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  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Court Rules that Unpaid Interns on Black Swan and 500 Days of Summer can sue Fox

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Not good. I started in this business interning for 3 months on a made for TV movie after high-school. Worked my ass off and felt great about every moment of it. The knowledge I gained and connections I made from that experience are the reason I'm doing what I'm doing today. The only reason I got the job was that I was willing to work for nothing. I had no experience and no connections at all.
 
Is it wrong to get paid for a job done?
i understand they were interns, but I would think the have worked hard and should in some way be compensated for that.
If only people who can afford to work for free get into the business, you'll loose out on a lot of good people .

Disclaimer: I didn't really look into this case and maybe shouldn't comment on it, but in principal I think one should get paid for work, as not everyone is in the position to work for free for longer periods

PS I worked very long hours for next to nothing, and also for free myself when I started out
 
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I presume they were told that interns receive no pay before they took (asked) for the job. Sounds like a lawyer may have convinced some young folk that he can get them (and him) a lot of money from a sympathetic jury of lay persons.
 
I interned unpaid for 6 months and wasn't paid a penny. I also had student loans to pay for school. I worked my ass off for the experience and knowledge of the industry. Would I have loved to be paid? of course, did I expect it? nope. Internships are a necessity especially here in LA where there are 4 million people looking at the same jobs as you. I couldn't afford to eat lunch when interning but do you see me filing a law suit? I made the choice to partake in an unpaid internship. So did these people. They could have easily said good bye when their internship was up. It's ridiculous if you ask me...
 
Joachim Hoge said:
...

Disclaimer: I didn't really look into this case and maybe shouldn't comment on it,
...
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Having read through only the first few pages of the document, I've decided I should probably adopt the same policy as Joachim above and further reserve comment.
 
Maybe I can find a Lawyer to sue all those companies I worked for to LEARN when I interned.

Lets see, I wasn't qualified, I didn't know the equipment or software, I had little to no experience and I was ready to do whatever it took to get in.

Im ENTITLED to get paid right? I mean i did work right.

Oh thats right my bad I was compensated. I now do what I love.
 
I have also worked for months without pay, but as "everyone" has done it, we all feel like the ones coming after us should do that as well. A lot of producers knows this and I feel they take advantage of this attitude. This way they will always have a supply of people to work for free, and we will not improve the working condition in this industry.

Would it not be possible to prove your worth if you got paid (however little)?
You have to work your *ss of and never sit down, and I'm all for that, but I can't see why one couldn't get a little salary.


On topic; Looks like they only afterwords wanted to get money, being fully aware that it was not paid when they signed on, I agree that's not cool
 
Thinking about the troubles on the VFX front... this is beginning to look like another domino in a long line of reforms yet to come, many of which are seriously overdue. Regardless of what you think about the interns, can we agree on that?
 
I think this should be looked at in a context larger than just the movie industry. It is rather well known in the corporate/tech world these days that corporations are pulling out all the stops to put younger people and out-of-work folks in a very disadvantaged position. Unpaid internships are very prevalent - with no academic credit (or even educational value) and no pay (which may actually be illegal - but I am no lawyer). Often those positions are dead end - i.e. no hiring at the end. The "value" is supposed to be the experience - sometimes dubious experience at that.

In addition, many companies pull together a major part of their work force by hiring part time workers whose weekly hours, coincidentally, fall just short of qualifying them for benefits or the other perqs of full time employment. And many part time workers are asked to be "on call" morning, noon, and night - "just in case" they are needed.

I am no big fan of labor movements or unions but I am rather biased toward fairness and integrity. These specific folks may have thought they knew "what they were signing up for" but just maybe the facts weren't clear and they were taken advantage of. Just maybe. In my mind, work for absolutely no pay really isn't helping anyone, especially the overall economy when it becomes a prolific pattern.
 
Unpaid interns has always been a scam by entertainment companies to save money. It's short sighted and in my opinion one of the ways used to drive everybody's rates into the ground. If you're doing a menial job get menial pay. i can understand that there should be a place for people to apprentice around sets but companies are taking this too far and should be taken to task for it. As far as learning on the job, the court document said it best, everybody in the office was learning from their experience, paid or unpaid. What, Searchlight couldn't make the movie or afford to continue if they paid these kids $8 an hour? Really?
 
Chris: I absolutely agree.

The law says, among other criteria, that if an unpaid internship displaces what would have been a paid employee - it is illegal. Period. The law does not allow companies to leverage their position to exploit the labor market. It also does not allow an intern to voluntarily waive their right to not be exploited. So, Matt, you cannot "volunteer" to participate in an illegal employment scheme, even if you believe you will receive some benefit (in what I am going to call a short-sighted and selfish decision).

Chris is absolutely right that interns who "volunteer" in this type of relationship are short-sghted and, this system puts downward pressure on everyone's wages (but not corporate profit). Fox et al are not creating these fully-staffed productions and saying hey: we are about to sail this full ship and, students, you are welcome to come hang out with us rather than sit in a classroom (another of the 6 criteria for qualifying as a legal unpaid internship). They are partially-staffing the ship with slave labor.
 
Brandon J.F. said:
Not good. I started in this business interning for 3 months on a made for TV movie after high-school.
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Matt Ryan said:
I interned unpaid for 6 months and wasn't paid a penny
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How did you afford to eat, pay for a roof over your head, travel to work or wash your clothes?

I'm not judging you guys, but not paying young people is a scourge on our industry.
 
Unpaid interns are scams. And just because some of you had to be exploited to get your job doesn't mean others should have to be exploited as well. What if you had to be an unpaid burger flipper at Mcdonalds for 6 months before getting paid? What if you had to work for free as an accountant at a company for 3 months before anyone would hire you? Only in the entertainment industry will people think "oh yeah, it totally makes sense to have people work for free before we'll consider hiring them."

One of the people who started the case was doing accounting for the production office. That's called working. If they are good enough to be hired then they are good enough to get paid. If they were shadowing a grip all day and able to ask questions and learn as they go they should be able to be an intern. If they're just ordered to do things and not getting any specific instruction in the industry then apparently they have the skills needed to work autonomously, they don't need any instruction and they're just unpaid slaves. Just because something is common doesn't mean it's right. We pay our interns even when they aren't working on commercial projects. Why? Because if they weren't useful to us then we wouldn't have them around. Use = work = wage.
 
Michael Panfeld said:
So, Matt, you cannot "volunteer" to participate in an illegal employment scheme, even if you believe you will receive some benefit (in what I am going to call a short-sighted and selfish decision)..
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Michael, your logic doesn't seem to include that these "interns" did not have to do any work past their internship end which is what the suit is over. They could have walked away but instead continued to work unpaid...

Liam Hall said:
How did you afford to eat, pay for a roof over your head, travel to work or wash your clothes?

I'm not judging you guys, but not paying young people is a scourge on our industry.
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Student loan, that's how everyone I know did it.

I'm not saying it's a good thing being unpaid, but it's necessary in a way. Of course not if someone is doing a paid positions work.... But then those would not be duties of a normal intern.
 
Joachim Hoge said:
On topic; Looks like they only afterwords wanted to get money, being fully aware that it was not paid when they signed on, I agree that's not cool
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By law they were promised an educational experience befitting their sacrifice of income. Instead they got used. And they rightfully knew that complaining would get them blacklisted so they probably were slow and weary to throw away a career they had just spent 4 years training to perform over a principle. Luckily one of the plaintiffs was in their 50s and was old and wise enough to know when he was getting shafted.

Matt Ryan said:
I'm not saying it's a good thing being unpaid, but it's necessary in a way.
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Yes it's necessary so that a producer can get the Audi RS5 instead of the S5.
 
Liam Hall said:
How did you afford to eat, pay for a roof over your head, travel to work or wash your clothes?
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Its a good question. On several web sites that posted the article, there have been some insightful comments on this. The gist of which are that this helps perpetuate the good ole boy network. That middle and upper class kids, the ones who can afford to work for six months without pay, get a leg up on those that cannot. Thus, the wealthy can afford to "purchase" the experience needed to compete for paying jobs, which perpetuates the lack of social mobility in our society.
 
Michael Panfeld said:
Its a good question. On several web sites that posted the article, there have been some insightful comments on this. The gist of which are that this helps perpetuate the good ole boy network. That middle and upper class kids, the ones who can afford to work for six months without pay, get a leg up on those that cannot. Thus, the wealthy can afford to "purchase" the experience needed to compete for paying jobs, which perpetuates the lack of social mobility in our society.
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Excellent point, Michael. Sometimes this can be the beginning of a very difficult struggle for less fortunate kids to get into a career they want. We Americans like to believe in the Horatio Algier boot strap stories but so many of them are myths. Successful people often have a leg up. A fair playing field is all some people are asking for.
 
Matt - what would constitute "paid position work" in your opinion? Is carrying c-stands up three flights of stairs not work? I sure think so. :-) I guess if they get to sit on director's chairs and shout orders, that wouldn't be considered work. Hey, wait a minute, isn't that what the director does? (And he/she gets paid! lol) And, in my experience, operating a camera is the most fun thing one can do - but those guys still get paid. :smiley:

Seriously though, I feel that it is hard to make the case that most of these "warm bodies" don't add some value to the project. And, I am pretty sure if any one of them proved to be disruptive, paid or not they would probably be sent packing.
 
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