The stakes couldn’t be higher for the e-commerce giant, which is fighting the biggest labor battle in its history on U.S. soil
Facing expulsion from SAG-AFTRA, Donald Trump resigned his membership from the union Thursday. To which SAG-AFTRA president Gabrielle Carteris and national executive director David White simply said: “Thank you.”
The relationship between the show and the folks who make it began to shift in March, when the latter were informed that Ray would, in response to the rapid spread of COVID-19, shoot the remainder of the 2019-20 season remotely from her house in upstate New York without on-site assistance from anyone beside her husband — and that displaced crew members would not be paid for the five scheduled shoot days remaining in the season. That move prompted a dispute by IATSE, which claimed that its contract with the show covering 18 union camera operators, audio engineers and other technical crew requires producers to pay those furloughed workers for all remote shoot days that had originally been planned for the studio.
More than 15,000 people have signed a petition from the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees asking Sinclair Broadcast Group to improve its recent offer to unemployed broadcast technicians. The petition was circulated after IATSE criticized Sinclair’s plan to loan money in response to the coronavirus pandemic through a multi-million-dollar emergency fund that offers an interest-free advance of $2,500 to the 1,000 sports network freelancers who work at its Fox regional sports networks and Marquee Sports Network.
Exclusives
Over the last few years, a wave of unionization has swept local newsrooms and digital media outlets. As the coronavirus sweeps the country, forcing media companies to enact drastic cost-cutting plans, unionized newsrooms are putting the power of collective bargaining to the test.
The Writers Guild of America East says it has negotiated the first contract with CBSN, which the guild said marks the first anchored live streaming service to be unionized.
Leaders of the Directors Guild of America have approved a three-year successor deal to the DGA master contract, triggering a ratification vote by the 18,000 members. The DGA national board announced Saturday that it had approved the deal unanimously. The guild revealed that the agreement includes a significant increase in residuals for high-budget streaming content, pension, wages and TV creative rights.
Jessica Meiselman: Over the past few years employees at Vice, G/O Media, the Huffington Post, BuzzFeed, Slate, The New Yorker, the LA Times, New York Media, and Vox Media, among many others, have decided to organize. Management responses have had this in common: their ultimate goal is to avert a union.
The editorial employees at NBC News Digital voted overwhelmingly to unionize with the NewsGuild of New York, which will now represent about 150 employees at nbcnews.com, today.com and msnbc.com. The vote tally, announced Friday, was 90-40 in favor of unionizing.
On top of a “No NBC NewsGuild” Instagram account and a bare-bones website, employees have posted flyers around the network’s office in Manhattan: “a massive, college dorm-esque battle of the posters.”
Collins | Understanding Both Sides In Labor Negotiations
Media companies and their employees’ union representatives both have an obligation to bargain in good faith. Here are some insights into what it takes for today’s media businesses to conduct successful union negotiations.
Sinclair Broadcast Group said it received notice from the International Chemical Workers Union (ICWU) disclaiming interest in representing employees that provide services to Sinclair’s CBS-ABC affiliate KHQA Quincy, Ill. (DMA […]
Journalists are saying yes to unions to lift salary floors, win or improve basic benefits, and provide some cushion to the industry’s volatility.
A reporter for the site estimates the effort has the support of “90%” of eligible employees. The BuzzFeed founder Jonah Peretti has spoken against the idea.
The ad industry is preparing for a possible actors strike. Its chief negotiator is urging advertisers and ad agencies to finish all commercial shoots that employ union actors before the March 31 expiration of SAG-AFTRA’s current contract, lest they be caught in a work stoppage in the middle of production if upcoming negotiations fail to produce a new agreement.
Tronc is looking for a new director of labor relations, and one of the job responsibilities will be “maintaining the non-union status of the unorganized employee population.”
LOS ANGELES (AP) — The entertainment industry union SAG-AFTRA has issued a code of conduct in an effort to protect its members from sexual harassment in the workplace. The code published Saturday […]
A doubter at Vox Media, where one of the latest organizing efforts has begun, became a believer — no thanks to Twitter, he said.
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Video-game voice actors have agreed to end a nearly yearlong strike against several major gaming publishers. The actors union SAG-AFTRA and a representative for the publishers […]
The SAG-AFTRA national board has approved the successor deal for a new three-year master contract for primetime TV and feature films, triggering a ratification vote by members. The contract was approved by 77.4% of the board, which met Saturday in a videoconference at union headquarters in Los Angeles and in New York.
Hollywood can breathe a sigh of relief: There won’t be an actors strike. A new deal was reached at sunrise Tuesday. The agreement came after a month of bargaining, a strike threat, three 24-hour extensions and six more hours of talks. It’s valued at a record $256 million.
Contract negotiations between SAG-AFTRA and the studios, represented by the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers were extended for a third time Sunday night, two days after the parties announced a day-to-day extension about an hour before contract expiration Friday at midnight.
