Look for Union Label at iPhone App Store

Elana Levin, communications director for the Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE), announces the first-ever app organizing victory.

The writers of iLarious have just become the first writers of content for an iPhone app to form a union—joining the Writers Guild of America, East. 

And why not?! 

Comedy writers working in digital media deserve the same rights and protections as other workers. The Writers Guild of America, known for our successful TV writers strike in 2007-2008 over new media jurisdiction and residuals, is fighting to make sure that writers are represented even as the media and employment landscape changes.

Under the agreement, writers for apps such as “This Just In” (which delivers 10-15 jokes a day to the iPhone) will get to count their jokes written for the app toward WGAE health insurance and other benefits.

Comedy writers covered by this new agreement work at “The Daily Show,” “The Onion,” “Human Giant” and “Saturday Night Live” and in other comedy media.

iLarious staff voted to join a union because company founder and comedy writer Fred Graver is himself a member of the WGAE and gets how important union representation is to writers.

As Graver put it:

It’s important to the founders of iLarious that we bring the best talent to the table, and that we put a stake in the ground in this newly developing territory. The new means of producing content allows us to be owners and creators at the same time—and in the future, we look forward to being able to picket ourselves every few years.

WGAE Executive Director Lowell Peterson, who developed the union’s Writers Guild 2.0 initiative, added:

Whatever the technology, writers will always benefit from membership in a creative community which is organized to advance their interests. The job standards enjoyed by writers in film and broadcast TV were built over the years by creative people working together. Signing on with the WGAE is a very important step for creators of digital media to gain the standing and strength they deserve.

For more on this story, check out coverage in FireDogLake’s Work In Progress and Tech President.

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