Animation Projects

Here, there and everywhere.

Tobey Maguire is turning to "Cardboard" with some help from Fox Animation, WedgeWorks and graphic novelist Doug TenNapel. Fox is optioning the recently published Graphix tome for its WedgeWorks banner to develop. ...

A source close to the project says Maguire, who voiced the lead in WB's "Cats & Dogs," may have the option of voicing one of the main roles if the project moves forward. Fox Animation and Blue Sky Studios are now in post-production on Wedge's "Epic," a 3D CG-animated action-adventure film due in May 2013. ...

When a sector of the film business is hot, the executives yanking the purse strings pour more money into it and increase the temperature.

Funny how that works. Click here to read entire post

September Derby

Your (slow) weekend box office.

1. The Possession (Lionsgate) Week 2 [2,834 Runs] PG13 Friday $2.8M (-50%), Weekend $9.1M, Cume $33.0M

2. Lawless (Weinstein Co) Week 2 [3,138 Runs] R Friday $1.7M (-40%), Weekend $5.7M, Cume $23.3M

2. The Words (CBS Films) New [2,801 Runs] PG13 Friday $1.6M, Weekend $5.0M

4. The Expendables 2 (Lionsgate) Week 4 [3,260 Runs] R Friday $1.3M, Weekend $4.6M, Cume $75.4M

5. The Bourne Legacy (Universal) Week 5 [2,766 Runs] PG13 Friday $1.1M, Weekend $3.8M, Cume $103.5M

6. 2016 Obama’s America (Rocky Mtn) Week 9 [2,017 Runs] PG Friday $1.0M, Weekend $3.1M, Cume $25.9M

7. The Campaign (Warner Bros) Week 5 [2,542 Runs] R Friday $990K, Weekend $3.2M, Cume $79.2M

8. Odd Life Of Timothy Green (Disney) Week 4 [2,717 Runs) PG Friday $872K, Weekend $4.1M, Cume $43.5M

9. Dark Knight Rises (Legendary/WB) Week 8 [1,987 Runs] PG13 Friday $853K, Weekend $3.0M, Cume $437.6M

10. ParaNorman (Focus Features) Week 4 [2,856 Runs] PG Friday $838K, Weekend $4.2M, Cume $45.6M ...

The cartoons of summer (Ice Age, Brave, etc.) have pretty much run their course.

Ice Age: Continental Drift picked up $140,000 on Friday, and Brave collected $130,000. Both are in less than a thousand theaters. Click here to read entire post

End of Summer Animation Totals

On the domestic side:

Brave -- $232.7 million

Madagascar 3 -- $214.9 million

Ice Age, Continental Drift -- $156.3 million

And worldwide:

Brave -- $470.3 million

Madagascare 3 -- $602.9 million

Ice Age, Continental Drift -- $828.8 million

It doesn't appear that animation projects are devouring each other; one seems to reinforce another. And it's been this way for awhile.

Take, for instance, the situation of feature-length cartoons a half-dozen years ago:

... 2006 had an unprecedented number of major animated feature films released, and a particularly amazing number of CG features (12 this year, compared to five last year, four in 2004, and one in 2003). Because of this, lots of people have been speculating that this was the year CG animation would hit the wall, the way hand-drawn features did a few years ago, and we'd be awash in major animated busts. Cue the funeral dirge . . .

But stop the music, and take a look at a list of the box-office leaders for the year. What's that? Four of the top eight films in 2006 were fully animated? (And we'll note that animators had a big hand in three of the remaining four on that list.). . .

There's Cars at number two, then Ice Age: The Meltdown, Over the Hedge, and Happy Feet (the latter with a bullet) in slots six, seven, and eight, respectively. So if the public got sick of these films, they had a pretty odd way of showing it. ...

Year after year, animation has been consistently profitable. The market continues not to be saturated. Click here to read entire post

Digital Domain closes Florida Studio

Early morning news from Florida's south-east coast:

PORT ST. LUCIE, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sep. 7, 2012-- Digital Domain Media Group, Inc. (NYSE:DDMG) today announced that it has initiated a strategic realignment that will enable it to focus its resources on its core business, Digital Domain Productions, Inc., a company focused on creating digital visual effects, CG animation and digital production for the entertainment and advertising industries. As a key part of this strategic realignment, DDMG has begun the cessation of its Port St. Lucie operations by reducing virtually its entire Port St. Lucie workforce, retaining approximately 20 employees who will remain as part of the wind-down.

DDMG’s studios in California and Vancouver intend to continue to operate without interruption, as will the Digital Domain Institute, based in West Palm Beach, Florida. Long-time Digital Domain executive Ed Ulbrich has been promoted to Chief Executive Officer of Digital Domain Productions.

According to a local news report, over 200 artists, whose jobs were created as part of a promise to the state of Florida, are being fired. We're saddened at the loss of a feature animation studio and the impact it will have on so many lives.

While its easy to point at mistakes the former CEO made, its important to understand that at the core, he attempted to create a new business model in spite of the industry's resistance to change. That goal should be at the heart of all who call animation/visual effects their muse.

We wish Mr. Ulbrich and the rest of the artists and staff at Digital Domain the best of luck.
Click here to read entire post

Catching Up With Jeff

Two years back, TAG blog noted the trial and tribulations of animation veteran Jeffrey J. Varab:

... Jeffrey Varab is an animator and director who started at Disney, did years with Don Bluth, used to work for Disney Feature Animation Florida, left there and worked on films such as “Eight Crazy Nights.” ... He set up an outfit, with backers, called Genesis, which animated a movie about a WWII vintage Willys Jeep named “Tugger,” “The Jeep 4 x 4 Who Wanted to Fly.” ....

Varab was arrested this week, charged wtih fraud in Osceola County. ...

Today a member asked us about him: So what's up with Jeff? How did his Florida kerfluffle work out?"

So we did a wee bit of poking around to find out what the hell happened. ...

And it seems as though Jeff's tribulations came to an end earlier this year. Because there is this:

01/30/2012 -- PLEA AGREEMENT ...

01/30/2012 -- DEFENDANT PLED - SET FOR SENTENCING SENTENCING SET FOR 03/23/12 AT 3:00PM IN COURTROOM 5F PLEA OF NOT GUILTY WITHDRAWN, PLED GUILTY TO COUNTS 2 THRU 13 AS CHARGED COUNT 1 TO BE NOLLE PROSEQUI AT SENTENCING PSI ORDERED DEFENDANT IS TO REMAIN ON BOND/RELEASE PENDING SENTENCING ORDER ON PLEA SET FOR SENTENCING

03/26/2012 -- SURCHARGE 5% (OF THE FINE AMT) COURT COSTS Charge #2: SALE OF AN UNREGISTERED SECURITY. FELONY FINE W/H ADJUDICATION Charge #2: SALE OF AN UNREGISTERED SECURITY. FELONY ADJ W/HELD SERVICE CHARGE Charge #2: SALE OF AN UNREGISTERED SECURITY. (etc.)

07/09/2012 -- ORDER ON MOTION TO ALLOW OUT OF COUNTRY TRAVEL - GRANTED

So if I'm reading the above correctly, Jeff withdrew his "not guilty" plea and did a deal on some of the charges, and the district attorney agreed not to pursue at least one of the counts ("nolle prosequi").

And some months later, Jeff's legal team (or maybe it was Jeff repping himself?) made a motion to the court for out-of-country travel, and the motion was granted.

So we make the assumption that Jeff has now traveled from our shores. Good luck Jeff.
Click here to read entire post

Nick Product

The press release:

Nickelodeon and the National Football League continue their relationship with NFL RUSH ZONE: Season of the Guardians, the first-ever original half-hour animated series developed by a major U.S. sports league and a cable network, the two entities jointly announced today.

The second installment of the Nicktoons series (24 episodes) - based on NFLRUSH ZONE, the NFL's online world for kids - is set to premiere on Nicktoons this November and follows kid protagonist Ishmael (Ish) and his friends on a journey to protect the league's 32 teams and the world from a plotting master villain. ...

Okay, another cartoon series. Big whoop. But one of the more interesting aspects of this is, it's a hand-drawn show.

Nick, a couple of years back, was gearing up to produce more and more CG (and they were hiring the computer modeling crews to prove it, many fresh out of school.)

But it seems Nickelodeon is taking a second look at hand-drawn fare, and now using a (somewhat) more balanced approach. Nick's discovered that traditional animation has a place at the t.v. table, and ratings don't necessarily "pop" just because the latest television half-hour is computer generated.

Unlike their theatrical counterparts, more and more it seems that hand-drawn cartoons still have a major role to play on the home screen. Click here to read entire post

The IATSE and AMPTP Reach Another Agreement

And the press release reads as follows:

Los Angeles, Sept. 5 – The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, Moving Picture Technicians, Artists and Allied Crafts (IATSE) and Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) announced today the ratification of a new Area Standards Agreement. The agreement covers 8,000 IATSE members working in feature film and television production in most areas of the United States outside of the Los Angeles and New York regions. The IATSE and AMPTP reached a tentative agreement on a new contract on August 24th, and the agreement was subsequently ratified by the IATSE General Executive Board.

The new contract, which will run through July 31, 2015, includes 2 percent annual wage increases and an increase in health plan contributions of $5 per day in each year of the three-year agreement.

“The new contract provides stability for the next three years and we are pleased to achieve increases that will protect our members,” said IATSE International President Matt Loeb.

In response to the ratification, the AMPTP said: “Feature film and television production has grown throughout the United States in the past several years, emphasizing the importance of the Area Standards Agreement for both IATSE members and the studios. Ratification of this new agreement will enable production to continue while raising wages and improving access to health benefits for crew members and their families.”

This agreement, per what I've been told, was not an easy agreement to reach.

The press release indicates sweetness and light, but there was a good deal of contention, and the IA broke off the initial talks for awhile.

Much as we did with our local agreement.

Much as the IATSE did with the Basic Agreement.

(Is there a continuing theme here? Mostly, I think, that we are not living in the age of happy and joyous labor management relations? But then, was there ever such a time?) Click here to read entire post

Sequelitus

The majors (Pixar/Disney, DreamWorks, Fox/Blue Sky, etc.) aren't the only ones teeing up sequels to older triumphs. Elton is also getting into the act.

The Kung Fu Panda director [John Stevenson] has come aboard Sherlock Gnomes, the 3D animated sequel to last year’s Disney-released Gnomeo & Juliet. Elton John‘s Rocket Pictures is producing again with the first movie’s co-writers Andy Riley and Kevin Cecil also back for the follow-up, which centers on the characters from the first movie enlisting the help of a famous gnome-detective ...

When I read this tonight, the first question that popped into my head was: So who's releasing? Disney? I would assume such is the case, but there is no mention about distribution.

The other question: The first installment was produced at Starz' CG facility in Toronto, headed up by Disney veteran David Steinberg. But Mr. Steinberg isn't there anymore. He is now a topkick at Nickelodeon Cartoon Studio in Burbank.

So what studio will be creating the Gnomeo and Juliet followup is anyone's guess. (Maybe Toronto again, maybe someplace else.) Click here to read entire post

Wage Survey Returns at 24%

Rounded.

As of today, we have 834 wage surveys back from members. This amounts to 23.8% of all forms sent out (3500) ...

In raw numbers, we're doing quite well, but it's still important to get wage surveys back in. So if you hadn't spent the five minutes that it takes to fill out the form, here's our invitation to do so now.

We will have the tabulated results up on this site as soon as they're complete. Click here to read entire post

The true King Of Comedy

From Bob Foster:

Leonard Maltin always writes good, interesting stuff about the movies and here's one more reason he should be on your Bookmarks list. Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is doing something this month that I'm looking forward to and Leonard tells us all about it on his website.

It's about the King of Comedy who produced more than 1,000 silent films and several dozen talkies during a 25-year career. Check it out. Click here to read entire post

First Award of the Season

... goes to DWA.

Peter Ramsey's Rise of the Guardians will be presented with the Hollywood Animation Award, which honors the year's best animated film, at the 16th annual Hollywood Film Awards gala ceremony -- the first awards show of the Oscar season -- on Oct. 22 at the Beverly Hilton. ...

Funny thing. I spent the middle of the day at DreamWorks Animation's Glendale campus and got to see some footage of The Croods, and also too, ROTG.

There were a number of staffers on their last scenes for Guardians, and one of them said "Not much more to do. No time left anyway."

Rise of the Guardians looks considerably different from other DWA features. Characters are not your standard-issue DWA designs, and the environments and story are departures from the DWA norm.



So the question is, does HFA presage an Academy win? Does it foretell big box office? I haven't the foggiest, but the scenes and clips I've seen look pretty edgy, and the crew (admittedly not always the best judge, since they're right on top of it) seem to think so.

In two and a half months the wider movie-going world will have some idea.



Click here to read entire post

New/Old Short

So the Mouse restores and projects his immediate predecessor.

Walt Disney Animation Studios debuted a newly restored digital print of the once-thought-lost 1928 Oswald the Lucky Rabbit animated short “Hungry Hobos” at the Telluride Film Festival on September 2, according to Dave Bossert, producer/creative director and head of special projects for WDAS. ...

And where did the lost short come from?

... The only known copy of Hungry Hobos starring Oswald the Lucky Rabbit was found at the Huntley Film Archives in Herefordshire, where it had probably languished for decades. ...

"This was made in 1928 and has been in our collection for decades. We specialise in social history films and not animation," [said Amanda Huntley.]

"But my colleague took the film from the shelf and Googled it – I don't really know why." ...

So the short is whisked away to a Los Angeles auction house, where an "anonymous bidder" named the Disney Co. snaps it up ... and restores it.

My question: Is this short under copyright, or not? Because once a copyright lapses, it's tough to put the public domain object back under the (c) again. (Of course, the Mouse will likely find a way to copyright "this version" ... and since the Telluride specimen is the only version, I guess it could be under copyright, yes?

Click here to read entire post

A Tale of Two Declines

Washington Post wonk Ezra Klein explains them.

Since the 1960s, organized labor in the United States has been steadily decaying. A half-century ago, 30 percent of American workers were members in a union. By last year, that had shriveled to 11.8 percent. Economists have offered up all sorts of theories for the drop, from the shrinking manufacturing workforce to foreign competition that has made U.S. companies more hostile toward unions.

But a new paper from Kris Warner of the Center on Economic and Policy Research suggests that the decline in U.S. labor unions wasn’t simply due to inexorable economic forces. Government policies likely played a big role too. ...

Between the 1920s and 1960s, both countries saw a similar surge in union membership, thanks to changes in labor law and the growth of sectors ripe for organizing, such as automobile manufacturing. But around 1965, something changed. The two countries diverged. Union membership held steady in Canada, but plummeted in the United States. ...

Warner suggests the biggest reason for the two nation’s contrasting fates has to do with labor law. Canada’s rules for union organizing are largely overseen by its provinces, and, until recently, Canada’s rules made it much easier for workers in the private sector to form a union. A majority of employees in the workplace simply needed to sign cards indicating their desire to join—a process known as “card check.”
....

Speaking as a grizzled union organizer, Kris Warner hits the nail on the head and drives it cleanly into the balsa wood board.

In the time I've been doing the organizing thing, one of the BIG impediments to organzing studios is studio push-back. (Surprise!)

The employees want a union, but the employer doesn't want to have to pay the extra freight to have employees working under union wages and benefits, so the employer threatens and cajoles employees to vote "No."

The employer challenges the size and shape of "the unit" the guild or union is striving to organize. He raises objections at National Labor Board hearings.

If that doesn't work, and if -- despite all the various forms of arm-twisting of employees prior to the National Labor Relations Board vote -- the union wins the election, the company goes to work inserting poison-pill proposals into the mandatory contract talks, and stalls and foot-drags on even minor issues.

The surprise isn't that unions lose so many NLRB elections and, after winning, fail to reach a contract 50% of the time. The surprise is that unions and guilds manage to organize as much as they do.

Small wonder then that Canada has two and a half times as many unionized workers as the United States. And it's even less surprising that Canada has "progressive" type things like Single Payer health care.

Do all the Canadian unions slow down Canada's prosperity? Not lately. Click here to read entire post

Dragon Reviewed

The Times (and others) gives the cable version a thumbs up.

"Dragons: Riders of Berk," which premieres Tuesday, is the latest small-screen incarnation of a successful animated film to retain both the personality and production value of its progenitor.

But unlike its predecessors, it plays more like sequel than spinoff. (Although a cinematic sequel is also in the works.) ...

Its stories, set on the viking-settled island of Berk, speak of tolerance and the value of withholding judgment. There the human denizens have made friends with their centuries-old foes, the dragons. ...

The pre-production crew -- the writers, board artists, modelers and designers -- are headquartered in Studio City. Staff was originally employed by APU/Wildbrain, which was doing the development work for DWA. But there were some production hiccups (no pun intended) along the way, and now DreamWorks Television Animation is the corporate entity doing the work.

Having walked through the facility on multiple occasions, I can say that everyone is working their hindquarters off to make the series top drawer. (You can say this of lots of animated projects, but Dragons has been particularly challenging because of the corporate musical chairs that took place a few months back. So it's nice to see the show is getting good critical reaction. Now, on to ratings.) Click here to read entire post

So Tell Me Again? Why Are We Home Today?

Because it's, you know, Labor Day, that little celebration of working people.

(Some politicians think the holiday is to celebrate the small businessman. But actually, no.)

The day started back east, in New York City, in 1882. In 1894 Labor Day got made a holiday. The Times-Union remembered the why and how, back in the 19th century:

Twelve years ago, in New York city, Labor Day was first celebrated. The general assembly of the Knights of Labor was held in New York in 1882, and it was proposed by Mr. P.J. McGuire, a member of the New York Central Labor union, that some time during the assembly's session that year all the labor organizations of New York should turn out in a big parade.

The proposition was adopted and a monster parade was held Sept. 5, which fell on the first Monday of the month. Working men of almost every trade took part, and this of course stopped many business establishments and virtually made the day a holiday. ...

Today, relatively few think about what the day means. (But then, who sits and reflects that November 11th -- Veteran's Day -- originally commemorated the end of World War I? Time moves on ... and slowly dissolves collective memory.)

The heirs to the Knights of Labor -- you and me -- have a lot of jams and jellies because of the marching, demonstrating and general rabble-rousing that they did, among them:

The Weekend

Employer-based Health Care

The End of Child Labor ...

And so on.

Anybody who hasn't been living in a Barstow basement has probably picked up on the fact that the Middle Class has been shrinking as the bank accounts of the Fortunate Few have been rapidly growing. (One of the issues that workers in the 1880s and 1930s rioted over.)

In animation's little corner of the world, differences in pay can be stark. In New York City, for example, wages are a fraction of what they are in unionized Los Angeles (where are the Knights when you need them?) Yet even in L.A., salaries have been stagnant for more than a decade and deadlines aren't getting less tight. Artists still wax nostalgic for the 1990s, when rates were skyrocketing and demand for work outstripped the size of the talent pool.

But times are different now. In the recent negotiations, TAG's negotiators got told that they should be grateful for the 2% wage bump-ups, since unions in other sectors of the economy were going with any increases. (To their credit, none of our folks showed much gratitude.)

Nonetheless, artists -- like most other working persons in the U.S. of A., are hunkered down. They know that times are far from ideal, and that companies are taking advantage of that reality. Which is, now that I think of it, pretty good motivation for remembering what this September 3 holiday is really all about.

Add On: A bit of chart porn, showing how well the Middle Class has been doing over the past three-plus decades.
Click here to read entire post

Stampede

Or at least a rush to get in through the door.

... Since the February DreamWorks announcement [to construct a studio in China], four other Hollywood companies went public with the development of joint Chinese ventures: Walt Disney and Marvel Studios will be producing the next Iron Man movie in conjunction with Beijing-based DMG Entertainment; James Cameron’s 3-D technology company Cameron Pace Group will partner with both Tianjin North Film Group and Tianjin Binhai Hi-Tech Development Group; comic-book legend Stan Lee’s POW! Entertainment signed up to create the next generation of superhero with Beijing’s National Film Capital. Even News Corp. is getting in on the Chinese film industry. ...

There's been a general frenzy among the conglomerates to establish a beach head inside the Middle Kingdom. So why do I have the feeling that their Chinese adventures might not work quite as splendidly as they suppose? Click here to read entire post

Animated Fare in Foreign Venues

No big new breakout hits, but plenty of holdovers.

... Taking the No. 5 spot was Brave, drawing $12.9 million from 51 territories. The Pixar animation title lifted its offshore cume to $237.6 million while its worldwide tally stands at $469.3 million. ...

Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted elevated its foreign box office total to $388 million thanks to $8.9 million weekend ... Ted pushed its international gross total to $168.4 million ...

For those of you keeping score, Mad 3 now has a worldwide total of $602.5 million, while Ted has an accumulation of $384.3 million. (Not bad for a guy who started at Cartoon Network as a board artist.)

ParaNorman's worldwide total (if projections hold up) comes to $57 million. Click here to read entire post

At Warner Bros. Animation

I spent a big chunk of my Friday at Warner Bros. Animation, watching artists work on Tom and Jerry, MAD TV, Teen Titans Go! and Looney Tunes (the series) among others ...



Although it's been announced, the new Scooby Doo direct-to-video is only now starting development. Much of the crew is shifting to a different part of the studio and boxes of personal and drawing items sit on desks waiting for owners to arrive. One Scoob artist told me:

We're going back to the old days with this one. They used to do episodes with the Harlem Globe Trotters and others as guest stars. This time around it will be World Wrestling personalities. ...

(In case you don't habituate show biz or animation sites, Warners announced the new feature a couple of weeks ago. And like the Warners employee said, it's only a new wrinkle in the Scoob franchise if you don't know the history of the big dog.)

A director stopped me in the hall and voiced the opinion that he didn't think WBA would be doing a lot more CG super hero shows like Green Lantern because "They're expensive, and they don't get bigger ratings than hand-drawn super heroes."

His viewpoint, of course, and it might be wrong, but hey. If the extra production money and extra headaches don't earn the studio more dollars, then why do Batman, Superman and the rest of the D.C. universe in CGI? Warners is in the cartoon business for profits, not providing Indian studios with a bigger cash flow.

Tom and Jerry, a non CGI show now in work, is being animated in Glendale at animation veteran's Darrel Van Citter's shop. (Who says you can't do television animation in California?) Click here to read entire post

Labor Day Derby

The last hurrah of summer and big bucks at the box office.

1. The Possession (Ghost House/Lionsgate) NEW [2,816 Runs] Friday $5.5M, 3-Day Weekend $14.4M, 4-Day Holiday $17.5M

2. Lawless (Revolt/Yucaipa/Weinstein) Week 1 [2,888 Runs] Friday $2.8M, 3-Day Weekend $10.1M, 4-Day Holiday $12.9M, Cume $15.0M

3. The Expendables 2 (Millenium/Lionsgate) Week 3 [3,334 Runs] Friday $2.4M (-39%), 3-Day Weekend $9.5M, 4-Day Holiday $12.0M, Cume $69.3M

4. The Bourne Legacy (Universal) Week 4 [3,131 Runs] Friday $1.7M, 3-Day Weekend $7.2M, 4-Day Holiday $9.5M, Cume $98.3M

5. 2016 Obama’s America (Rocky Mountain Pics) Week 8 [1,750 Runs] Friday $1.5M, 3-Day Weekend $4.5M, 4-Day Holiday $5.7M, Cume $19.0M

6. ParaNorman (Focus Features) Week 3 [3,085 Runs] Friday $1.5M, 3-Day Weekend $7.2M, 4-Day Holiday $10.0M, Cume $41.6M

7. The Odd Life Of Timothy Green (Disney) Week 3 [2,635 Runs] Friday $1.4M, 3-Day Weekend $5.6M, 4-Day Holiday $7.8M, Cume $37.7M

8. The Campaign (Warner Bros) Week 4 [2,941 Runs] Friday $1.4M, 3-Day Weekend $5.5M, 4-Day Holiday $7.0M, Cume $74.5M

9. The Dark Knight Rises (Legendary/Warner Bros) Week 7 [2,187 Runs] Friday $1.3, 3-Day Weekend $5.5M, 4-Day Holiday $7.2M, Cume $432.6M

10. Hope Springs (Columbia/Sony) Week 4 [2,441 Runs] Friday $1.1M, 3-Day Weekend $4.0M, 4-Day Holiday $5.0M, Cume $52.5M

ParaNorman hangs in the middle of the pack, performing below what Laika probably wanted, but still performing. Click here to read entire post

Tied Wage Surveys

The morning mails brought some more paper surveys.

Also, too, the interwebs delivered more digital surveys. So we are now up to 22.8% in the "returned survey forms" category ...

This is higher than the return of two years ago (22%) and within spitting distance of last year's 23%.

The survey "deadline" is now over, but here is how things will go from here until the survey's publication: On Tuesday next, when staff returns from the three-day weekend, we will commence counting wages and numbers. This will take a bit of a while, since we've had a return of close to 800 survey forms.

Sooo. What we want interested parties to do, from right now until the end of next week, is send in more survey forms. We will go on toting up received forms until we're ready to publish a couple of weeks hence, and our practice is to accept stragglers until the day of publication.

In other words: keep sending in the freaking forms. The more information we have, the more detailed and accurate we can be. Click here to read entire post