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The Writers Guild sent its proposed new contract with Hollywood TV and film producers to its members for ratification.

WGA West President Chris Keyser and WGA East President Michael Winship said in a letter to the Guild's membership that the boards of the union's two wings have approved the new three-year deal for primetime TV and feature film and unanimously recommended ratification.

The WGA and Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers reached a tentative agreement. The current pact runs out on May 1. Members can approve or reject the contract by voting online, by mail (after requesting a paper ballot) or at membership meetings in New York and Los Angeles on April 29.

The Senate Finance Committee has revived a package of tax credits that includes Section 181, a lucrative federal tax incentive for the film and TV industry.

The committee renewed a package of more than 60 different enticements, commonly known as the Extenders Bill, and dispatched it to the full Senate. Attorneys said that the bill faces an uphill climb because of a credit for win energy -- not because of Section 181.

The package expired at the end of 2013, and this new bill would apply retroactively to Jan 1, 2014. It would run through the end of 2015, at which point committee chairman Ron Wyden (above) hopes to be rid of it forever. The legislation permits producers to deduct some of their expenses before they see any profit. If it expires, they will not be able to do that. It is even more helpful to television as it lets them deduct for each episode.

Apparently, the Writers Guild of America and Hollywood's TV and movies producers have reached a tentative agreement on a new three-year contract covering feature films and primetime television.

The pact is subject to approval by the WGA West board and the WGA East council and would then be submitted to the membership for ratification. It would replace the current agreement between the writers and the Alliance for Motion Picture and Television Producers that expires on May 30.

California's film and television tax credits generated $4.3 billion in economic activity and bolstered 22,300 jobs, according to a study released by the Southern California Association of Governments.

But an exodus of films with massive budgets to production hotspots such as the United Kingdom and Canada that offer more generous subsidies was acutely felt in the Golden State. It cost California an estimated $410 million in state and local tax revenues. It also meant sacrificing 47,600 jobs and $9.6 billion in economic output, the study's author’s claim.

“You cannot look at this program and not see it as a formidable economic and fiscal benefit,” Hasan Ikhrata, SCAG Executive Director, said in a statement. “California is very much at risk of losing its film industry, and without this program the past five years, the losses would have been even more painful.”

Time Warner Cable CEO Robert Marcus, who served in the role for just 44 days before Comcast announced plans to take over his company, is eligible for an $80 million golden parachute in the acquisition.

A Securities and Exchange Commission statement says Marcus could receive $56.5 million in equity, $20.5 million in cash, and $400,000 in benefits, among other payments. The payout is dependent on Comcast winning federal approval for the takeover, and TWC shareholders will have a chance to weigh in on the terms.

Armistice has been declared in a $1 billion lawsuit, with Google and Viacom announcing that they have resolved a copyright infringement legal battle that stretched seven years.

Their dispute dates back to Google's $1.65 billion acquisition of YouTube. Shortly after a deal closed, Viacom accused the online video platform in 2007 of violating its copyright by hosting clips from its movies and television programming such as “SpongeBob SquarePants” and “The Daily Show” without its permission. It sued the company for $1 billion.

Terms of the settlement were not disclosed, but the resolution did not involve the exchange of any money, according to an individual with knowledge of the situation. The primary focus was on working together more collaboratively moving forward, the individual said. The two sides were scheduled to appear in appellate court.

The Justice Department is taking an extra step to bolster its support of TV networks in their Supreme Court case argument that Aereo is illegally retransmitting local TV station signals.

US Solicitor General Donald Verrilli, who previously filed a friend of the court brief siding with broadcasters, is now asking to be allowed to argue his view endorsing TV networks stance during high court oral arguments in the case April 22.

The court has yet to make a decision about the request. Cory Andrews, an attorney for the Washington Legal Foundation, which has filed its own friend of the court brief in the case, told TheWrap the move was not that unusual. He said in about 50 percent of cases where the government files friend of the court briefs, it gets time to argue its view. Sometimes the government asks for the time. Other times the court asks the government to act.

Don't watch much ESPN? You still have to pay for it. Love “The Walking Dead,” but hate “SportsCenter”? Too bad. Cable providers pay only a fraction as much for AMC -- the network that airs TV's top-rated drama -- as they do for ESPN.

And they pass their fees on to you, the consumer. The average cable bill in the United States has increased about 4.5 percent annually over the past 15 years to more than $90 today, according to the Federal Communications Commission.

One major reason is the increase in the prices networks charge cable providers to carry their programming -- known in the industry as carriage fees. But those fees don't always correlate to networks’ popularity. ESPN charges the most per subscriber by far -- $5.54 -- taking up on average about 6 percent of basic cable bills, according to numbers SNL Kagan compiled exclusively for TheWrap.

An Internet domain ending in “.sucks”? That idea blows, says Sen Jay Rockefeller (D-WV). Requests for the “dot-sucks” domain appear to be little more than “a predatory shakedown” -- an attempt to extract money from companies worried their brands would be tarnished, the chair of the Senate Commerce Committee wrote in letter to Stephen D. Crocker, chairman of the board of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN).

“I believe any potential this might have to increase choice or competition is overwhelmed by the ways it will be used to unfairly defame individuals, non-profit organizations and businesses,” Sen Rockefeller wrote. ”It is clear that the companies competing to operate this view it primarily as an opportunity to generate income through ‘defensive registrations.’ In my opinion, it is not in the public interest.”

The request to ICANN for the new top level domains were made in 2012 by three competitors: Donuts, Momentous and Top Level Spectrum. An ICANN spokesman said all three requests are still being reviewed. If ICANN approves the requests it will either pick one of the three companies or an auction will take place on which gets the rights to the .sucks suffix.