A newspaper ad placed by Hollywood studios touts their contract offer to the Screen Actors Guild as a groundbreaking deal that mirrors those already accepted by other industry unions.
Meanwhile, guild leaders pressed their case at a weekend SAG meeting attended by an estimated 700 people and got an enthusiastic reception, Daily Variety reported on its Web site Sunday.
SAG President Alan Rosenberg and Doug Allen, national executive director, said over the weekend that negotiations are continuing despite the studios’ insistence that they put their final offer on the table June 30.
The SAG leaders didn’t discuss strategy but Allen noted that SAG still could strike, Variety said. The union has not scheduled a strike authorization vote.
The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers ad, to appear Monday in the Los Angeles Times, is titled “The Deal: Let’s Keep Working” and includes comments made by other union leaders about their agreements reached earlier this year.
Writers Guild of America, West, President Patric M. Verrone is quoted as calling the writers’ contract “the best the guild has bargained for in 30 years” — a comment he made in March when WGA leaders recommended the proposal to its members.
The ad repeats the studios’ contention that their three-year offer to SAG would give members $250 million in additional compensation and “the same groundbreaking new-media terms that have already served as the cornerstone” of other major industry agreements.
In explaining its rejection of the offer, SAG has disputed that figure and cited shortfalls in pay and union jurisdiction on made-for-Internet productions. It claims the deal would allow nonunion actors into almost all new-media productions for the foreseeable future.
SAG did not immediately respond Sunday night to an e-mail request seeking comment on the alliance ad.
The two sides met several times since June 30, when the current contract expired, but no progress has been reported. No new meetings were scheduled.
Producers have said if their final offer is not ratified by Aug. 15, any proposed wage increases would not be made retroactive to July 1, potentially costing actors more than $200,000 a day.
SAG represents 120,000 actors in movies, TV and other media.
Apple and Google Face UK Investigation Into Mobile Browser Dominance
Apple and Google aren't giving consumers a genuine choice of mobile web browsers, a British watchdog said Friday in a report that recommends they face an investigation under new U.K. digital rules taking effect next year.
The Competition and Markets Authority took aim at Apple, saying the iPhone maker's tactics hold back innovation by stopping rivals from giving users new features like faster webpage loading. Apple does this by restricting progressive web apps, which don't need to be downloaded from an app store and aren't subject to app store commissions, the report said.
"This technology is not able to fully take off on iOS devices," the watchdog said in a provisional report on its investigation into mobile browsers that it opened after an initial study concluded that Apple and Google effectively have a chokehold on "mobile ecosystems."
The CMA's report also found that Apple and Google manipulate the choices given to mobile phone users to make their own browsers "the clearest or easiest option."
And it said that the a revenue-sharing deal between the two U.S. Big Tech companies "significantly reduces their financial incentives" to compete in mobile browsers on Apple's iOS operating system for iPhones.
Both companies said they will "engage constructively" with the CMA.
Apple said it disagreed with the findings and said it was concerned that the recommendations would undermine user privacy and security.
Google said the openness of its Android mobile operating system "has helped to expand choice, reduce prices and democratize access to smartphones and apps" and that it's "committed to open platforms that empower consumers."
It's the latest move by regulators on both sides of the Atlantic to crack down on the... Read More