WGA and AMPTP Reach Tentative Deal

Before you get too excited, remember the words of the great New York Yankee Yogi Berra, "It ain't over till it's over." Early Saturday morning, a draft of the agreement reached between the WGA and AMPTP was delivered via email to the 10,500 members of the WGA.

Here are some highlights of the letter Patric M. Verrone (President of the WGAW) and Michael Winship (President of the WGAE) sent out to the membership:

We have a tentative deal. It is an agreement that protects a future in which the Internet becomes the primary means of both content creation and delivery. It creates formulas for revenue-based residuals in new media, provides access to deals and financial data to help us evaluate and enforce those formulas, and establishes the principle that, "When they get paid, we get paid."

Over these three difficult months, we shut down production of nearly all scripted content in TV and film and had a serious impact on the business of our employers in ways they did not expect and were hard pressed to deflect.

Nevertheless, an ongoing struggle against seven, multinational media conglomerates, no matter how successful, is exhausting, taking an enormous personal toll on our members and countless others.

As such, we believe that continuing to strike now will not bring sufficient gains to outweigh the potential risks and that the time has come to accept this contract and settle the strike.

Today, WGA members are meeting in New York and Los Angeles to get a general consensus as to whether or not the membership feels the time has come to accept the deal and if it needs to be put to a membership vote before calling off the strike. If the deal is generally accepted by the membership, WGA leaders will make any necessary final adjustments and the strike will come to an end before the membership votes (the producers insisted that this be part of the deal).

If all goes well, the writers will be back at work on Monday and perhaps some of this television season will be salvaged. If the membership hates the deal or insists that they vote before lifting the strike, well.....get ready for more garbage on the tube this spring. Stay tuned - you'll know the strike has been called off the minute we do!

• Complete Writers Strike Coverage
• View the Tentative Agreement