What if there is a longer Writer's Strike in 1984 to 1987?

What if there is a three year Writer's Guild of America and Writer's Guild of Great Britian strike in 1984 to 1987?
 
One can only assume that thatcher sends in the police to reopen the typewriter pits. Sadly for the union the government stockpiled scripts…

A three year strike by a nonessential industry will result in it being scabbed out unless power, transport, or the primary surplus value circulating productive industry also go out. This is especially true because professional theatre writers are basically sinecures and are largely infinitely substitutable with complex labour power of different composition, for example a finite but very large number of monkeys. Or nuclear power station publicists.

And then you’re talking about a very different situation.

Or of course Australian, New Zealand and Canadian film industries finally triumph.
 
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Baseball Rule TV invictus as can fill games during the day if well programmed...and later NBA day games maybe?
 
A 3 year long Writer's Strike in both countries would likely result in the effective demise of the Writer's Guild due to multiple factors.

1. - Both the Film and Television Industries would end up turning to Non-Union writers to replace the striking Union writers [1].
2. - The Film and Television Industries Australia, New Zealand and Canada would easily see an uptick in the demand for the Films and Television Shows that they produce [2].
3. - Scores of Striking Writers would just likely end up crossing the picket lines and just throw down their Writers Guild Membership cards for good [3].
4. - The moment that enough of the Striking Writers have crossed the picket lines the remaining Writers on Strike would either have to Discontinue the Strike, Crossing the picket lines or find themselves out of a job (Both of which would effectively end the strike and bring the de-facto end of the Writer's Guild).
5. - In the event of an effective end to the strike the remaining Striking Writers who don't cross the picket lines will end up seeing their writing careers end.
6. - The end result of such a lengthy strike after all of the above occurs would see the Writer's Guild end up winding down their operations and in the end would just dissolve.
7. - The side effects of a lengthy strike would be the Television show cancellations, Remakes of previous Television Shows including ones produced in other countries, Increase of unscripted shows and shows not affected by the Strike [4].

What would happen in such a Writer's Strike is it gets settled within several months as the actual Writer's Strikes that occurred IOTL or the Writer's Guild ends up being done for.

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[1] There is nothing that that would stop the Film and Television Industries from hiring Non-Union writers if they decide to "Grow a Pair".

[2] The 1988 Writer's Strike did lead to ABC ordering a revival of Mission: Impossible which was produced in Australia (Originally started with reworked scripts of the previous incarnation and eventually used original scripts when the strike ended) and the 2007-2008 Writer's Strike did result in CBS picking up the Canadian series Flashpoint (Although that series debuted in July of 2008 around 5 Months after the strike ended).

[3] That would happen with any Strike in the event that enough of them have crossed the Picket Lines.

[4] The 1988 Writer's Strike had resulted in The demise of Moonlighting and Kate & Allie, In addition to ABC's Mission: Impossible revival NBC debuted their version of the British sitcom Dear John (Which started with reworked scripts as well), CBS did revive The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour due to the 1988 Writer's Strike (And allowed them to perform their Existing Material), Both the 1988 and the 2007-2008 Writer's Strike's did result in a number of Reality Shows, Game Shows being aired to fill the time and the 1988 Writer's Strike did see program-length Political Advertisements air on ABC and did lead to Animated specials being aired (Animation writers did not Strike in 1988).
 
But...but...that's what happened!
Now imagine TV schedule with even more of them.

Cheap to produce and gets good ratings.

The demise of Daytime Soaps, it was cheaper to have 48 minutes of a Host and a few assistants GIVE AWAY MONEY than to shoot a one Camera show on a Soundstage, and get better ratings
 
The BBC move Doctor Who over to Canada, and Peter Davison is replaced by a Canadian actor. Planets that are basically quarries are placed by planets that are all forests, Matt Frewer signs on as the Sixth Doctor which means the TARDIS has a Canadian Doctor with an American Companion.
 
The factors that did lead to the demise of the numerous Daytime Soap operas had been going on since the Early to Mid 1990's due to.

1. - The proliferation of Cable Television and Direct Broadcast Satellite (Started taking off at that time) that would give the viewers an increased number of Television Channels that they can watch.
2. - The televised coverage of the O.J. Simpson murder trial had sparked a demand for Reality Television that would take off years later (And it did cut into the Soap opera viewership).
3. - The increasing number of women (The targeted demographic for Soap operas) entering the workforce which caused Soap opera ratings to drop.
4. - The emergence of Sensationalistic Television programming (Mainly the Tabloid talk shows) had also cut into Soap opera viewership.
5. - The debut of Judge Judy in syndication and the subsequent success in the ratings which would lead to a number of new Court shows (Including a new incarnation of The People's Court) which also cut into the Soap opera viewership (The court shows would be profitable to the Television stations and the Syndicators).

The daytime Soap opera had already ran into trouble before the turn of the century.
 
[snip][2] The 1988 Writer's Strike did lead to ABC ordering a revival of Mission: Impossible which was produced in Australia (Originally started with reworked scripts of the previous incarnation and eventually used original scripts when the strike ended).

I remember this, own the DVD's. The Australian company used many of the same people who had previously done TIME TRAX.
 
Why people call demise of WGA? what happen if the end date is because they won big?

For the end date of the Writer's Strike due to the Writer's Guild truly winning big would require the Film and Television Industries to completely cave-in to the demands either due to them chickening out or facing serious pressure from the other Labor Unions (If they do take sides).

The Writer's Guild in the event that they do call any Strike would need the strike to be settled in less than 1 year and any such strike that lasts more than 18 Months would likely see the Writers Guild face a completely irreparable decline since the Film and Television Industries would eventually see all level of tolerance for the Writer's Guild to be completely used up by that point. By then they start turning to the Non-Union Writers and decide to take Legal Action against the Writer's Guild through a major lawsuit.

In the event that the Film and Television Industries and the Writer's Guild ended up in court arguing their sides before a Judge the likely outcomes would be.

Outcome #1 - The courts order the Striking Writers back to work (Forcefully ending the strike), Impose a "Cooling off" period and the negotiations restart afterwards and possibly the Film and Television Industries secure an injunction preventing the Strike from being restarted.

This outcome could easily open the door to changes that would easily weaken all of the Unions

Outcome #2 - The courts order the Film and Television Industries to agree to the demands of the Writer's Guild and the Strike ends.

This outcome would be the least likely outcome.

Outcome #3 - Before the courts make a decision both the Film and Television Industries and the Writer's Guild step up their negotiations and manage to make an agreement which ends the strike and would result in the lawsuit being declared as being Settled out of Court.

This would be the most likely outcome.
 
US audiences would have Australian shows such as Neighbours & Home and Away inflicted on them. OTL these shows were also massively popular in the UK as well as Australia, with a US audience thrown into the mix, both shows would probably end up with a heavy US influence instead of ending up being produced for a mainly UK audience as has happened OTL. Neighbours in particular has only a fraction of the ratings in Australia that it once had, to the point of being moved to a secondary channel, it's UK audience is the only thing saving it from cancellation.
 
Sports, sports and more sportss...and some reality show in the mix.

Could see other butterflies like Saturday Night's Main Event becoming a weekly NBC show on Saturday nights, which hastens the demise of the territories. FOX might try to sign WCW and turn it into a more sports-based (think Bill Watts era) product as a way to launch Fox Sports.
 
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