MERGED--> Lost Season 4

The friendliest place on the web for anyone that follows U2.
If you have answers, please help by responding to the unanswered posts.
Carleton Cuse would prefer fans wait another year than have only half a season air:
http://tv.ign.com/articles/833/833445p1.html

Writers Strike: Should Lost Air This Season?
Producer Carlton Cuse tells us whether he thinks half a season is better than no season.
by Eric Goldman

November 7, 2007 - Yesterday we reported that thanks to the Writers Guild strike, Lost's fourth season will likely consist of only 8 episodes -- half of the intended 16. But one possibility that could occur is to hold the show completely, not airing any episodes until the 2008 - 2009 season. If the strike continues and no more episodes can be produced this season, Lost executive producers Carlton Cuse and Damon Lindelof think that's the way to go.

I spoke to Cuse today, who was standing among a group of the most notable showrunners in television, picketing outside the Walt Disney studios. When I asked him if ABC was intending to air just those completed 8 episodes, he replied "I don't know yet. I think it'll depend on how long [the strike] lasts." But as to whether he'd want to see those episodes air without their intended second half ready, he firmly said "No. We'd rather them hold it. It would be like reading half a novel."

Lost aired a brief 6 episode run in the fall of 2006, which wasn't a popular move with fans or critics and Cuse thinks that while fans would be frustrated by the longer wait between seasons, it would ultimately be a bigger disservice to air only half a season. However, it's believed that ABC is likely to decide to air the episodes in the spring as originally intended, especially given how few scripted series will be available at that point, thanks to the strike.
 
Muldfeld said:
Carleton Cuse would prefer fans wait another year than have

Screw that, I would take a half season over waiting any day...

Just like I would take an EP rather than have to wait another year for new material from my favorite artists...
 
i cant wait either!
But why did Charlie have to die :(
at least des is still around though
 
They are starting to put the webisodes up. There are 13 total, a new one every Monday.

http://abc.go.com/primetime/lost/missingpieces/index?pn=index

NYTimes

November 20, 2007
Webisodes of ‘Lost’: Model Deal for Writers?
By EDWARD WYATT

LOS ANGELES, Nov. 19 — On the picket lines, striking television and film writers adamantly claim that studios are refusing to pay for the use of writers’ scripts on the Internet.

But ABC Studios is doing just that. Over the next three months fans of the hit show “Lost” can go to ABC.com to view weekly episodes of “Lost: Missing Pieces,” a series of new two- to three-minute shorts that reveal background information and previously undisclosed details about the stranded inhabitants of the show’s mysterious island.

The “Missing Pieces” episodes were produced under an agreement with the writers’ union that provides for much of what the writers say the studios have been refusing to offer.

Payment for the use of material on the Internet will be a central issue keeping the Writers Guild of America and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers apart when they head back to the bargaining table on Monday.

But as the “Lost” example shows, the two sides have found common ground before, and both have shown interest in giving some ground on the issue.

The “Missing Pieces” episodes were written by Carlton Cuse, an executive producer of the series and one of its lead writers. They feature the show’s regular actors and characters, including Matthew Fox, who plays Dr. Jack Shephard. Mr. Fox appears in the first installment, released last week. The writers, actors and others involved in the production were paid specifically for their work on the Web episodes and will earn residual income, just as they do for the broadcast show.

In an interview Mr. Cuse said that while it took five months to reach an agreement, he believes the “Missing Pieces” deal could serve as a template for resolving at least some of the dispute over payment for online use of material.

“I think it is a pretty good model,” he said last week. “What it shows is that there is basically room for a partnership between writers and the studios in a new medium. It’s where I wish we were headed instead of being stuck in this standoff.”

People close to the studios say they also see some promise in the “Lost” deal, although they note that it was negotiated with a single producers’ alliance member, ABC Studios, rather than with all of the members of the group. The deal also included a clause specifically stating that it did not set a precedent for any future deals and could not be cited as such in future negotiations.

Nevertheless, the television and film studios offered terms similar to the “Lost” deal in the negotiations that took place before writers began their strike on Nov. 5, said Barbara Brogliatti, a spokeswoman for the alliance.

Charles B. Slocum, assistant executive director of the Writers Guild of America West, said in an interview on Friday that he believed “in general terms” that the “Lost” deal created “the pattern that we are looking for in our negotiations,” although he noted that the guild was seeking better financial terms.

“Lost: Missing Pieces” paid the writers of each short episode approximately $800. For that the studio received the right to run the episodes on Verizon cellphones for 13 weeks. After that period, repeats of the episodes or their transmissions on other media — like the Internet — would generate residuals for the writers of 1.2 percent to 2 percent of the fee the studio received to license the material.

Therefore, the episodes now running on ABC.com, each preceded by an advertisement, are generating for Mr. Cuse a 2 percent residual. In its contract negotiations, the Writers Guild is seeking 2.5 percent for similar work in the future.

The “Lost” deal represents, for the writers, a significant improvement over similar situations elsewhere. On NBC.com, for example, fans of “The Office” can find episodes of “The Accountants,” a series of shorts made for the Internet, scripted by writers of “The Office” and featuring regular actors from the show. A short commercial usually accompanies episodes.

But writers of the “The Accountants” received no specific payment for their work and receive no residuals from their continued play. Writers from “The Office,” including Greg Daniels, an executive producer, have objected to that and refused to work on further shorts without a separate agreement.

There is some dispute over exactly what writers want in such agreements, however. Representatives of the studios, who agreed to speak only on the condition of anonymity, said writers were asking to be paid a percentage of the retail price of movies and television episodes downloaded over services like iTunes, and a percentage of the advertising revenues generated when movies or television shows or mini-episodes — like those from “The Office” and “Lost” — are streamed online.

To the studios that is like the manufacturer of a product’s being asked to pay its workers based on the retail price of what it makes, something the manufacturer has no control over.

Mr. Slocum disputes that, however, saying that the guild is only seeking to be paid a portion of the wholesale price of downloaded content, and a portion of the licensing fee that the studios receive for streamed content. In other words, Mr. Slocum says that the writers are seeking what the studios have said, in principal, that they are willing to pay.

The two sides don’t agree on when payments should begin. The studios want a six-week window in which they can replay full episodes of a television series without paying extra. The time is necessary, they say, to “promote” the series, allowing viewers who missed a show’s regular broadcast to catch up. The writers have said they would accept a much shorter window, of about three days.

Another sticking point remains in how licensing fees are measured. Because ABC Studios, which produces “Lost,” is owned by the same company that owns the ABC television network, which operates ABC.com, the Writers Guild questions whether the licensing fee being paid from one related party to another is being negotiated fairly.

The guild argues that the best indicator of what is a fair licensing fee is how much advertising revenue the Web site can earn selling ads for the Internet content. The studios object to advertising revenue being brought into the equation at all.

With the two parties seeming to agree in principle that there can be a way for studios to pay writers when their scripts are used for Internet content, the studios and the writers would seem to have already established some sort of foundation for a settlement.

Perhaps that recognition helped push the two sides to agree to return to the bargaining table in a week. As Mr. Cuse said of “The Missing Pieces” episodes, “It’s ironic that these are coming out and flourishing when this is the crux of the issue in our strike.”
 
Last edited:
VintagePunk said:
I'm abstaining from watching them (no matter how much I may want to) because the writers are not being paid for them. I'll wait till they get a deal, and then catch up.


Because that will do what exactly?

If everyone thought that way the only result would be no more webisodes.
 
Lancemc said:



Because that will do what exactly?

If everyone thought that way the only result would be no more webisodes.

It will be one less person clicking up the page counters of the networks, and one less viewer number they can take to the advertisers to make income off of ad revenue from the pages that the webisodes appear on, while the writers who actually did some of the work toward it get squat for their efforts.
 
VintagePunk said:


It will be one less person clicking up the page counters of the networks, and one less viewer number they can take to the advertisers to make income off of ad revenue from the pages that the webisodes appear on, while the writers who actually did some of the work toward it get squat for their efforts.

And again, how exactly does that help the writers.

So one less number for the page counter, great. That makes no difference "for the cause". And what if hundreds of people choice not to watch them out of spite for the network? Still nothing. What if thousands and thousands choose not to? Now we're getting into deeper shit. "Oh look, seems like these webisodes aren't really popular at all. We can't get advertisers to pay us for this, so we'll just stop making webisodes. Oh, are those pesky writers still asking for more share? Fuck them, their webisodes sucked anyway."
 
Lancemc said:


And again, how exactly does that help the writers.

So one less number for the page counter, great. That makes no difference "for the cause". And what if hundreds of people choice not to watch them out of spite for the network? Still nothing. What if thousands and thousands choose not to? Now we're getting into deeper shit. "Oh look, seems like these webisodes aren't really popular at all. We can't get advertisers to pay us for this, so we'll just stop making webisodes. Oh, are those pesky writers still asking for more share? Fuck them, their webisodes sucked anyway."

If you don't think it'll be effective, don't do it. I know people from various sites are - honestly, I don't know whether it'll have an effect or not, but I'm still doing it. Some have even started a letter writing campaign to let the networks know what they're doing, and why. I'm not quite that hardcore, I'm too lazy to actively participate. :wink:

I don't think the networks are quite as obtuse as you're making out. They'll see the pre-strike numbers and I'm sure they'll look at post-strike numbers too. I'm sure they'll make the connection, if the numbers are significant.
 
They won't be, and these webisodes started around the same time as the strike, no? Or shortly before. So there wouldn't be much pre-strike and post strike numbers to compare.

I'm all in favor of letter writing and other forms of protest, but this is just too indirect to have much of an effect.
 
lazarus said:
They won't be, and these webisodes started around the same time as the strike, no? Or shortly before. So there wouldn't be much pre-strike and post strike numbers to compare.

I'm all in favor of letter writing and other forms of protest, but this is just too indirect to have much of an effect.

Other shows have had webisodes for ages, it's not just Lost.

The way I figure it, at the very least, a decrease in viewing numbers will affect ad revenue, hitting the greedy bastards where it hurts.
 
'Lost' returns Jan. 31

Lost fans have long been dying to get back to the future, and their wait is almost over: ABC will debut season 4 of the island drama on Thursday, Jan. 31 at 9 p.m. This scheduling move keeps the series out of harm's way (read: American Idol), and will also please tired fans who had trouble last season staying up Wednesday nights until 11 p.m. It's believed that eight episodes of the show will air on consecutive Thursdays (the other half of the season is still TBD because of the strike).

yay
 
I have a buddy that works in scheduling at ABC. He's watched the first 3 episodes and says they're great. He's usually pretty objective, so, this bodes well.
 
Well, they can't be worse than the beginning of last season, where we only saw Jack, Kate and Sawyer for like 3 episodes. That little mini-season almost drove me away. Thankfully it picked up in the second half, especially when they got rid of those worthless eye candy tools.

Buried alive FTW.
 
HE'S MY SON!... I barely know him, and I'd kill all of you cuz HE'S MY SON!
 
Back
Top Bottom