E-Dribble

Michael Hollick feels he has been cheated. He only pulled six figures for a voice over in a game that has made millions. He was the voice behind the main character in Grand Theft Auto 4.

Now don’t go thinking that I don’t feel compassion for people like Michael. I do. Just not because of his money situation.

Michael lives in a society that thinks 100 G’s for lending your vocals to a computer game is unfair. He’s not alone. He’s come to believe this because the sports players of all types, network writers, airline pilots all the way down to the lowly labor crews on film sets have bemoaned the fact that they are being raked over the coals for their hard work.

Mr. Hollick doesn’t blame Rockstar games for his meager monetary compensation. He acknowledges that Rockstar hired him when he was unknown, and he’s appreciative. But they’re making a lot of money on that game and in turn, he would like to make a lot of money on that game if for no other reason than the fact that there’s a lot of money floating around and he didn’t get enough.

Americans’ perception of what they are worth has become so skewed that nobody really knows why they deserve the money that they do. They just know that they should have made more. They will go so far as organized strikes because of the perceived injustice they feel has been brought down upon them. Baseball players – men playing a child’s game feel no sense of shame when they state that they’re not being fairly compensated for all of their hard work. Network writers, those guys that write the same show over and over while only changing the characters’ names have absolutely no qualms with telling the world that their job is worth more and they are putting down their pens until everyone agrees.

Outsourcing. That’s the answer. If it worked for phone support, it can work for voiceovers, baseball and network television. It seems that the rest of the world have not yet caught up to us in regards to egos. We seem to have gotten along fine without being able to understand our phone support. Who really needs to understand a baseball player or game character?

Besides, you’ll need the extra money once I talk my fellow bloggers into striking.