So the Writers Guild of America is on strike, which means you aren't getting your Daily Show fix, shows like Lost might be coming to an abrupt end soon and American Idol is going to a four-hour format. At least now you've got time to read all those TV-related blogs you love so much, right?
Not if you were looking yesterday, you don't. More than 20 bloggers who write about the industry went "dark" in support of the Writers Guild and its demands to be compensated for streaming TV broadcasts and other digital media. Blogs like The CineManiac and Media Pundit didn't actually shut down or run black pages. Instead, they ran statements in support of the strike in place of their regular content, which in most cases consists of industry chatter about whose show has been canned or which writer-producer just got fired.
In addition to CineManiac and Media Pundit, other blogs that went down included Give Me My Remote, Glowy Box, Mikey Likes TV, Ramblings of a TV Whore and Televisionary. Among those that didn't drop the mouse and keyboard in support of their union brethren were TV Squad (part of the Gawker Media blog empire run by Nick Denton) and Lost Remote. One party pooper on Deadline Hollywood Daily, which has been covering the strike in great detail, posted a comment noting that a blog strike could be seen as a "secondary boycott" and therefore illegal under U.S. labour legislation.