Hollywood to IMDb: Stop listing our ages!
Hat/tip to nebris.
Crossposted to clairvoyantwank on JournalFen and awaiting moderation.
The Wrap reports EXCLUSIVE: Battle Raging Over Age Listings on IMDb
One of the biggest movie sites in the world, IMDb.com, is facing a hornet's nest of controversy over its policy of publishing the ages of actors and writers who say it leads to ageism, TheWrap has learned.
The Writers Guild of America, West, is leading an effort to convince the massive database -- used by virtually everyone in Hollywood and far beyond -- to permit people to remove their birth dates from the site.
"The Guild has a contract with IMDb to provide credits information and does not release information on age," Neal Sacharow, a spokesperson for the WGA, told TheWrap. "We have raised our concerns with IMDb about its listing of ages."
It's not just the writers who are upset. The actors are as well.
Representatives from Hollywood guilds including the Screen Actors Guild have reached out to the site to see about taking down the birth dates of people who are not movie stars like Angelina Jolie or Leonardo DiCaprio, according to an individual knowledgeable about the talks. (A spokeswoman for SAG declined to comment.)
The guilds argue that not just writers and actors, but also below-the-line workers as they crest 40 face fewer job opportunities in a business that tends to prefer 25 year olds. Listing their ages publicly is exacerbating the situation, they say.
Now, ageism isn't funny. But a culture clash could be.
But IMDb isn't eager to make the change, according to people knowledgeable about the disagreement.
Part of the issue seems to be a cultural one. IMDb comes from internet culture, which is data-focused and oriented to revealing everything imaginable (though not from a corporate perspective -- just try to find a phone number for Google). Meanwhile, veterans of the entertainment industry are not particularly tech-savvy and often fearful of the reveal-all nature of the web.
It's Wikipedia wank with show business egos careers involved!
There is already deletion wank going on in the comments, most of it blaming IMDb. For example:
"My comments got removed along with everyone else's.
What happened, Wrap? Did the IMDB tell you to take the comments down? If so, they're awfully attentive to the comments section here, and not to the 1000's of people who are trying to communicate with the website. That'd mean they care more about their image than the people who have a problem with the site.
People without whom the site wouldn't even exist, I might add"
"The other comments look like they were removed. THE WRAP should put them back up. There were 40 more comments. Almost all denouncing IMDB as the ageism machine that it is."
The comments section at The Wrap looks like an insider's game, and the insiders don't like IMDb.
On the other had, the Huffington Post's article on the subject display the fan reaction, and the nearly 400 comments and counting are blasting the ageism of the entertainment industry, while some are just telling the crybaby starts to suck it up. The possibilities for fanwank (and, sadly, a lot of unfunny) are endless!
Crossposted to clairvoyantwank on JournalFen and awaiting moderation.
The Wrap reports EXCLUSIVE: Battle Raging Over Age Listings on IMDb
One of the biggest movie sites in the world, IMDb.com, is facing a hornet's nest of controversy over its policy of publishing the ages of actors and writers who say it leads to ageism, TheWrap has learned.
The Writers Guild of America, West, is leading an effort to convince the massive database -- used by virtually everyone in Hollywood and far beyond -- to permit people to remove their birth dates from the site.
"The Guild has a contract with IMDb to provide credits information and does not release information on age," Neal Sacharow, a spokesperson for the WGA, told TheWrap. "We have raised our concerns with IMDb about its listing of ages."
It's not just the writers who are upset. The actors are as well.
Representatives from Hollywood guilds including the Screen Actors Guild have reached out to the site to see about taking down the birth dates of people who are not movie stars like Angelina Jolie or Leonardo DiCaprio, according to an individual knowledgeable about the talks. (A spokeswoman for SAG declined to comment.)
The guilds argue that not just writers and actors, but also below-the-line workers as they crest 40 face fewer job opportunities in a business that tends to prefer 25 year olds. Listing their ages publicly is exacerbating the situation, they say.
Now, ageism isn't funny. But a culture clash could be.
But IMDb isn't eager to make the change, according to people knowledgeable about the disagreement.
Part of the issue seems to be a cultural one. IMDb comes from internet culture, which is data-focused and oriented to revealing everything imaginable (though not from a corporate perspective -- just try to find a phone number for Google). Meanwhile, veterans of the entertainment industry are not particularly tech-savvy and often fearful of the reveal-all nature of the web.
It's Wikipedia wank with show business egos careers involved!
There is already deletion wank going on in the comments, most of it blaming IMDb. For example:
"My comments got removed along with everyone else's.
What happened, Wrap? Did the IMDB tell you to take the comments down? If so, they're awfully attentive to the comments section here, and not to the 1000's of people who are trying to communicate with the website. That'd mean they care more about their image than the people who have a problem with the site.
People without whom the site wouldn't even exist, I might add"
"The other comments look like they were removed. THE WRAP should put them back up. There were 40 more comments. Almost all denouncing IMDB as the ageism machine that it is."
The comments section at The Wrap looks like an insider's game, and the insiders don't like IMDb.
On the other had, the Huffington Post's article on the subject display the fan reaction, and the nearly 400 comments and counting are blasting the ageism of the entertainment industry, while some are just telling the crybaby starts to suck it up. The possibilities for fanwank (and, sadly, a lot of unfunny) are endless!