ecosystem products at Google from 2017 to 2023, recently wrote in the Washington Post that AI-powered chatbots, not human-written articles like the one you’re reading right now, are the future of news.

“Publishers will have to think less about those articles and more about conversations with users,” Albrecht wrote. “The users will interact less and less with the actual articles and instead talk about the articles with what the tech industry used to call ‘intelligent agents.’ ”

The most reliable way to make a living in journalism is to establish direct relationships with readers. Subscription products, newsletters, ways for stories and reporting to make its way to readers without having to go through large intermediaries like Google. It's a problem I struggle with on a daily basis.

SPEAKING OF INTERMEDIARIES
Expansive NY Times profiles have an odd reputation in the industry. Being the recipient of one must be an amazing experience and it certainly illustrates that you have arrived on the national scene.

But every six months or so, they run a profile of someone who seems to primarily be considered nationally important because they are important to people in the very insular New York media world.

Today, the subject of the Times profile treatment is Rusty Foster, who runs the internet culture and media world-oriented Today In Tabs newsletter. And much is made of the fact that even though the newsletter focuses on the media world - especially the New York City media world - Foster writes it from his home in Maine:

A surprising thing about Today in Tabs — which has a knowing, satirical tone that has made it an enduring hit among media insiders — is that Mr. Foster writes it from the bucolic setting of Peaks Island, Maine, which is where he was when the National Magazines Awards ceremony took place.

He says he finds New York’s nonstop noise and crowds tiring, and his most recent visit to the city was last May, when he and the youngest of his three children stayed at a Times Square hotel and saw “Harry Potter and the Cursed Child” on Broadway.

One of his friends, Paul Ford, a writer, editor and tech entrepreneur, noted that Mr. Foster, the person, seems to have little in common with the media chronicler of Today in Tabs. “He’s a very New England guy,” Mr. Ford said. “When you meet this guy, if he told you he’s going to make a wooden canoe, you’d go, ‘Alright.’”

This is a very NY Times reaction. The piece recounts the story of him covering the media world from Maine in the same way it would report a dog was editing NBC News footage from it’s doghouse in the upper reaches on Michigan.

But honestly, that wasn't what annoyed me. What irritated me was this paragraph, which kinda proves the NY Times doesn't have much of a grasp of what a successful newsletter might look like:

Around 10 percent of his 36,000 subscribers are paying readers, he said, who fork over $6 per month or $50 per year. That’s not quite three-bedrooms-in-Cobble-Hill money, but it allows Mr. Foster to make a living in media at a time when many veteran journalists are struggling to find jobs.

I'll just mention that I have more than twice that many subscribers (more than 80,000) and I suspect I am not the only journalist who can say that. And while I love "Today In Tabs," (I'm a subscriber!), I don't think it would be getting an extended profile if it didn't focus on a topic that The New York Times cares about above nearly any other - the NY media world. 

ODDS AND SODS
* Apple TV+ has ordered a fifth season of its alt-history space drama For All Mankind. It's also ordered to series Star City, which follows the Soviet space program in this same semi-fictional universe.

* Comedy Central has ordered a 10-episode animated show based on the 80s Sega game Golden Axe.

* Paramount+ and the National Park Foundation announced a new streaming partnership on Tuesday this week that will livestream sunrise-to-sunset content from seven U.S. national parks: Yosemite National Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, Bighorn Canyon National Recreation Area, New River Gorge National Park & Preserve, Everglades National Park, Death Valley National Park, and Zion National Park. Yeah, I'm not sure why Yellowstone isn't on the list either.

* And in the category of "I did not see that one coming," Laurie Anderson has apparently created a Lou Reed chatbot, which she speaks with on a regular basis.

* NPR is in the middle of a big public battle over whether its editorial stance is as liberal as critics claim. If you've been following the story, you'll want to read this absolutely brutal takedown for longtime NPR newsperson Steve Inskeep.

WHAT'S NEW TONIGHT AND TOMORROW

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 17TH:
* Don't Hate The Player Series Premiere (Netflix)
* Our Living World (Netflix)
* The Grimm Variations Series Premiere (Netflix)
* See You In Another Life (Hulu)
* The Circle Season Premiere (Netflix)
* The Grimm Variations Series Premiere (Netflix)
* Under The Bridge Series Premiere (FX)

THURSDAY, APRIL 18TH:
* Bros Series Premiere (Netflix)
* Conan O'Brien Must Go Series Premiere (Max) - [first look video]
* Dinner With The Parents Series Premiere (Freevee)
* Going Home With Tyler Cameron Series Premiere (Prime Video)
* Locked In My House (LMN)
* Orlando Bloom: To The Edge (Peacock)
* Sins Of The Parents: The Crumbley Trials (Hulu)
* Superbuns Series Premiere (Peacock)
* Theresa Caputo: Beyond The Readings Series Premiere (Lifetime)
* The Upshaws (Netflix)
* True Crime Story: It Couldn't Happen Here (Sundance)
* Welcome To Wrexham Season Three Premiere (Hulu)

SEE YOU ON THURSDAY!