• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

John August

  • Arlo Finch
  • Scriptnotes
  • Library
  • Store
  • About

Film Industry

FTC proposes new merger guidelines

August 21, 2023 Film Industry, News, WGA

The Federal Trade Commission and Department of Justice have drafted new merger guidelines outlining how the agencies should approach corporate consolidations.

Here are the key points:

  1. Mergers should not significantly increase concentration in highly concentrated markets.
  2. Mergers should not eliminate substantial competition between firms.
  3. Mergers should not increase the risk of coordination.
  4. Mergers should not eliminate a potential entrant in a concentrated market.
  5. Mergers should not substantially lessen competition by creating a firm that controls products or services that its rivals may use to compete.
  6. Vertical mergers should not create market structures that foreclose competition.
  7. Mergers should not entrench or extend a dominant position.
  8. Mergers should not further a trend toward concentration.
  9. When a merger is part of a series of multiple acquisitions, the agencies may examine the whole series.
  10. When a merger involves a multi-sided platform, the agencies examine competition between platforms, on a platform, or to displace a platform.
  11. When a merger involves competing buyers, the agencies examine whether it may substantially lessen competition for workers or other sellers.
  12. When an acquisition involves partial ownership or minority interests, the agencies examine its impact on competition.
  13. Mergers should not otherwise substantially lessen competition or tend to create a monopoly.

These are good principles! Notably, they’re not obsessed with whether a merger is likely to raise prices for consumers. Rather, they look more broadly at how consolidation impacts all the components of an industry.

The FTC has invited public comment on these draft guidelines. As of today, there are over 1,000 comments. The WGA has encouraged its members to share their experiences. Citizens working in every industry should write in as well. Mergers affect all of us, and these policies could shape the next few decades.

I submitted my comment today. Here’s what I wrote.


I’m a screenwriter and novelist who has seen firsthand the impact of mergers and consolidation in the film and publishing industries. That’s why I’m writing in support of the FTC and DOJ’s Draft Merger Guidelines. We need to revive and rethink antitrust enforcement in this country so that it recognizes consolidation’s impact on workers, sellers, consumers and citizens.

My work as a screenwriter has found me working for both Disney (including 2019’s Aladdin) and what remains of Fox (where I currently have a series in development). I believe Disney should never have been allowed to buy 21st Century Fox in 2019. Not only did it increase concentration and reduce competition for consumers, it did the same for writers. This issue is addressed in Point 11 of your draft guidelines: “When a merger involves competing buyers, the agencies examine whether it may substantially lessen competition for workers or other sellers.”

When Disney bought Fox, it came at the immediate cost of redundant employees’ jobs. It then created downward pressure on the wages throughout the industry, with one less buyer for the services of writers, directors, actors and crew.

I can offer a specific example from my own experience. In 2018, Fox brought me in to meet on a high-profile book adaption for their Fox Family division. By the time it came to make my writing deal, the proposed Disney merger was announced and the division wasn’t allowed to pursue any project that might compete with Disney’s own. All of the executives on the project were let go.

In the process of Hollywood development, projects disappear and executives get fired all the time. What was unique is how this merger broke so many pieces simultaneously, from studio feature films to indies to cable to broadcast television. We should consider not just the immediate negative impact, but also the after effects. Tom Rothman, who used to run Fox’s film division, noted that “Consolidation under giant corporate mandates rarely promotes creative risk-taking. And in the long run, it is always a challenge to compete against horizontal monopolistic power.”

I also work as an author, with three books published by Macmillan and an upcoming book published by Crown (Penguin Random House). Consolidation in the industry means that 60% of books published in English come from just five publishers, and we nearly dropped to four. They have unprecedented control over the market, limiting options for retailers, authors and readers.

I’m a proud member of the Writers Guild of America, West, and have served on both its board and negotiating committee. The entertainment industry’s history of unchecked consolidation is a major factor in the strike of 11,500 writers including myself on May 2 against our employers, who collectively negotiate our three year contract as the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP). SAG-AFTRA has joined us on strike, their 170,000 members seeking a contract that fairly compensates us for the value we create.

It is essential that antitrust agencies consider how any future proposed mergers in this industry — such as the long-rumored Apple/Disney deal — would impact writers and other industry workers. It’s not enough to wait and see; antitrust agencies should proactively investigate and announce decisions, so CEOs don’t propose deals that paralyze the industry.

These Draft Merger Guidelines are the solid principles we need to maintain a vibrant, competitive environment that serves all Americans.

Thank you for the consideration of my comments.


You can submit your own comment on the FTC’s public comment page.

The One with Patton Oswalt

Episode - 589

Go to Archive

February 28, 2023 Books, Film Industry, Scriptnotes, Talk, Transcribed

John and Craig welcome comedian, actor, writer and Jeopardy! champion Patton Oswalt to discuss joke structure and building standup specials. Patton pulls back the curtain on his writing process, how he develops a comedic premise, and earning an audience’s trust.

We also dissect M.O.D.O.K., punching up other people’s scripts, and the art of adaptation. We then answer a listener’s question about writing films that include standup comedy.

In our bonus segment for premium members, we discuss characters who keep secrets for no reas– there’s no time to explain!

Links:

  • Patton Oswalt on IMDb, Twitter and Instagram
  • “Wackity Schmackity Doo!” from Patton Oswalt’s Werewolves and Lollipops
  • Animation of Patton’s “Christmas Shoes” joke
  • “The Ham Incident” from Patton Oswalt’s Finest Hour
  • M.O.D.O.K. on Hulu
  • Silver Screen Fiend by Patton Oswalt
  • Clinical Practice Guideline for the Evaluation and Treatment of Children and Adolescents With Obesity by the American Academy of Pediatrics
  • Dracula: The Evidence by Beehive Books
  • Melanie Lynskey answers questions for Dear Prudence
  • Murderers’ Row – Melanie Lynskey by Scout Tafoya
  • The Unloved by Scout Tafoya for RogerEbert.com
  • Get a Scriptnotes T-shirt!
  • Check out the Inneresting Newsletter
  • Gift a Scriptnotes Subscription or treat yourself to a premium subscription!
  • Craig Mazin on Instagram
  • John August on Twitter
  • John on Instagram
  • John on Mastodon
  • Outro by Timothy Lenko (send us yours!)
  • Scriptnotes is produced by Drew Marquardt and edited by Matthew Chilelli.

Email us at ask@johnaugust.com

You can download the episode here.

UPDATE 4-11-23 The transcript for this episode can be found here.

Whither Westworld

December 13, 2022 Asides, Film Industry, Television

Like most writers, I’m trying to understand these wild moves at HBO Max.

Cancelling Westworld? Sure. Happens all the time. That’s TV.

Ditching an unaired season you’ve already shot, like what just happened to Minx? That’s heartbreaking, but I guess not unprecedented after Batwoman.

Pulling Westworld off the service is just bonkers to me. My only guess is that they’re going to stick it on an ad-based service with a different residual formula.

Makes it hard to want to make a show for HBO Max.

I mistakenly titled this post “Wither Westworld” instead of “Whither Westworld” and both work.

PayUpHollywood progress, an update from ‘Christian’

October 10, 2022 Film Industry, First Person, Follow Up, Television

Three years ago — October 8, 2019 — a writer who went by “Christian” emailed about their experience as a writer’s PA, explaining how they were expected to do the jobs of multiple support staff on a tiny salary. We discussed their email on the show, including the issue of needing to have a car.

Last week at the premiere event for The Simpsons’ Treehouse of Horror XXXIII (delightful, btw), I met “Christian” in person. They filled me in on what had happened in the past three years.

Some legitimate progress had been made, which Christian felt could be traced to the #PayUpHollywood movement. Their pay had gone up from minimum wage — but not necessarily to a living wage — and conversations about pay were becoming more open. That’s the good news.

Frustratingly, studios were still balking at reimbursing staff for things like assistants’ use of their own cell phones. Showrunners weren’t willing to engage on getting assistant and support staff properly compensated for their hours. It felt like the same grind for a few dollars more.

Christian ended up quitting work as a writer’s PA to focus on their writing, which had gone neglected for two years due to stress and overwork. I asked what advice they’d give to a writer who was looking at taking a coveted showrunner’s assistant job.

Honestly, do it for one show, one season. Learn everything you possibly can. Make contacts. Then get a job as a receptionist at a law firm so you can have the time to write.

This week, Christian wrote in with some follow-up thoughts.


first personI wanted to thank you for not only graciously listening to me ramble last night, but asking me how things were going. As you could probably assume from what I said, it’s been a lot of ups and downs.

I won’t bug you further with the details behind my experiences, but just want to make it known that my toxic boss and the refusal to provide pay parity or stipends for what we were legally owed was happening on essentially both the studio’s and network’s biggest drama cash cow. So there really isn’t any excuse for nickel and dime-ing the assistants, other than the fact that they can.

But really, it doesn’t matter what the budget is, there’s no excuse for screwing the lowest paid workers out of fair wages when these corporations are making billions of dollars a year. The money is there. They just don’t care.

It doesn’t help that there’s a huge line of people willing to accept things as they are because they believe getting an assistant job is a ticket to staffing. (The person who took over my desk when I left was a previously staffed writer, who had left the industry for personal reasons, and was so hell-bent on getting a foot “back inside” that they accepted the demotion to Showrunner’s Assistant on a desk that doesn’t promote up and isn’t particularly kind. So there were really no consequences to my toxic former boss or the show for behaving so poorly.)

And I’m not sure that there’s an easy solution, because even though my boss was not supportive, I know countless assistants who do have supportive bosses, and even their bosses have gotten stonewalled when trying to help their assistants get paid what they’re owed. One example: a friend’s boss actually carved out the show budget so that there would be enough to pay each assistant $20/hr (this is back in 2019 I believe, well before union negotiations), and the studio refused to allow the Showrunner to pay the assistants that because it would “start a precedent.”

Even today, I have a friend who got promoted to manager at her POD, but is still getting paid at the assistant rate AND having to cover her former boss’s desk because the studio won’t give the POD the budget for a managerial wage and a new assistant until the POD has “more projects in development.” Currently, this POD has the #1 show on its network, a spinoff in the works, and several other projects being pitched around town.

I feel as though ultimately the only solution seems to be to unionize every assistant position at every level, but that is a hefty, years-long goal filled with complications and extra financial barriers for those who are already struggling to make ends meet, or even just to break in.

And in the meantime, I think the only other thing to do is to make it really, REALLY clear that being an assistant isn’t a gateway to becoming a writer anymore. It’s purely a networking tool at this point, and you should use it to build up connections with supportive writers, then get out and find something that pays better with less hours so you can hone your craft (unless, of course, you are lucky enough to land a boss who actually will lift you up). And, just to note from my own job search over the past few months, almost everything pays better for less hours outside of the entertainment industry.

One more thing that I really think assistants need, and I wish that the WGA or even IATSE offered, was a course on financial literacy. I know this isn’t something that’s a problem specific to assistants, or even to this industry, but it’s something I think every assistant would really benefit from, and it would give them more capability to walk away from bad situations, rather than staying because they need the money.

I think the biggest takeaway I’ve gotten from becoming financially literate is that you don’t need a lot of money to learn how to better manage it. I was essentially broke when I started to understand my finances. In fact, I think it’s more important to understand money when you don’t have it. Especially if you’re also trying to pay off debt. That’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot and also contemplating in the context of being an assistant.

Sorry for such a novel of an email. After our conversation, I felt there was a lot I had left out that was more useful than what I had actually said, so I hope that this has been of value for your time.

Next Page »

Primary Sidebar

Newsletter

Inneresting Logo A Quote-Unquote Newsletter about Writing
Read Now

Explore

Projects

  • Aladdin (1)
  • Arlo Finch (27)
  • Big Fish (87)
  • Charlie (39)
  • Charlie's Angels (16)
  • Chosen (2)
  • Corpse Bride (9)
  • Dead Projects (18)
  • Frankenweenie (10)
  • Go (30)
  • Karateka (4)
  • Monsterpocalypse (3)
  • One Hit Kill (6)
  • Ops (6)
  • Preacher (2)
  • Prince of Persia (13)
  • Shazam (6)
  • Snake People (6)
  • Tarzan (5)
  • The Nines (118)
  • The Remnants (12)
  • The Variant (22)

Apps

  • Bronson (14)
  • FDX Reader (11)
  • Fountain (32)
  • Highland (72)
  • Less IMDb (4)
  • Weekend Read (34)

Recommended Reading

  • First Person (87)
  • Geek Alert (147)
  • WGA (158)
  • Workspace (19)

Screenwriting Q&A

  • Adaptation (66)
  • Directors (90)
  • Education (49)
  • Film Industry (488)
  • Formatting (129)
  • Genres (90)
  • Glossary (6)
  • Pitches (29)
  • Producers (59)
  • Psych 101 (117)
  • Rights and Copyright (96)
  • So-Called Experts (47)
  • Story and Plot (170)
  • Television (164)
  • Treatments (21)
  • Words on the page (238)
  • Writing Process (178)

More screenwriting Q&A at screenwriting.io

© 2023 John August — All Rights Reserved.