SAG looks to increase dues for the first time in seven years, a move that could put an unwelcome financial burden on your favorite bartender, valet parking attendant, or Starbucks barista in between slow-arriving residual checks. [Variety]
· On fledgling network The CW's premiere night, America's Next Top Model carries them to a win in the only demographic they truly care about, 18-34 year-olds, as the kids obviously put in the effort to figure out which channel is the new home of Tyra Banks' trademark sassiness. (Disclosure: We still have no idea what channel The CW landed on here in L.A. We suppose we'll figure it out eventually.) [THR]
· Adorably quirky superproducer Brian Grazer's Imagine TV is hooking up with the FBI to develop a drama about its role in the post-9/11 government. In the meantime, The Graze and his partners are hoping that new CBS series Shark will be a hit and make them incrementally richer. [Variety]
Justin Long will join Bruce Willis in the cast of the fourth Die Hard flick, Live Free or Die Hard, playing an obnoxious Mac enthusiast who scoffs at Willis' every frustrated attempt to download pictures from his digital camera onto his PC. [THR]
Thursday night ABC newcomer Grey's Anatomy defeats CBS timeslot stalwart CSI in both overall and key demographic viewership, leaving Les Moonves no choice but to promise his network affiliates that he plans on having the entire Grey's cast murdered by the end of the month. [Variety]

An operative sent over this photo from today's WGA rally at Pan Pacific Park, where Guild members gathered to renew their commitment to unionizing reality show writers and establishing fair residuals for use of their work on digital platforms. At the rally, WGA officials admitted that they were ready to try a more militant approach to resolve their two-month-long America's Next Top Model standoff, as they've found that peacefully occupying the sidewalk outside their offices with picket signs and waiting for the show's producers to die of shame has so far failed to yield results, and officially authorized the brutal beating of up to two Top Model employees as they return from lunch each day until the unionization stalemate is finally broken.

• WGA Unity Rally [WGA.org]
• Previously: Hollywood ProtestWatch: Striking Writers Enlist Ringer Model Picketer [Defamer]

This is the craziest coincidence ever! I was at the Grove mall [yesterday]. I was done picketing for the day, and there was going to be a concert there sponsored by the CW that I wanted to check out. I ended up getting there way early, and went window shopping in Nordstrom.

After a few minutes of perusing the shoe department, I notice a group of people gathered around none other than Tyra Banks! And here I am in my handwritten "America's Next Top Model writer on strike" T-shirt! I was trying to move around to the front of where Tyra and her fans were, hoping she would see me. Within seconds, however, a guy dressed all in black with a headset on kicked me out of the store! I was just standing there! So, I left and as I did I heard him say into his mouthpiece "don't let that girl back in." Unbelievable!

I always had a positive opinion of Tyra, but that is being tested lately. First, remaining silent about whether she supports her writers or not. Now this. I just dont know.

While we're sure that Banks and her people weren't going to take a chance that a disgruntled writer might suddenly attempt to bludgeon the host with a reduced-price pump and inflict hundreds of dollars in hair-extension damage, they could've at least been a little more subtle in their methods. Having a salesgirl hover nearby the striker, click her tongue at the writer's homemade top, then rudely suggest that someone who might be about to lose her job probably can't afford anything in Nordstrom's might have been enough to get her to leave the store before excessive strong-arm tactics became necessary.

Bonus To Do link: The ANTM strikers are staging a fan appreciation event at the picket site tomorrow, complete with sympathetic models from the show and a "special celebrity guest appearance" by a hissing cockroach. We'll leave it up to you to supply the Janice Dickinson joke.

• TYRA BANKS' people kicked me out of Nordstroms today!!! [Myspace/topmodelunion]

The Defamer Special Correspondent On Sneaky Protest Tactics has filed this brief report on the ongoing writers' strike at America's Next Top Model, complete with photographs documenting how the picketers have resorted to enlisting some ringer T&A to draw some attention to their cause:

So Day 3 of "Strikewatch '06" (as NBC4 News will undoubtedly want to call it, so I'm trademarking the phrase today) and there've been no meetings or negotiations to this point.

But the Top Model writers, in a strategic move, brought out the big guns (or little guns if you're a boob guy). Former ANTM contestant Lisa D'Amato was out there today walking the picket line. And she also used the opportunity to show the writers the "proper" way to walk a picket line - apparently you have to chant in time with the hip sway. Who knew?

Another photo of the attractive woman holding picket signs is after the jump, should you want to fall into the striking writers' clever trap.

• Hollywood ProtestWatch: Writers Vs. Top Models [Defamer]

Our request for photos of the WGA protest outside the America's Next Top Model offices did not go unheeded, as a faithful operative in the area supplied us with this picture of the red army of reality show writers stirring up attention for their attempts to unionize. We're a little disappointed that no one's yet burned Tyra Banks in effigy, for there could hardly be a more potent symbol of coming revolution than Banks' iconic weave aflame, but at least someone tried to deliver the goods on a picket sign. The one featured here is partially obscured, but we think we can extrapolate the catchy slogan "Models Don't Eat—But My Family Needs To" from what's visible. Not bad, but maybe they can borrow a sympathetic Guild sitcom writer for a little punch-up if the strike drags on.

UPDATE: More protest pics after the jump.

• Reality Writers Protesting Tyra Banks' 'Top Model' Sweatshop [Defamer]

The dispute comes at a delicate time for the new CW network, which is relying on the hit reality show created by supermodel Tyra Banks to dress up its inaugural lineup.

The series debuts Sept. 20 on the CW, forged by CBS Corp. and Warner Bros. Television from the remnants of the WB and UPN networks. Only the first few episodes have been completed for the series' seventh cycle.

In a low-key protest outside their West Los Angeles offices, the writers wore red "United We Stand" T-shirts with the writers guild's logo and handed out fliers titled "Free to Be Union? Not at the CW's America's Next Top Model," a play on the network's motto, "Free to Be."

Yesterday's "low-key" event was obviously just a warm-up for today's action, as we're told that picketers are already noisily protesting outside the ANTM offices and plan on being there all day. It should go without saying that we welcome any reports on the melee, especially those that involve cameraphone photography of sandwich board and picket-sign copy decrying Tyra Banks as a sweatshop foreman.

• 'Next Top Model' Writers Threaten Strike [LAT]