2nd Order Effects

I keep hearing this term lately, 2nd Order Effects. It is the idea that when something takes place, called a 1st Order Occurrence, there are associated 2nd order effects as a result. In the context I am using, the Writers of the WGA and the Actors of SAG in 1st Order Occurrences, went on strike. Those Union members were clearly affected. The 2nd order effects are that non-striking Below the Line workers and Film industry vendors covering everything from catering to camera rentals have been bled dry after almost a year of anticipatory production shutdowns, followed by the actual strikes.

Now the Writer’s themselves are also part of the 2nd Order Effects as they have settled a new contract, but the Actors go on with a 1st Order Occurrence. As we pass the 100 day mark of the SAG strike, it’s important to understand the 2nd Order Effect concept, and how being the afterthoughts of a negotiation has been devastating for the greater Film Community.

Decades ago, when I was working out of offices on Hollywood Boulevard, there was a little tailor shop in the lobby of the building. Any time I needed pants hemmed, or more likely a jacket taken in or let out due to my yo-yoing weight, I would take my business there. I got to know the tailor on a first name basis, though his name is lost now to the tumbleweeds blowing through my synapses. What I do remember, is that his main source of income was altering military uniforms for the TV series JAG. When the series concluded, he told me he was hoping to find something else before long, or else the shop would have to close. He didn’t and it did.

This was my abject lesson and just how close to the bone most workers in the film industry actually are. Our fortunes can rise and fall with the whims of studio executives and Union negotiators. Most aren’t doing it for the love of the game, it’s simply how the trajectory of their work and life turned out. Don’t bother pining for me or my agent fraternity. We’re well aware we live and die by the sword. Huge swings in our fortunes are expected and planned for. Conversely, the fact is, most Film workers are freelance and move job to job with limited financial safety nets. Camera Operators, 2nd and 3rd Grips, Location Scouts, PA’s and down the line to Crafties and Coneheads all are show to show and paycheck to paycheck. Being out of work for a year simply drives them to other industries to survive. Many won’t be back and the Industry overall will feel it.

So while Ari Emmanuel and Brian Lourd trade barbs in the press about 7 Billion Dollar valuations, and their support of Harvey Weinstein and Vince McMahon, there are Union Crane Operators now installing shower doors for their Brothers-In Law. While Fran Drescher ridiculously suggests a 57 cent per subscriber levy to go to the Actors alone, there are 2nd Assistant Costumers trying to eke out an existence, by driving 30 miles from home, sitting in a parking lot and waiting for Uber Eats orders to pop up on their phones.

The fact is, at the moment there are Oscar winning BTL workers, doing Sabras Hummus commercials to make the mortgage. While there is absolutely nothing wrong with this, those jobs would normally go to the Journeymen and Women who are making their way up to big budget movie jobs. They themselves are currently slashing their rates and doing non-union In-House corporate films. Again, nothing wrong there, but those jobs should be going to the up and comers, just learning the craft, and the downward trajectory continues.

My point is, while the world looks at the Hollywood strikes with a “what’s their problem, they get to work in the movies?” attitude, on the ground there are real world problems occurring. Real families who are suffering and will continue to suffer long into the future. See my article about Allostasis for more on the dynamics of that.

I am not saying that the Studios or SAG is to blame for all of this. No, wait, yes that’s exactly what I’m saying. There is massive Hubris and a tone deaf attitude that permeates these negotiations that only results is what’s best for stock price and direct constituency. There is little concern for the 200,000 other film workers that have Deadline on refresh, hoping for any positive motion in the negotiations, who are so close to not even making it to Christmas.

So, 2nd Order Effects, are they real? Ask the old Tailor, wherever he is. The effects are all around us now and will absolutely continue past the Gang of Four CEOs and the SAG negotiators patting each other on the back for striking a new deal. What about next year when the IATSE contract is up? Likely, they will be in no financial shape, with no support from the other tired Unions, and with no leverage to make any advances in compensation or working conditions. They will have to settle with a capitol “S.” For them, for production workers, for Vendors, the 2nd Order Effects will just keep coming.

I Love the Smell of Allostasis in the Morning…

I’m going to start this week with a bit of a physics lesson. Bear with me, it comes back around.

I’ve been reading an interesting book, “Master of Change” by Brad Stulberg. In it, he brings up the concepts of Homeostasis versus Allostasis in managing rapid change, which I can use here to illustrate where I’m going with my views on what recovery from the strikes may look like.

Homeostasis is the process from which you start at a set point, for example you are healthy. A deviation from the set point occurs, for example, you get a cold. Your body fights the cold and when you recover, you return to the set point. That’s Homeostasis. Allostasis on the other hand, is the process of a deviation from the set point, but instead of eventually returning to the same set point, you return to a new and different set point. It could be better or worse than the original, but the new set point helps you to adapt to future deviations in more effective ways.

I saw a blogpost from a journalist today that said, “the Writer’s strike is over and the CEOs lost!” Yeah, not exactly. Everybody lost, especially BTL workers and IATSE and everybody else won. I know the WGA negotiators have to claim victory, well, because if they had only won 7 and 1/2 cents (Pajama Game Reference) and Work From Home rights from 6am to 7am on every 3rd Friday of the month they’d be claiming victory.

Yes, the deal looks good, and the WGA made major gains so maybe they did win. However, if the CEOs had wanted to, they could have made the same deal on May 2nd that they made on September 24th. Don’t fool yourselves, this is the deal they were always going to make. They didn’t just swallow hard and agree to the WGA demands.

From the Gang of Four CEO’s perspective, manufacturing a prolonged strike forced the studios to all stop production at the same time, creating no competition among themselves while they all saved 100s of millions to contract and reboot their streaming businesses to a version that might actually be profitable. Plus the two quarters of better earnings reports they could take credit for to their stockholders helps them keep their jobs. I will maintain to the grave that they wanted this to happen, and the WGA itself led their constituency right over the cliff. But then again, with no contract, what the hell were they supposed to do? See what I mean? Not much to take credit for, not much to take blame for. Just another day in Hollywood.

The Studios orchestrated this, and long before May 2nd. They were pulling the plug on production from the beginning of the year. This “pause” was planned well in advance, and made a reality by intractability of not only their positions, but the mere lack of willingness to have meaningful dialogue before the strike and right up until after Labor Day.

So now what? Now we all try to recover from Capitalism at its most obvious. How do we do that? Slowly. The deviation from the last set point has not been a cold that was over in a week. It is a major health event that will take years to adjust to. Try as I might, I was not able to find any relevant data or studies showing short and longterm effects from labor stoppages to provide context. Any statistics I did find only covered regular employees, and not free-lancers of which so much of the industry is made up of. So, we’re left with our experience to draw from.

2007-2008, when the Writers went out for 100 days in the midst of a real estate crash and the Great Recession provides the best and most recent comparison. The most pressing question is, how does anyone striking or affected by the strikes make up for lost income? The answer to that one is you really don’t. You lick your wounds and move on. It’s like in the Dark Ages when they came through the village in the morning with a wagon shouting bring out your dead! You dragged Grandpa’s carcass out of the hovel, and got on with your life.

We will not be able avoid a new and different set point where we will have to adapt to a new and different version of work as we know it.

I was running an agency during the 2007-2008 strike, though much smaller than now with low overhead. Even so, I wasn’t sure if I would make it financially, but did by the skin of my teeth, because I was very focused on TV Commercials, and we were still in the broadcast and cable era. While watching my agent friends in Features and Television struggle at that time, I became a big proponent of diversification lest someday the tables were turned and Commercials became the focus of a strike, which it eventually did. So, as WPA developed, my droning mantra of a balanced roster probably made everyone around me roll their eyes hundreds of times daily.

I still believe in diversification to hedge downturns. However, not at the level of CAA, WME and UTA, (see my last blog on those dynamics,) their vastly over diversified holdings are toxic to creativity and subjugates the Artist. Fine for movie stars and moguls, but if you’re trying to build a career, you will be left behind on the path of least resistance in service to shareholder returns. Plus, their lack of action during these strikes to leverage the AMPTP should not go un-noticed. The concentration for big agencies during the strikes on shedding agents and further diversification into far flung businesses should tell Artists all they need to know about their intent and plans for the future.

Here’s what I think we can expect in getting to a new set point and, you guessed it “acceptance of Allostasis”: SAG/AFTRA will settle with the AMPTP during October. We’ll see an uptick of projects going into prep. We hear from studio sources that some projects are just waiting to flip the switch, further convincing me that the studios are orchestrating the end of the strikes as much as the beginning. Netflix never stopped production, they just continued offshore with non-union crews and talent for specific markets. I don’t believe they’ll ever really be back. Our talent is now too expensive.

The actual set point is, January 2024 is when most will be back to work in an industry that will now produce 15%-20% fewer projects per year. Not even with significant salary and residuals gains can the WGA and SAG/AFTRA members expect amortized yearly income to increase over the next three years, based on the fact that by January, they will have lost at least eight to ten months of salary.

“I get knocked down, but I get up again, cause you’re never gonna keep me down…” – Chumba Wumba.

But, certainly all is not lost. The Allostasis of the moment demands us to all stay lean, mean and creative. I actually love the position that WPA is in, as the big agencies become more bloated and more dependent on debt, acquisitions and the aims of hedge fund managers, we remain independent, true representatives of Artists. Lithe and agile, and when it comes to diversification, only in support of our Artists and employees.

I suggest you do a version of the same. When your finances begin to recover, stay lean and mean for an extra eight months at a minimum to cover the lost revenue. That’s the best way to stay true to your art.

Hollywood is the lovechild of Art and Capitalism. Success depends on your ability to adapt and evolve. Onward.

To Live or Die in LA

It’s time to call it like I see it.

On August 11th, CAA laid-off 60 staff and the “Hollywood back room” says more CAA lay-offs are on the way. All in the midst of 7 Billion Dollar valuation for the transfer of majority ownership from TPG to Artemis and François-Henri Pinault. Most of the original round of lay-offs were low paid support staff and junior agents making well under $100k per year. Even by generous math, the savings are still under 3 million dollars.

Now, 3 million dollars is not nothing, but with a corporate valuation of 7 billion? Shedding 3 million in staff can’t even be explained as salary shedding to make the agency more attractive to acquisition. It was only some kind virtue signaling. “There are strikes and we’re being victimized” (boo-hoo) is the only message. So, let’s do a short review. Basically, CAA threw 60 hard working people to the curb for PR purposes. They are preparing to put more staff on the unemployment line for PR. This is the undisputed leader in talent representation? Really?

But, you say “they have the most influence in Hollywood, of course I want to be repped by them.” Along with WME and UTA you are probably right about influence based on brand equity, but are they even still in the representation business?

In 2018, I decided to take $2000 and put it in some stocks on Scott Trade. I chose Tesla as one of the stocks and put in $600 for 3 shares. I then promptly forgot about it and didn’t look at it until Scott Trade was bought by E Trade or some other Trade, I can’t remember. Me being me, I still didn’t look at it until October 2022. My 3 shares had split a bunch of times and the stock went up. My 3 shares had become 75, and my $600 was now worth $27,000. Something Trade was bought by Schwab and the beat goes on.

But, Elon Musk. I was fine with his shenanigans throughout the Twitter/X thing, Space X, Starlink, and so forth, until he started making Anti-Semetic comments and encouraging Neo-Nazis on the X platform. I don’t do Anti-Semetic, and I don’t do Nazis, Neo, quasi, Nazi curious or otherwise. I know the stock will continue to go up and continue to split, but I sold it and I’m out. He doesn’t represent my values. He may never have and I just noticed it, but when I did, I didn’t hesitate. I’m out.

You may say that I have a false equivalency going on here. I’m not calling CAA, WME and UTA Fascist or Anti-Semetic. That would be stupid. I’m calling out Capitalistic ideologies that don’t fit with values. My question is, when the dust settles on the strikes, does talent want to build a new Hollywood, or go back to the practice of standing next to the biggest pile of movie stars and hoping it rubs off.

What are your values? If you’re reading this, I assume Art and Filmmaking. Years ago, I had a friend at the CFO level who interviewed at one of the big three agencies. He was told point blank, “we are not a talent agency, we’re in arbitrage.” This is a telling statement and it bears out. When WME has their deal with merging WWE and UFC having to be approved by the Fed, you’re really not in talent representation anymore. When hedge funds and stock holders control the decisions, you’re no longer representing talent, you are a financial instrument.

The last bastion of actual Hollywood business for the big agencies was “packaging.” A great deal of their corporate strategy depended on the big money of being in the producer pool of hit shows. It was talent related sort of, and it was indeed illegal, but it did benefit talent, again sort of. The law says you can’t control the talent and the product. Simple. I think they settled the dispute with the WGA over packaging because it became apparent that they would never win in court. Also, trial exposure would bring scrutiny on gray area anti-trust issues, and other monopolistic practices that they partake in.

With that revenue stream gone, the big three have needed to keep diversifying to keep stockholders happy. Once you get past movie star commissions, what is representation really worth to them? The answer is talent revenue that lags way behind sports leagues, advertising agencies and venture capital operations that all of the major talent agencies are heavily invested in. To get the right flavor of business at the big three these days, check out this article regarding Endeavor (WME) and the UFC/WWE merger. It’s all about stock buy backs, selling off of divisions of other companies WME owns. Boggles the mind actually.

For the big 3 agencies, repping talent isn’t worthless, but it’s far from the priority. The priority is Market Cap and EBIDA, and you can’t convince me otherwise. I read too much to see it any other way.

As part of their shedding of employees, during the Pandemic and the WGA Packaging action, the Big 3 took the opportunity to lay off scores of agents to redirect resources into bigger money making ventures. What became of them? Most became Managers. So, management, along with a handful of mid-sized, focused agencies like WPA are now the face of representation. However, the difference between a manager and an agent, is that managers are not supposed to procure work. They are supposed to tend to personal business management and production of the artist’s personal production ventures. They can also act as producers as they don’t hold Talent Agency Licenses (or any talent license for that matter.)

So, what’s next? I think you need to look at the inertia of what’s happening. The big agencies will continue to be in arbitrage first, acquisition diversification second, and representation a distant third. The management companies will be representation first, production second and scaling third. And by scaling I mean, they will start to consolidate, much as the agencies have done, as evidenced by the recent acquisition of Brillstein Grey by Wasserman. The question is, at what point do these consolidations start to run afoul of the legal partitions that separate agencies and management companies? Or, do we not care about those laws anymore? Maybe some don’t, but the laws are still on the books, and at some point there they will have to change the laws or enforce them. Clearly, the ecosystem is out of balance.

In this view, the strikes seem old fashioned and quaint. Yes, the WGA Strike has perhaps found its resolution, with SAG and AMPTP hopefully back to the table next week. But, when this is all over what business is everyone in? I’ve been spouting for the last few weeks that when you have a Civil War, there’s a winner and loser of course, but essentially the war itself has destroyed the place. What will rise from the ashes of the Strikes?

In my view, CAA, WME and UTA may as well change their names to Proctor & Gamble, Omnicom Group and Amazon. Conglomerates and holding companies just trying to stay on the right side of Anti-Trust Laws. They have used the pandemic and strikes to put their energies towards other things, like Arbitrage. OK, not LIKE arbitrage… arbitrage.

As an Agent whose company is wholly focused on representation, I can only point at my own values and ask, what’s best for the Artist? We’re coming through strikes that are asking Hollywood that question point blank. Labor are striking conglomerates and tech companies who are also in arbitrage, to the extent that how things actually get made, and the creative people responsible have had to take hostages to get their needs met. From the big 3 agencies, the silence, especially about the Writers and the suffering BTL workers has been deafening.

Is Talent at a crossroads where to make money, they need to be procured and sold as the product line at Amazon, to be peddled as part of a Capitalistic steamroller where products and people are just assets to be fit into an ever expanding Algorithm? Is that what is best for the Creative Artist? For Story telling? For Filmmaking? Talent needs to ask, do my reps represent the values of my creative vision?

In the end, I can only sweep my side of the street. So, I have to ask the big three agencies, what business are you in? Not the business you say you’re in, but the business that you’re really in. I think, to find out, we just have to follow the money.

Are The Wheels Coming Off?

Where were we? Ah yes, the Strikes. I start with an endearing anecdote, lay in a little dark knowledge during later paragraphs, then try to tie it all together at the end. Let’s see how I do.

The summer I was 13, a few friends and I decided to build a go-kart after someone gave us an old lawnmower engine to fool around with. I can’t remember the exact number of attempts to get the engine going, to turn the rear wheels, rig a cable to a pedal and have something to act as a brake. I remember it took a while, but we did it. We had found some metal rods somewhere for the axles, and the frame was made of 2x4s. What we didn’t have were front wheels. The rear wheels, nice metal hubbed ones off a wagon worked fine, but the front had nothing. At some point we hijacked the wheels from someone’s lawnmower.

We found out rather quickly the wheels need to move with the axle. We had made the mistake of attaching the front axle to the frame. We just figured the wheels needed to turn. But, when the axle doesn’t move with the wheels, all it does is create friction. Seeing as the front wheels were plastic, the wheel hubs melted and within five minutes they began to wobble before they just turned to goo and fell off.

A lot of yelling ensued the next time the lawn needed mowing, as a lawnmower missing two wheels is just halfway to becoming a go-kart. After that we managed to find actual go-kart wheels. They worked great, but in our desire to break a land speed record, we kept adjusting the carburetor to make the rig go faster, because let’s face it, the whole idea was to go as fast as possible. As I remember, this thing went very fast. I mean dangerously, you shouldn’t go this fast on 2x4s fast. Eventually even the go-kart wheels shredded into cascading bits of rubber, permanently ending our racing ambitions. We were forced to go back to shoplifting and vandalism for entertaining ourselves. Oh, I forgot to mention that we were bored, suburban miscreants.

We’d have been better off to go slower, cover less ground and maybe have the go-kart for a while longer.

The Streaming wars – stay with me here. Late stage Capitalism (see my last post) in media has forced all the parties to go faster and faster and cover more ground much to the detriment of everyone, including most of the Studios. The intense competition among Streamers, Tech companies, Studios and Big 3 Talent Agencies have driven prices up, production to unsustainable levels and created false expectations among Film Industry workers that the faster we all go, the more we’ll all prosper.

It doesn’t work that way. It never has. In the 1970’s and 80’s, when I was an actor sustaining myself mostly off of TV commercials, if I did a National Broadcast Commercial, I was in the money. If I did a Cable commercial, I made pennies in residuals because Cable was considered “New Media.”

Though I have been out of acting for 40 years, I know it’s been the same with VHS residuals, same later with DVD residuals, same later with On-Demand and Streaming residuals. It has always been a fight to get fair compensation on new media that has not been proven, wink, wink. But, if you can see it on the air supported by subscriptions or advertising, guess what? It’s proven.

There are two issues here. #1, the Union negotiating committees of the past 50 or so years have traded away the “unproven media” argument for issues of the moment like healthcare contributions (also very important) time and again, resulting in paltry contract increases in relation to the big money being made at the studio level, and then trying to negotiate the current contract to make up for the chasm. And #2, the Media heads repeatedly claim “unproven media,””precedent” and “cost of living increases only” while hiding profits and driving the industry economy so fast the wheels fall off and the workers are forced to strike due to the economic inequity.

The Sins of the Father

There’s a little bit of blame for everyone here. The divide between what has been negotiated in past decades and what is fair now is far too great to make up in one contract negotiation. Just refusing to work won’t do it either as part of the problem is how quickly technology is changing. Our new Tech Company/Studios/Talent Agency conglomerate Overlords need to support a sustainable economic model for Filmmakers that accounts for changes in technology, so they don’t have to be part time Uber Eats Drivers. That in itself is not too much to ask.

These dynamics are not even the fault of the current negotiators on either side. The Studio negotiators of the past claiming “New Media” needs lower compensation are all long gone, replaced by Streamers (Netflix) who refuse to let anyone see the data which forces compensation lower. The Union negotiators just trying to close a deal that gets any increase are all long gone, replaced by rightly inflexible activists who have had enough. But, the dynamic has not changed. Creatives, both Above and Below the Line have been asked in every media era to take less while the “unproven media” gets off the ground. Then when it does become highly profitable, which is pretty much right away, the Creatives don’t prosper along with the Studios, Streamers, Agencies, insert your current most powerful faction here… through lackluster bargaining, and/or a corporate ethos that socializes costs and privatizes profits.

Everyone needs to let it all go and come up with some new solutions. An ASCAP model as I outlined in a previous article might be a start? Something qualifiable and quantifiable that will work for decades, regardless of changes in technology. Not just a deal to get us to the next negotiation when the current technology will be outdated already. Maybe then the wheels will stay on? Netflix in particular has had to make this kind of deal for residuals in European countries where Federal Laws mandate it, with different deals for different countries.

But Can We?

The negotiating teams are now looking like the partizan divides we have in government. Each side wants all or nothing. Each side seems to want the other side to not exist at all. However, we are not in a fight of Republican or Democratic ideology. We are in a fight of being able to make a living or not on both sides. I’m not talking about the CEO’s or the Movie Stars. I’m talking about the hundreds of thousands of workers both working in BTL and in support positions at Streamers and Studios. We need to figure this out. Right now, today. There HAS to be a compromise or the Industry will bleed out.

We need to build a new go-kart with wheels that won’t melt or shred. Can it be all be done in the current negotiations? Doubtful, the divide is too expansive. Tech companies, Streamers and Studios all have different financial agendas and the AI question is unsolvable without defining litigation. Everyone being dug in for so long will undoubtedly result in a compromise no one is happy with. For what? So many people are already ruined as this has gone on too long in an un-winnable war of attrition.

The presence of an inflection point is clear. Maybe we need to say fuck it, and try building a go-kart – I don’t know, together? One that doesn’t make one part of the system infinitely more important than the others, making it necessary to make the whole industry idle while we figure out we’re only going fast for the sake of unbridled growth, big money now, market share competition, and not in the pursuit of Creativity and sustainable business models? Maybe a system where the axle moves with the wheels could work for future generations of Filmmakers without melting the industry into goo every ten years?

The alternative to effective collaboration are grown-up, more effective versions of suburban miscreants, just out to see what they can get away with. Been there, done that, and only good for an anecdote in a blog post 50 years later. I’d rather build something that lasts for the sake of building something that lasts…

As Hollywood Approaches the Singularity

The One Where CAAPPLEWMEFLIXUTAMETAAZON Came to Town

Hernan Cortes attacking the WGA picket-line in the Aztec capital city, Tenochtitlan in the year 1521.

I agree, CAAPPLEWMEFLIXUTAMETAAZON sounds a lot like a Aztec suburb of Tenochtitlan, and it has all of the Hollywood characteristics. An unbridled pleasure culture, ritualistic, yet casual human sacrifice, and many monuments to itself. 

Hollywood, much like the ancient Mexican city is also moving towards its own surrender to Cortes. It is in the process of systematically giving its power, freedom, and its dedication to art and artists away to an invading army of tech companies, big agencies and decisions based on stock price and/or returns. It’s only a matter of time before the “Big Three Agencies, ” or rather the “Big Three Entertainment Conglomerates” get swallowed up by the big four Tech Conglomerates.

As an economic system, we’re in the middle of Late Stage Capitalism. The striking members of the WGA and SAG/AFTRA are living this every day on the picket lines. For those of you who have never heard of Late Stage Capitalism, it is the natural progression of a Capitalistic system that results in consolidated power and monopolistic practices. The main symptoms becoming:

1. The commodification of everything: As tech companies have bought up competitors and new technologies, so too have the Mega Agencies. They have made countless acquisitions of smaller agencies, thus eliminating competition, and have veered into sports, buying up operations such as UFC, the WWE and PBR (Pro Bull Riding?) and others. They all have Venture Capital divisions, investing in everything from electronic gaming to niche tech start-ups.
2. Economic Disparities and Worker Rights: Historically, Hollywood has had its battles with fair worker compensation and rights (think of WGA and SAG/AFTRA strikes going back to the early 1960’s). However, the influx of tech giants, with their vast resources, has further complicated this scenario. Think for a moment about how anti-union Amazon is. Yet here they are negotiating with real live unions in a traditionally unionized market. It’s no wonder there’s a deadlock. As for the agencies, when they skirt laws in place prohibiting talent agencies from producing, and reliance on tech companies to buy their product… you see where I’m going. Suffice to say CAA President Bryan Lourd, still hating unions for taking away his packaging, coming from the annual “Tech Billionaire’s Summer Camp” in Sun Valley, and two days later appearing on a SAG picket line last month to show his support was nothing short of adorable. 
3. Financialization: Late-stage capitalism is marked by the increasing dominance of financial markets and financial instruments over traditional creative production. This can result in a focus on short-term profits, speculation, and a detachment of financial activities from the real economy of filmmaking. In 2015 twelve CAA agents left to join UTA. Their reasoning? They were tired of the pressure of the outside stakeholders and stock price primacy. Within three years UTA sold 40% of their company’s equity to Investcorp. Hilarity ensued.

How long will it be before the singularity occurs? One could argue by the movements of Lourd, it’s already here. The big three agencies are already beholden to tech, hedge funds and outside investors. Those investors are also invested in big tech. So, with big tech worth more in returns their tendencies are obvious. The investors become the fulcrum and well, you can do the math. Eventually, they’ll need more control because of tech stock valuation and the only solution will be majority ownership of talent agencies.

It has also been a slow degradation of Hollywood workers rights. The average yearly income for both writers and actors have plummeted between 20% and 30% over the last 15 years. This requires the big agencies to continue their attempts at artist monopoly and diversification by unchecked growth and volume as the only way to increase margins. Throw in the prohibition of packaging projects (the old way agencies were illegal producers) and you can see the enormous incentive created to put financials over art and artists.

But, what about the Artists? What about them? There are some good agents at those companies. What is also at those companies is a pressure to grow exponentially, represent more and more people, until the endgame of representing everyone arrives. Not just everyone who’s anyone, but literally everyone. With all of their outside investment, with the collusion focused under-pinnings of the relationships, what business are they actually in? The business of corporate valuation.

Yes, as co-head of an independent talent agency with no debt or outside investment (by choice,) is my argument incredibly self-serving? Perhaps, but look around, see what’s happening to Hollywood and tell me I’m wrong.

Also, as an independent without massive diversification, we’re suffering along with our clients. However, we’ve managed well, and have significant reserves to leg this out no matter how long it goes. We put that in place the old fashioned way. We saved it. 

As a business that is truly in service to artists, we support the WGA and SAG/AFTRA members on the picket lines trying to burn it all down. However, part of burning it down is considering how you are represented and by whom. The path of least resistance is tempting. It’s what got us here through the insufficient collective bargaining of the past. The big letters of the big agencies are tempting for the social confirmation and perceived prestige, but as I’ve laid out, they’re as big a problem as the tech companies. In essence, they are the same problem. They are already irrevocably enmeshed and you’re asking them to negotiate against themselves. What could possibly go wrong? 

The singularity is here. They could starve us out of course, much as the Spanish did to the Aztecs. But realize, the problem is larger than the AMPTP., the WGA and SAG. The call is coming from inside the house! You can stand in defiance, or bow. Your choice.

Ai and ChatGPT4 were used to research this article.

WGA, SAG and ASCAP?

At the end of eighth grade I was the runner-up for the “Takes Life Most Easily” award.  The winner stole and crashed his Dad’s Corvette the following week and was immediately shipped off to military school, so at least I didn’t take life that easily.  I get as nervous as anyone. Just ask my wife, my therapist, or my kids.  But I have found just understanding a problem and being able to articulate it gives me some comfort. In that spirit, I’m offering up my analysis of the current impasse between WGA, SAG/AFTRA and the AMPTP.

It’s far more complicated than it appears on the surface. First, I need to say as a talent agent I am Labor first.  Always have been, always will be. My bias may bleed through here as I lay out some points on the foundational friction on all sides of the conflict, but it’s important to at least know what both sides of any argument are.

At the heart of it, SAG and the WGA are fighting for the same thing. The survival of the middle-class Journeyman Artist.  In general, pay not keeping up with inflation, residuals, some basic work rules improvements and clarification on AI.

AI

Let’s get the AI issue off the table right away.  The idea that once your image, words, ideas are on the internet can be scraped by LLMs to inform the creation of new IP without consent is ludicrous.  It flies in the face of all copyright laws.  The only real clarification will come via Congress and copyright infringement lawsuits against the creators of the different versions of ChatGPTs and LLMs.  I believe that is why the current IATSE’s new AI guidelines are so broad.  This is an issue that has ramifications far beyond our industry and will be heavily litigated.  Do you think Elon Musk will sit back while his face and voice are used to promote “Threads” or the “Ford F150 Lightning electric truck?”  That’s the implication here.  It’s an eventual non-starter.  When the lawsuits start, it will be a deluge.

Executive Pay

I’ve heard a lot of talk about Executive pay vs what Writers and Actors want.  A better way to look at it is this, the top ten executives of streaming companies collectively made $400 million in 2022.  Conversely, the top ten actors made $370 million.  I don’t see either group willingly taking pay cuts for the rank and file.  It’s really not the point, and capitalism doesn’t work that way.

The better question is this, what needs to be done to prevent the creation of entertainment becoming part of the Gig Economy. 

Pay for Play with no residuals is what the AMPTP is going for.  Below the Line workers have always been based on Pay for Play, or gig work.  At least they have been protected by their unions establishing a scale rate.

Streamers have shown their hand already.  They want everyone on Pay for Play contracts.  Cinematographers have been pursuing residuals for decades to no avail, and the streamers want no residuals for anyone so if the streamers get their way, that fight is effectively over.

This is actually an opportunity for everyone.

When people bring problems to me at work, they are met with one of my mantras, “please don’t bring me problems without offering solutions at the same time.”  The good folks on the picket lines are fighting right now for a little more pay for continuing in the old system of residuals.  I’m surprised the AMPTP doesn’t just agree to whatever as it’s not a real solution to the problem.  They still would win.

The solution, or my solution anyways.

What makes the most sense here is for all filmmaking Guilds to begin pursuing an ASCAP model of residual or “royalty” payments.  The streamers have opened the door to this by making the argument that the old residual system was based on a 1^st run of a project and a re-release.  Syndication was the Holy Grail of re-release since it is broken down into separate licenses and the residuals add up exponentially.  Conversely, when your series is streaming, all episodes are on the Internet at once and for all time.  The refusals of streamers to reveal viewing data is the problem, therefore the Guilds have no way to track residuals when they have no information. Clearly a new system with an outside auditor is needed to compensate for unlimited runs. Not just for Above the Line talent, but also for the Below the Line Department Heads.

The ASCAP Model According to ChatGPT 4  (yeah, I did that) 

ASCAP, which stands for the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers, is a membership organization that protects the rights of its members by licensing and distributing royalties for the non-dramatic public performances of their copyrighted works.

The main ways ASCAP collects these licensing fees are:

1. Through performance venues: This includes bars, clubs, concert venues, etc. These venues pay a fee to ASCAP (and other PROs – performance rights organizations) for the right to play music in their establishment.

2. **Via broadcasters and streaming services:** This includes radio stations, TV broadcasters, and online streaming platforms such as Spotify, Pandora, and YouTube.

3. From other public performances: This includes things like music being used in businesses as background music, or at live events.

Once ASCAP collects these licensing fees, they distribute them back to the artists as royalties. How much an artist gets paid is determined by several factors:

1.a **Frequency of play:** More plays equals more money. This is why popular songs on the radio generate significant income.

2.a **Type of usage:** The medium in which the song is played matters. For instance, a play on a major TV network typically pays more than a play on a local radio station.

3.a Time of day: Plays during prime time hours generally pay more than those in the middle of the night when fewer people are listening/watching.

4.a  Negotiated rates: The rates for each play can vary, as they’re often subject to negotiation between ASCAP and the entities that use music (broadcasters, venues, etc.).

In order to distribute these royalties fairly, ASCAP surveys music usage across all these different mediums. They use a combination of digital monitoring and random sampling to determine which songs are being played, and how often.

It’s also important to note that ASCAP’s role is to protect the public performance rights for songs. This doesn’t cover mechanical rights (which are related to the reproduction of a song, such as on a CD or digital download), nor does it cover synchronization rights (which involve the use of a song in a video or movie). Other organizations handle those types of rights and royalties.

In summary, ASCAP collects license fees from a variety of sources that use music, then distributes those fees as royalties to its members based on the frequency and type of their music’s usage.

Please fixate your attention on #2 above.  

This system is already in practice by the studios and the streamers.  It is not an over simplification to say that this is the model that should be pursued.  Not only would it benefit the rank and file, but would account for more money for more successful shows. It should cover show creators, actors, directors, show runners, producers, cinematographers, production designers, costume designers, editors, music supervisors and stunt coordinators.  As a whole, these are the creative forces behind a project. I would include musicians and composers, but they are already covered by ASCAP!

I once knew a composer that had a hit song used in a movie. It also gained a lot of air play back when FM radio ruled. He was receiving 6 cents per play just for publishing. The performer received a lesser royalty, but still was compensated per play. They got rich and the label got even richer. Doesn’t it make sense for a certain amount per dollar to be set aside for the creators?

Is it a form of Socialism?  No, it’s Capitalism as it is supposed to work.  Capitalism in its purest form is not winner take all. It is supposed to benefit ALL stakeholders. A more equitable system is needed across the board. A per play royalty to be split in a weighted system among all is what is needed in the face of the distributors of content getting richer while the creators of content are getting poorer.

SAG and the WGA are beginning the process of making separate deals with the independent studios by virtue of granting waivers or exceptions to projects so long as they accept the terms of the last SAG offer to the AMPTP.  It will take time, but this will climb uphill, and Netflix will stand alone as the last holdout.  Due to their leverage, they may never settle.  But what may be lost in any settlement by SAG and the WGA with the studios is appropriating the ASCAP model for filmmakers.

I’m sure anyone on either negotiating committee would say I’m over simplifying things, but am I?  Just as the old studio system of the mid-19^th century, tying up actors with exclusive contracts to over work and under pay them needed burning to the ground and starting over, maybe the current system does as well.  Will it result in the end of syndication? The set for life bounty that worked so well for the few actors of the Seinfeld, Friends era? It probably will.  But it may provide some equity for the Journeymen across the full labor spectrum.

Right now, the strikes have stolen their Dad’s Corvette and are just holding it for ransom.  Crash the thing already.  Going to Military School has got to be better than the current state of things. Or maybe, just maybe, we’ll end up with a brand new model that works for everyone.

What Problem Does It Solve?

There has been much hype over the last week about Apple’s unveiling of Vision-Pro. Other than being immediately repulsed by it for reasons I couldn’t quite identify, I quickly became ambivalent about it. It’s not the $3500 price tag, though I just don’t know who will buy the thing. I thought, maybe the Military, to do troop simulations in. A realistic middle eastern locale where you learn to clear village dwellings without the inconvenience of getting sand stuck in your ass? Beyond that I don’t quite get it.

I spent the late 1970’s in Manhattan walking back and forth from my apartment to NYU. The Sony Walkman was a revelation to me. Walking down the New York streets, my life now coupled with a soundtrack. Perfection. Of course you played it at max volume and had to be careful not to be picked off by a Cab, but it was a slight adjustment for the tradeoff of not hearing the sounds of the city around you. At the same time it gave you the sensation of a heightened and somehow more important place in the world.

For me, the Walkman solved a problem. A portable audio experience that was unique and personal. It allowed you to drown out the sound around you while bolstering your low self-esteem to make you feel part of a fantasy you were making up on the spot with music that meant something to you. But, it didn’t take you out of the WHOLE world.

The other day I heard Scott Galloway and Kara Swisher’s podcast “Pivot” discussing the new Apple Vision Pro. Scott was not a believer and asked the simple question “What Problem Does It Solve?”

Unlike the Walkman, which enhanced the world while interacting with the world around you, the Vision Pro isolates you completely and provides you with a digital version of the world. Add the cumbersome goggles on your face, the obscuring of your eyes, the price and the general weirdness of it, and what have you got? An invitation to become a kinder gentler Darth Vader? If I have to become Darth Vader, I’m going totally Dark Side.

To digress from there, the question, “What problem does it solve?” completely resonated with me as a general query to just about any decision one has to make. It’s not just for product development. It’s especially prescient for business decisions. It is simply an excellent differentiator.

** Add your decision here ** What problem does it solve? Does it serve the actual goals of the organization, or will it just make you feel better? That’s fine, but, will it also show up in the data and be effective in the real world?

Re-organizing can have positives and negatives. Are you supporting ROI or could you lose ROI by upsetting a system too much, too quickly with less than ideal timing because of pressure not based on the realities of the situation.

You have to ask that question because, for any move that solves a problem, there will undoubtedly be some new problems created. It is Newton’s Third Law of Motion, “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” Leading is solving problems with all the elements considered. Not just “what will happen,” but “what could happen?” To not consider this, is an unwillingness to look at either the data, the big picture, or both.

Elon Musk is suffering from this in spectacular fashion. He buys Twitter, makes big moves and the Tesla stock price tanks. Exactly what problem was he trying to solve in the first place? Trying to control who could criticize him to save his delicate ego?

It has been posited that Tim Cook went through with the Vision Pro’s 10B investment, not because he believes in the product, but because he hates Mark Zuckerberg and just wanted to upset the Occulus and Metaverse products to make Zuck suffer. Not exactly 10B well spent, but if you have 1T in fun money, I guess that’s your prerogative.

Bold, decisive moves? What problems do they solve? Slow, incremental moves? What problems do they solve? For most of us, It’s a matter of keeping the boat in the water without blowing a hole in it. So, It has to be strategic. It has to be data driven, and not driven by pressure or feelings. In short, decisions large and small have to be made with discipline.

Is it hard? Yes. Will everyone be happy? No. It’s impossible to please everyone with any decision you have to make. The very least you can ask is, “What problem will it solve, vs. what problem will it create?” While we ponder that, I’ll put my 1970’s headphones back on and live blissfully in my own movie.

It’s Like Deja Vu All Over Again

Word came down this week that film sets will no longer require Covid testing after May 12th, 2023. Almost two weeks after the strike deadline by the WGA, but the two events have a kind of synchronicity. The end of one production nightmare shortly followed by the beginning of another.

The contract expiration date is not necessarily the strike date. As we close in on the strike date of May 1st, the two sides, the WGA and AMPTP will most likely extend the talks past May 1st in hopes of reaching a deal. If things go nowhere, at some point, the WGA will draw a line in the sand and set an actual strike date. They will already have a strike authorization vote, now set from April 11 to 17, which is a usual and expected negotiating tactic. They may extend the deadline to a date later in May. They may even extend again to sometime in June. Once the strike final date is set, it’s a game of chicken to see if one side or the other will blink. They usually don’t.

That’s the broad stokes of the process. The phone keeps ringing with clients and producers asking me “What’s going to happen?” The short answer is, it’s already happening. There is a de facto strike going on right now. Many shows have pushed their production dates to the fall. They can lock scripts, dismiss the writer’s room and produce what they have already now. But, the product can’t be polished or adjusted for actor injuries, firings, arcs that don’t work, etc, Quite possibly, with locked scripts they could be mid-production in say late June, and the DGA, SAG, and/or the Teamsters strike in sympathy, or just won’t cross a picket line. Therefore, being in production on a scripted series when the strike deadline arrives is a monumental risk to producers and studios. As a result, a good deal of local production has paused schedules until September to see if they can out leg a strike.

Pushing production offshore sounds like a good idea, but WGA signatory studios are still subject to union work rules no matter where they’re shooting. Again, if there are WGA picket lines, DGA, SAG and other union members, even foreign, may not be willing to cross it. It’s a zero sum game.

Why September? That theory is wrapped up in high cost production deals the Studios have made with writers, directors and actors. If the writers were to strike by June 1st, Force Majeure contract clauses would void all those deals on September 1st, allowing studios to cancel any they feel are not worth it. I’ve heard back and forth on this. Some say the number of these deals are far fewer than in 2008 when this last happened, and an inordinate number are with star level actor/producers who won’t go quietly. The negative press may not be worth it. I don’t see that as the motivator for AMPTP to draw a hard line and force a walkout.

Of course this also affects advertising production. When the world may be forced to subsist on sports and reality programing, the demographics are more limited. Add in a global recession and a major war in Europe, of course marketers are going to sit on the sidelines more than usual.

What do the writers want? Larger cuts of streaming residuals and better work rules. In 2008, they were arguing about residuals on DVD sales at a time when streaming was just a glint in Jeff Bezos’s eye. I think the producers will quickly agree to a higher cut of streaming residuals, because of course the technology is going to change again. As long as they don’t agree to residuals on yet to be invented technology, which they won’t, they should be fine. I’ll get to that in a minute.

The glut of shows that have been produced in the last ten years have led to the current studio rollbacks. The boom in production, first fueled by investment and IPO’s, then ironically by government pandemic rescue funding, created a bubble that was bound to burst. This gives the WGA a weak bargaining position in general, as the main streaming services are increasingly retreating to a catalogue model and producing less original programming.

No matter how this goes, I believe in the end AMPTP will give the WGA a reasonable deal. However, the WGA will come up short for its members whether they strike or not. It won’t seem like it at the time, because just as if you’re a hammer everything looks like a nail, to a screenwriter everything looks like writing a script. In this case, it’s more like a surfer focused on riding a six foot wave while a three hundred foot wave is coming right behind it.

What is the three hundred foot wave? : AI

AI is not just a media disruptor. It’s a force multiplier as well. VHS was a disruptor, DVD was a disruptor. The Internet was a disruptor and a force multiplier as it quickly took over every part of our lives. AI is a disruptor and a force multiplier many degrees beyond the Internet. If you don’t believe this, consider why an open letter was written and signed by 1200 of the world’s most prominent computer scientists and tech executives, imploring governments to pause AI’s unchecked development. But, the genie is out of the bottle already, and AI will affect Hollywood in the early stages, where its use is not dangerous per se, but its potential to displace artists through efficiencies and economy is obvious. While it is not being currently considered for what it is, it will advance so quickly, there will be very little reaction time for any guilds or unions to protect the jobs of its members.

How does this inform the negotiations? I believe the residuals conversation is a Trojan Horse. The only part of the current negotiation that pertains to AI is this: writers want to receive ownership and credit based on if a WGA writer prompts AI Chatbox programs to write a script. Whoever prompts it, owns it. I don’t think producers care about that. They’ll gladly give it away in pursuit of the larger goal. They really care about retaining the right to have salaried employees of the studio start cranking out AI scripts. Any decent employee contract assumes ownership to the employer. The real IP is not just the final script, it is also the AI prompts that wrote the script. All residuals and IP ownership in this case revert to the studio, and there is no incentive for them at that point to be signatories of the WGA. You think writers are not being fairly compensated now? This crucial issue is not being addressed. Prepare yourselves for a world where Development Executives instruct studio AI techs, already an actual vocation known as “Prompt Engineers” to prompt scripts of their own concept. The worse news? It’s already happening. The best a WGA member can hope for is a polish. No ownership, no options and no residuals.

I’m prognosticating of course. No telling exactly how AI will proliferate. But, written media will undoubtedly be the first medium significantly affected. For example, it’s hard to tell if I wrote this article or ChatGPT wrote it? I’ll leave it to you to decide. But, I have you thinking about it now don’t I?

As for the strike, sit tight. The WGA will get a better deal on residuals and work rules for the membership and avoid a lengthy strike. Leadership will declare victory, everyone is back at work by September at the latest. Halfway through the contract, the 300 foot wave will crash onto the beach. Just my two cents. Or is it?

Interconnected

I’ve heard so much over the past several pandemic years about Individualism, as in, “I won’t wear a mask because it intrudes on my personal freedoms,” or, “it’s just the flu, why should I care if people get the flu?” or my favorite, “I don’t share my vaccination status with anyone,” which is just code for, I’m not vaccinated because Tucker Carlson thinks it’s the banks trying to control us.

I feel as if you are retaining your own agency in the decisions you make, but preserving it at the expense of the greater good denies the basic fact that every person on the planet is connected to every other person. For instance, the keyboard I’m writing on was imported by someone in an office somewhere. It was probably shipped on a boat that had a crew. Assembled in China by someone, who I hope was not a ten year old orphan. It’s made from plastic parts that started as oil, pumped from the sea by a group of oil riggers, and the oil is made from fossil remains of creatures that lived millions of years ago. There are about one-thousand other steps in between the fossil creatures and the keyboard my fingers are tapping on, one of which has a band-aid on it, that has a similar chain, because I have a cut on my index finger from an matte knife I was using, which also has a similar story.

As I was filling up Adrienne’s car yesterday with six dollar a gallon gas, I suddenly felt connected to people in Ukraine. The high price of gas is indirectly a result of the new US policy to not import oil from a Russia who is attacking Ukraine. In reality, we don’t import all that much oil from Russia. But, other countries do, so a multi country embargo of Russian oil affects global supply chains that eventually reach me. So, in one way or another, abstract or not, I’m connected to people in Ukraine, and Russia for that matter. Oh yeah, and common humanity, let’s not forget that, but we don’t primarily think that way. We think about how six dollar a gallon gas affects us. You can look around you at virtually everything in your range of vision. It’s undeniably the same.

It goes further. Biologically, our DNA is not much different from a fish. At one point a distant relative crawled out of the ocean and continued an evolutionary process that resulted in a two legged, upright oxygen breathing, Californian, sitting in his comfortable home office, pontificating about his singular world view. If that poor first fish, who lets face it, probably lived about five minutes out of water, knew that he gave his all so a million or so years later, I could idly tap away on my keyboard, he would have turned right around, swam back to the depths and found a fish poker game or something to occupy himself with, saying to his friends, “do you know what stupid shit I almost just did?”

Carl Sagan famously said “We are all stardust.” That goes for me, you, Ukrainians, Russians, the ten year old Chinese kid who I hope didn’t put my keyboard together and the fish. On an elemental level, we all come from somewhere else, likely “a galaxy far, far away.” We hurtled through space on a comet, imbedded in ice crystals, or an asteroid that contained our essence in micro-biomass, left over as a distant star exploded and took with it, a planet with rudimentary building blocks of life on it.

Yes, we are all stardust, which means we are all the other. We are all aliens living together on an unforgiving planet. It is unthinkable that, with a common biology that is easy to see if we choose to look at it, and heritage that is so easy to track, that we can’t look at each other and know we’re simply looking in the mirror.

Sometimes, I think it’s just that nasty survival instinct, and the biological imperative to pass down our DNA that makes us all see ourselves as separate individuals, void of commonality and irreversibly alone. We’re not alone. We’re not individuals. We’re all sown from the same seeds and interconnected in a universe that we are commonly a part of.

Mostly, we’re separated by ideologies. You know, those things that are completely man made and subjective? Ideologies really do cause most of the suffering in the world, stretching to gain resources, whether they be elements or attention. And who invented borders? There’s no such thing. They’re only on man made maps. It’s all one thing. We’re all one thing. At some point we just need to start acting like it.

Now What?

While Covid fades into the background, and at the same time doesn’t fade into the background, we’re facing the start of year three in our new reality. It seems like just yesterday, in February of 2020, when I was getting off of a plane from London, tired and happy after a successful sales trip, aware of this strange illness in China that I was sure would peter out like every Ebola and Sars scare of the last twenty years. I was confident that if it even made it to the US, it would only kill a few random, unfortunate schmucks in some Texas backwater, who somehow came in contact with someone who had eaten Monkey brains or stuck a Gerbil up their ass. I mean that’s how these things start, right? Then, I wake up two years later with a haircut like Doc Brown and an attitude like Ted Kozinski, and my only thought is, “what the hell just happened?” But, unfortunately, it also makes me wonder, “now what?”

Events, just lead to more events. My 89 year old Mother, who is in the middle stages of Alzheimers, who calls my wife Mrs. Jacob, as she can’t remember her name is Adrienne, has no short term memory. But, she does remember certain things in detail from the distant past and tells them on repeat. She lives with us, so we are regaled daily with one or two of the same five stories. One of her favorites right now is the Kennedy assassination. She tells of how my sisters came home from school early, and as they burst through the door, announced that the teachers were all crying. But, then they noticed their Mother is also crying, and asking to the heavens “Now what?”

She goes on to explain that as they came out of a church vigil a few days later, she turned on the radio in the car to learn that Oswald had been shot and killed in the Police station in Dallas, and through more tears asked “now what?”

From her perspective and in context of the early 1960’s Cold War environment, now what?, was an important question. At school, they were doing drills where kids were instructed to get under their desks, to protect themselves in the event of Thermonuclear War, which when you think about facing Slim Pickings crashing through the ceiling riding an A-Bomb, yelling “Ye-Haw”, or more likely instant vaporization. Hiding under the desk would represent, in the words of Otter from ‘Animal House,’ “a stupid and futile gesture.” Or, perhaps the threat of some kind of military coup was possible. Kennedy was not in favor of Vietnam, while the Military Industrial Complex and the Generals were pushing it harder than day old Sushi. It doesn’t matter that Kennedy’s killing may have been the act of a lone madman, or more likely, an extremely high profile, audacious Mob hit. Events, just lead to more events.

If indeed, history is an indicator, we will just go on thinking there is a status quo, while in reality, that concept is purely a figment of our imaginations. The status quo of my pre-Covid travel schedule was no more status quo than walking around in a mask for the last two years, and holding my breath in stairwells.

So, now what? From where I sit, I see things happening in the film industry in real time. When Covid was a new phenomenon, and someone tested positive on a set, the entire project shut down. Then, came the pods of departments. When someone in a pod tested positive, the pod went home and they were replaced. Now, if anyone tests positive, they are sent home, and the production just keeps going unabated. The infected person comes back when they test negative. Events just lead to more events, and the only thing that changes is the pretext for what to do as the next event arises. That’s the good news.

So, now what? Actually, same as it ever was. Kennedy was replaced by Johnson, who was replaced by Nixon, etc… Millionaire Railroad Barons and private rail cars were replaced by Billionaire Tech Barons flying personal Rocket Ships in a space race of douchebagery. Lockdowns were replaced by masking and social distancing, replaced by vaccination, etc… The beat goes on.

It all just keeps going of it’s own accord. Everything arises, has its moment, and fades away as something else arises. The beauty and tragedy of life is impermanence. It’s comforting and terrifying at the same time as we ourselves are represented in that equation. Don’t bemoan what was, or worry about what’s coming with any more veracity than keeping a roll of duct tape in the house and a retirement fund. Look at what’s happening in the present moment and lean into it. So the answer to the question, “now what?” If you look around, the answer is right before your eyes. Do your best to enjoy it, and accept that it will change again before you know it.