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How are we going to pay writers ten years from now?

Nobody knows--there's no standard industry price to pay a writer for a blog post, a web video, or a podcast. As these forms multiply, it's becoming harder and harder for writers to get a fair wage for these new products.

That's one of the big reasons why the Writers Guild of America is striking in Hollywood right now. This video from the Guild explains, complete with cast members from the brilliantly written (and now halted by the strike) show, The Office. (Thanks to TV Decoder for the link)

If you want more funny and dark context on the strike, Steve Bryant passes along the mysterious videos of Alex Perez: Scab Writer. Finally, think about this quote from the story, "Penny-A-Worder" by Cornell Woolrich--a reflection on the self-destructive joy of writing for the vicious pulp fiction industry in the 1930's.

Is this how we will be living in ten years, chained to metaphorical typewriters?

"The story flowed like a torrent.  The margin bell chimed almost staccato, the roller turned with almost piston-like continuity, the pages sprang up almost like blobs of batter from a pancake skillet.  The beer kept rising in the glass and, contradictorily, steadily falling lower.  The cigarettes gave up their ghosts, long thing gray ghosts, in good cause; the mortality rate was terrible."