Let me re-phrase. IMHO “Television” and “New Media” are becoming increasingly unseperable. Especially as IPTV and fibre-optic to home connections increase there’s going to be ever less distinction between the two. To put a per-viewer royalty on once (and that is what we’re talking about with new-media, unless the WGA is really characterizing things differently behind closed doors than they are in the news) but not the other changes the dynamic for independant producers. Similarly, I’m not convinced that new media (or even DVD now a days) is an “additional” revenue stream, it’s just reallocated from a time when everyone was watching network television or in cinemas and revenues from those channels were a lot higher.

Again though, I’m not arguing against profit sharing with the writers - I’m just arguing for a system that’s based on all net profits, in all media up front. John Rogers points out that’s tricky because of the accounting that distributors involve - but that’s an issue that affects producers as much as writers (if not moreso).

Television residuals are done on a per dollar basis, not a per viewer one.  The same is true for DVD/VHS.  In most cases, the same would be true for the “new media.”

You should read some of the links on this in MGK’s blog.  This post from John Rogers is great place to start.

Try to imagine how Televison would work with a “per viewer” royalty and then think about how new media and traditional medias are starting to converge and you get some sense of what I’m worried about.

Note, of course, that if the viewer has to watch paid advertising in order to see something at no cost to them, it’s not really being given away for free.

The only point at which this turns into a “number of times viewed” argument is when the pay per viewing becomes muddied by things like subscription models.  E.g., if people could pay $50 a month for unlimited itunes downloads, how do we track the royalties owed.  The product was sold, but not on anything like a per-unit basis.