And Now for a Word from Our Writers
By Jen Jones

Some Hollywood writers are mad as hell, and they’re not going to shill product anymore. Enter ProductInvasion.com, the brainchild of numerous industry writers and Writers Guild of America, west staffers. The website serves as a voice for writers and a tool in the current WGA:w campaign to eliminate egregious product integration in reality programming.

On the site, writers swap stories of crass commercialism suffocating creativity. One writer for “The Simple Life: Interns” laments the episode in which a skidding bus shown for comedic effect was pulled at the behest of Greyhound, while a story producer for “The Swan” shares a story of contestants repeatedly being shown eating Jenny Craig food (even though they were forbidden by trainers to do so off-camera). Another site feature is “Subservient Donald,” in which visitors interactively turn the tables on a virtual Donald Trump by typing in outlandish commands he must obey.

“Product Invasion came about because we discovered that the amount of product integration in reality shows is enormous,” says WGA:w president Patric Verrone, adding that the site is just the beginning of many multimedia efforts rolling out in the next few months. “It isn’t a coincidence that producers have been able to integrate product in programming where the writers don’t have the protections or benefits of a union.”

Though brand integration makes sense to many networks as a response to DV-R technologies, Verrone says that audiences don’t appreciate the intrusion to their favorite programs: “The people feeding through the commercials using TIVO are the same people who aren’t too fond of seeing that kind of product integration built into the show.”

In an attempt to curb the trend, the WGA:w and SAG have drawn up a proposed code of conduct that will add checks and balances such as full advertiser disclosure, reduced integration in kids’ programs, and heightened input for writers in whether and how to endorse products. Though Verrone is hopeful about the outcome, he remains realistic about the present: “Our members and SAG performers are effectively being asked to do endorsements that would be paid in a different atmosphere. We’re asking for a dialogue on the subject and so far have received a roaring silence.”