IP Democracy: Writers, Letterman are Bypassing Hollywood

Although it may seem that Hollywood has the upper-hand in the stalled contract talks with the Writers Guild, the writers have a lot more power than the studios think. The rise of the broadband Internet has given creative talent freedom to forge ahead on their own.

This LA Times' piece today says that seven groups of striking writers are in the midst of planning Internet-based ventures to reach the viewing public directly without the studios' help. Unlike in the pre-YouTube days, venture capitalists are now all ears when it comes to the risky business of video entertainment -- blue-chip firms Accel and Spark Capital are in talks with some of these new ventures.

Meanwhile, David Letterman's production company, Worldwide Pants, is pursuing a side deal with the Guild to get The Late Show with David Letterman back on the air. Such a deal cuts CBS, the program's network, out of the loop. Other similar talk show side deals are in reportedly in the works.

With writers decamping to the web and side deals bypassing the studios, this strike is eating away at the power of the big studios. What isn't clear is whether these tentative moves to cut out the middlemen, so to speak, are leaks in the dike, poised to suddenly tear down Hollywood's retaining walls, or simply the continued slow erosion of centralized control of video programming.

Unlike in the past, TV and screen writers had nowhere else to go (although side deals between independent production companies and the writers' union are nothing new). Now, however, writers can start their own little studios on the web. The Times' piece even likens one of the new writers-backed venture to the creation of United Artists by Charlie Chaplin, Mary Pickford, D.W. Griffith and Douglas Fairbanks.

Once writers become free agents, can they ever go back to being team players?

Posted by Cynthia Brumfield on December 17, 2007 9:25 AM to IP Democracy