For clarity -- and because not everyone could get to one of the meetings last night in NY or LA -- here's a handy little FAQ for some of the questions we're hearing.

What's the 48 hour vote for again?

It's a vote on whether or not to lift the strike (which in the Constitution is called "the restraining order".) If the vote passes, writers can go back to work.

It's not a vote on the contract,

Voting on whether or not to lift the restraining order (legal jargon for calling off the strike) will take place in person at two meetings, one in NYC and one in LA.

If you cannot attend the meetings, you may vote by proxy. Today, there has been some confusion on what "voting by proxy" means. Faxing in a proxy vote form is NOT the same as voting. You are designating a fellow WGA member to vote

Emotions are flying fast and furious around this issue: do we hold a ratification vote before we lift the strike? Or do we go back to work as quickly as Monday, and hold the vote afterwards?

To get our position up here as quickly and accurately as possible, we decided to do separate grafs signed by each of us, and combine them into one post.

We're all coming at this from different perspectives

This was sent out today by the WGA:

LOS ANGELES and NEW YORK – The membership of the Writers Guild of America, West (WGAW) and the Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE) today voted overwhelmingly in favor of lifting the restraining order and ending their 100-day strike that began on Nov. 5. 3,775 writers turned out in Los Angeles and New York to cast ballots or fax in proxies, with 92.5% voting

From tonight's captains' bulletin:

To cast your ballot in person: Vote at the Writers Guild Theater, 135 S. Doheny Drive 90211. Tuesday, February 12, 2008 from 2:00 pm - 6:00 pm.

If members can't cast a ballot in person: Proxy ballots are available. To vote by proxy, download this form and fax to 323-421-9177. Proxies must be faxed in by Tuesday February 12, by 2 pm, or dropped off at the WGAW

We've been hearing a lot of procedural questions in the last few days, so in an act of serious selflessness, we decided to do a little paging through the WGA Constitution so you don't have to.

Here are the questions we've been hearing most:

Can the Board lift the restraining order (meaning the strike) without a general vote of the membership?

Yes. In Article IX, Section 3b, it states that the

Robert J. Elisberg, WGA Member and contributor to The Huffington Post, wrote a piece excerpted here called, "WGA Strike Primer: Settling a Final Debt."

It's not officially over yet, of course. There still is the matter of approving the contract. It's a 10-day process, a blink by strike standards, but long enough. Arguments of all views will be made, we do know that -- these are writers after all

The Strike Captains met at the WGA Theater today and we were allowed to look at the NOT FINISHED Terms Of Agreement. The reason that the Guild has not published them to everyone in the membership is because they ARE NOT FINISHED. In fact, still today the negotiating team has to fight the AMPTP lawyers on drafting legal language that the lawyers keep backsliding on – which sounds like, “Nope, my

SAG Board member and regular U.H. contributor Justine Bateman sends this open letter to all WGA members. -JA

To the WGA membership,

As you prepare to examine the proposed deal points and assemble for your meeting tonight, if the decision is made to continue striking, I will see you on the lines Monday. If you decide to recommend the deal to the membership at large for a vote and it is ratified,

Former WGAw board member Michael Russnow has been covering the strike on his personal site and recently began blogging "The Writers Strike for Dummies" on the Huffington Post. In his most recent entry, Russnow discusses the importance of setting precedents for compensation on the Web. We believed the AMPTP when they cajoled us to accept the cable deal in 1981 with the understanding that when they

The following letter was sent to Charles Slocum of the Guild west and Mona Mangan of the Guild east.

Dear Chuck, Mona and all WGA colleagues,

The Writers' Guild of Great Britain Executive Council met today (Monday) and members were delighted that a deal is being recommended and the strike is likely to end within the next few days.

We salute the WGA, east and west, on the unity and discipline

Last night I received a very nice email from Victoria G., a nice 10-year-old girl from Massachusetts, who also happens to be a Red Sox blogger. Victoria alerted me to the fact that she is in the running for the position of Captain of Red Sox Kid Nation.

Red Sox Kid Nation currently having the vote to determine the final 12 Captains, and there are 25 kids currently in the running, between the ages of 10 and 14, including Victoria. They were originally selected from a pool of 700 contestants, from all over the United States. Victoria has done some wonderful things to help people in her neck of the woods, like raising money for breast cancer research, helping her local baseball team and helping feed hungry people. And of course, she is a dedicated fan of the Red Sox.

To find out more about the Red Sox Kid Nation Captains contest and how to vote for Victoria, go here.

This was sent in an email to strike captains:Informal talks between WGA negotiators and reps for the other side will commence this week. WGA leadership has been studying the Executive Summary of the DGA's Temporary Agreement to determine which parts of their deal might form a framework for our own negotiations with the Companies. While nothing formal has been proposed, and the DGA's full

(The following is a letter from the presidents.)

To Our Fellow Members:

Today, it is our pleasure to inform you that members of the Writers Guilds of America, East and West, have voted to ratify the MBA contract with 93.6% approval. With a total of 4,060 votes cast, the tally was 3,802 to 258. These numbers reaffirm the tremendous level of support and commitment our membership has continuously demonstrated over these last few crucial months.

We are also pleased to report that the trustees of our health fund voted yesterday to follow the recommendation in our strike settlement agreement to provide additional coverage and an extension of the earnings cycle for a full quarter (three months) to participants who would otherwise lose health coverage following an earnings cycle that included all or a portion of the strike period. Participants whose health coverage is paid for by points will only be charged points if they have ten or more points as of April 1, 2008.

Interesting things, facts. They are simply what they are. And yet sometimes you can read a lot into them.

Here's a fact:
On December 18, the Writer's Guild testified before the Los Angeles City Council about the economic impact of the strike.

Here's another fact:
The AMPTP didn't show up. [Gosh, just like at the negotiating table.]

Instead, they asked the MPAA to take care of it. The MPAA represents the AMPTP before all levels of government throughout the world. The MPAA also provides economic data and information on the motion picture and television business to the public.

And one more fact:

At today’s Los Angeles City Council meeting, over 300 writers and supporters came to hear Councilmember Eric Garcetti speak to the City Council about the writers strike, and the need to bring the AMPTP back to the table so negotiations can resume.
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The AMPTP did not bother to send a representative, apparently feeling that the $20 million a day damage to the Los Angeles economy is more the City Council's problem than theirs.

Garcetti introduced an emergency motion asking for both parties to resume bargaining, and to come to a just and fair deal as quickly as possible. He also pointed out that the writers are still at the bargaining table, ready to negotiate, and called specifically on the AMPTP to return as well.

The WGA waits by the negotiating table while the AMPTP is MIA. And the moguls couldn't be bothered to attend Wednesday's LA City Council meeting because they were flying off for their vacations. (from Strike Life)

Or... was it because they had some other, more important meeting to attend?

This past Wednesday, I entered a contest over at the great web site Surviving Grady, as Red and Denton asked fans to write in with "the one person you'd love to spend a day with at Fenway Park." It could be anyone, living or dead, and you had to explain why. The winner gets the new 6-DVD set, "The Essential Games of Fenway Park."

The site got hundreds of entries, and the boys had a tough time narrowing it down to five. So, they expanded it to ten, and this morning, they announced on their site the finalists.

And my entry is one of the ten finalists.

I'm really blown away that it was chosen. If you go over to Surviving Grady, you can read it. It's not hard to figure out which is mine, but if you go to the fifth of the ten, "Dear Friend," that's mine.

(Breaking news from the WGA - the AMPTP has agreed to come back to the table on November 26th. Now, let's hope they are prepared to make a fair deal. This is progress. Everyone wants to go back to work. Everyone wants fair compensation for their work.)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

November 16, 2007

Thank you for your overwhelming support in our email campaign earlier this week – councilmembers collectively received thousands of emails, and our work had a very real impact.

Now they know that people are engaged and paying attention, and we need to let them know our involvement is serious and ongoing. Although the special motion does not compel the AMPTP to come to the table, it becomes part of a “paper trail” that shows the AMPTP’s behavior, which will matter as we go up the political food chain (Congressional hearings, anyone?)

We're making a difference, and we need your help to keep it going.

This is an email "House, M.D." strike captain and Canadian Leonard Dick sent to his team today.

Subject: Guild-wide picket Thursday

As the twentieth century rambled into its final decade, this freshly minted MBA landed his first job in Hollywood as a finance executive at Disney. Heeding the lessons garnered at a cost of $60,000 for two years of tuition, room, and board, I invested in myself

In the coming days, we'll be running pieces on the proposed contract.

We'll include our own takes on what's good and bad, the official "pro" and "con" statements that will be issued by the Guild, and -- we hope -- op-ed pieces submitted to us here by readers.

Feel free to submit your analyses of the deal points and your opinions about the contract to unitedhollywood@gmail.com. We won't be able

This was submitted by WGA member Robert Eisele, who was present for both the strike in 1985 and the longer strike of 1988.

"Those who cannot remember the past are doomed to repeat it."
-- George Santayana, 1905

In 1988, writers endured a strike of nearly six months. In 2008, we are now approaching the halfway point of the length of that strike.

Although most Guild members in ’88 stood strong

I've been avoiding a few big-time classics for awhile, mainly because they are so long.

I've decided to buck up and read at least one of them, and, since I'm so bad at making decisions, I thought I'd leave it up to you. With that I bring you Reading Faceoff, Round One: Classics Edition. Voting ends in two days, so vote now! Feel free to comment to further explain your choice.

UPDATE: Voting is closed! I didn't mean to delete the poll, but I did and I guess life just sucks, doesn't it? Take my word for it: Anna Karenina won, with a whopping (not really whopping, but I like the word) 40% of the vote.

I don't expect to have finish it too too soon...procrastination is still my forte, and I've been putting this one off for years. So, expect a post on it...soonish.

Statement from Chief Negotiator David Young and the WGA Negotiating Committee.

We have attempted to negotiate with the AMPTP companies since July. First they ignored our opening proposals. Then they told us we had to choose between their two horrible proposals. Then we removed DVDs from the table. Their response was to walk out of negotiations and tell the press that we were the ones who walked. Last week they presented us with another set of ultimatums. They didn’t even wait for a reply but broke off negotiations and walked out again.

There is a strategy at work here.

In any negotiation there are bottom line goals and “fringe” goals. The AMPTP wants to make the WGA reduce our demands to the bottom line so we’ll negotiate down from an acceptable deal to a bad deal If we do this, as we did with DVDs, you can be sure they would not hand us the deal we want. They would simply try to further wear us down.

This was sent yesterday to WGAW members:

Dear WGAW Members,

As you know, we are currently meeting informally with the companies under a news blackout. However, we would like to take this opportunity to urge you to attend this Monday’s WGA-SAG Unity Day picket at Fox Studios in Century City. More info here.

This joint WGA-SAG picket event will once again demonstrate to the entertainment

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

February 26, 2008

Writers Guild Members Overwhelmingly Ratify New Contract

Before we begin, here's a caveat: WE ARE NOT LAWYERS. WE ARE NOT BUSINESS AFFAIRS EXECS. WE ARE NOT PROFESSIONAL NEGOTIATORS.

We're a group of volunteer WGA strike captains, and we're posting our reactions to the DGA deal summary that was released today. These are our thoughts alone. They are not official, they don't reflect the WGA's opinion, and frankly, they will probably include a few