Campaign spreads for fairer pay for screenwriters and directors

28 January, 2016

Writers and Directors Worldwide (WDW) are stepping up their fight for fairer payments for content creators and are inviting Australian writers and directors to look at what is being done internationally to protect creators’ interests.WDW, an umbrella body for national royalty-collecting societies have launched a worldwide campaign under the hashtag #TheAudiovisualCampaign that aims to create awareness and encourage changes in law that will result in a fairer share of income for content creators from films and TV programs.Tim Pye, chair of the Australian Writers’ Guild Authorship Collecting Society (AWGACS), says copyright creators all over the world are now mobilising about this issue, demanding fair remuneration from the income streams that are generated by the secondary use of their work.Tim is on the executive committee of WDW, an organisation he says has been created to lobby policy makers and to make people aware of how vitally important writers' work is in the brave new screen world.“When I first started writing for television, the business of how my copyright would be used and paid for was very straightforward,” he says. “I was working for a producer who made the series for one of four Australian free-to-air networks. I sold my copyright - my ‘primary’ rights - and, under the terms of the contract, the episode produced from that work could be screened four times; that was it.“Free-to-air broadcast was the only game in town. No multi-channel digital TV, no Pay TV, no online catch-up, no YouTube or Google, no Netflix.“These days, the TV broadcast landscape could not be more different, not only because of the array of viewing choices available but also because the digital revolution has made the business of film and TV broadcast a world-wide business. The implications of all this for copyright creators are profound because, as they say, ‘content is king’.”Tim says that while the first (or ‘primary’) use of the copyright is still important, the secondary use of the work – the screening and re-screening of the work on platforms of all types all around the world - is fast becoming equally important.He is inviting Australian writers and directors to look what is being done internationally and join the fight to protect their interests.You can see the campaign here and share the website using the #AudiovisualCampaign hashtag. More information on the WDW initiatives can be found here.