Michael Eisner Calls Writers Strike 'Insanity'

You might expect a former studio chief like Michael Eisner to side with the studios over the current writers strike, and you would be very right. Speaking at the Dow Jones/Nielsen Media and Money conference this morning, the ex-Disney honcho called the Writers Guild work stoppage "stupid," "misguided" and "insanity."

"I see stupid strikes and I see less stupid strikes. And I see smart strikes. This is a stupid strike," he told interviewer Neil Cavuto of Fox News.

Eisner believes the writers are dramatically overestimating how much money the studios will make from digital distribution over the next few years. A bigger cut of digital revenues is the key issue in the dispute.

"They're giving up money today for a piece of a nonexistent flow which won't [always] be nonexistent, but it will be nonexistent for the next three years.... They could [strike] in three years. They shouldn't be doing it now."

But if digital revenues are nonexistent, why are the studios so reluctant to cut the writers in? Cavuto wanted to know. After all, a bigger slice of nothing is still nothing.

"They don't know what to give. There's nothing to give," he told Cavuto, before deflecting the question with a joke. "Who's making money? Apple. [The writers] should get a piece of Apple. They should be striking up wherever [Steve Jobs] is."

It was one of only a couple laugh lines for Eisner, who apparently didn't bother to stock up on internet witticisms beforehand this time.

Other highlights:

Eisner on YouTube: "How many times do we want to see a pussycat riding a skateboard, or a kid getting hit in the groin?"

Eisner on why he thinks he can turn a baseball-card company into a media company: "If you ask people about Topps, particularly American males, there's kind of a Pavlovian response.... There's an almost Proustian remembrance of things past."

Eisner, who hosts a show for CNBC, on arch-rival Fox Business Network's chances: "It's not crazy if you have [Rupert] Murdoch and [Roger] Ailes. it's probably crazy if you have two other people, but those guys are pretty good. So you can't bet against them."

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