Quarterly Hollywood Strike

What is it?

The reduction of media purchases to once a fiscal quarter, aka one entertainment purchase alone, or of each type, every three months.

Why do it?

To send the entertainment industry a clear message in the only language that matters. Our money. We cannot cut entertainment out of our lives, but we can make a conscious effort to scale back. If this industry is going to use our money to buy the political clout to negatively impact other industries (like controlling the internet), and if you feel this is a misuse or betrayal of the money you spend to have a good time, a message to the entertainment industry is in order. You can help send that message.

How does it work?

Make a plan to cut back, follow it, and send a note to the big players in the entertainment industry that this is what you are doing and why. The note is important. They need to be told WHY they are losing YOUR money.

The Bare Bones –

This is my plan. You don’t have to follow my plan exactly. By all means, tinker with it. Customize parts of it to fit your own entertainment needs.

Step #1 Don’t Make Things Worse.

Do NOT commit online piracy. If everyone quit paying for stuff and just started pirating it, the only message that would be sent is that the internet DOES need to be regulated within an inch of its existence. It also sends the message to the industry that we really cannot LIVE without their product. That we need it so bad we will STEAL to get it. It says we are junkies. And junkies don’t make the rules. The drug dealers do.

Step #2 Who Do You Curb?

Know your industry. Not ALL of the entertainment industry is causing a stink. Find out what smells. For my own part, I checked out OpenCongress. For each Bill (for example…SOPA and PIPA) there is a section marked Money Trail. There is a breakdown of how much $$$ each industry sector gave to the politicians behind and in support of, the Bill. Feel free to get as nit-picky as you like, but to keep this simple as possible, these are the entertainments giving the big money.

Music

Movies (both Big Hollywood and Independent)

TV (Broadcast and Cable)

Reading material (books, periodicals, magazines, digital publishing)

There are more…sports is pretty big on shelling out the $$$, but we want this Quarterly Strike to be effective…so that leads to the next step.

Step# 3 I Just Can’t Live Without My…

Know what hurts you too much to cut back. You cannot give up everything, I’m not even asking you to try. But at the same time, saying you are giving up football when you don’t even WATCH football to begin with… that really doesn’t help that much. Pick one thing to NOT limit. In my own case, I cannot cut out reading. I love it way too much so I won’t try. TV is another hard thing to live without, but since I’ve already picked reading as my untouched entertainment I will have to start cutting back on my TV viewing. Music and Movies though….those I’m going to apply full Quarterly Strike on. And there are a lot of ways to do the quarterly strike. If you want to be extreme…go full limit and only pick ONE type of media purchase every three months. Not everyone can go that extreme. But I figure most people can opt to restrain themselves to buying ONE NEW CD, ONE NEW DVD, and ONE movie ticket every 3 months.

Step#4 Still Enjoy Entertainment Anyway!

Know your loopholes. Everything in your current entertainment collection has already been paid for. You can watch them as much as you like with no restrictions. You bought them already…the industry doesn’t care how many times you watch them. Listening to regular radio in the car is free. They get their money from ads. There are also plenty of writers and music artists self-publishing too now.

Get some patience. You don't have to see a new film in theaters on opening day. Wait. It will come out on DVD. Keep waiting. Buy it used. Used media has already paid the industry when it was first purchased. When you buy used, the money goes to support where you bought it…and that’s it. The entertainment industry doesn’t get a portion of secondhand purchases. Used bookstores, libraries, pawn shops, and trading with friends can come in handy here.

Step#5 They Need To Know!

Here is the really hard part. These industries need to know why you’ve cut back your support. It’s one thing if you are doing it to save money (which this is a pretty good plan for anyway). But if you are an avid user of the internet (which if you are reading this, you probably are) you might want to protect it politically too. One thing the Blackout one-day Protest was VERY effective at…was informing the political world just how MUCH influence the internet has on the voting populace. We will likely see more political banners than we used to in places we didn’t normally see them. Those old guys in office who were content to snooze away dreaming of the internet as a “series of tubes” that just kids and perverts messed around on, they just got a wake-up call. So did these industries. “Someone” is going to try getting some internet control again. And I’m just not willing to have an industry that gives us sequel after sequel of ‘Fast and Furious’ schlock deciding what sort of content the internet can have.

The great thing about the internet, complaining is easy! Most places have a feedback form on their websites. And our Offenders have websites. Your note can be something very basic, you can use this if you like:

“I don’t appreciate your organization trying to control the internet. For the foreseeable future, I’m curtailing my entertainment usage to one movie, music, and/or published product per fiscal quarter. I don’t want you using the money I spend for political agendas I don’t agree with. Have a nice day.”

And here is a short list of websites with contact information

Movies:
Motion Picture Association of America: ContactUs@mpaa.org
National Amusements -Who they Are : customer_service@national-amusements.com

Regal Entertainment Group: http://www.regmovies.com/corporate/contactus.aspx
Time Warner: http://www.timewarner.com/contact-us/
 (one of the world's largest media companies...and you can only contact them by snail mail or phone? Keep these guys away from our internets)
The Walt Disney Company:   TWDC.Corp.Communications@disney.com
NBCUniversal: nbcuniversalviewerfeedback@nbcuni.com
 
Music:
Recording Industry Association of America: http://www.riaa.com/aboutus.php?content_selector=about-who-we-are-riaa  (another one without online contact. Snail mail & phone only)