David Zaslav, the CEO of Warner Bros. Discovery who has quickly found himself as Public Enemy Number One as the writers’ strike drags on, has made the mistake of not locking his Venmo profile, leading to this amazing tweet:



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“David Zaslav’s Venmo isn’t private and really highlights why he should be paying writers,” points out Sean Morrow next to a screenshot of a payment Zaslav sent actor Cheryl Hines with the note, “Way to go Cheryl!...Your so good….”


Yikes.


Zaslav, who oversaw the merger between Warner Bros. and Discovery, the latter of which he had been CEO of since 2006, has faced relentless criticism over the last year, and his actions during the writers’ strike have only made things worse.

Among his baffling business decisions have been to shrink HBO’s library, going so far as to scrap features in post-production like Batgirl for tax write-off purposes; to rebrand “HBO Max” to simply “Max”; and openly expressing his desire to work with J.K. Rowling on a Harry Potter TV series despite the final movie being only just over a decade old and Rowling becoming an infamous TERF in the interim.


All of these moves have made Zaslav unpopular with all manner of internet commenters and film lovers, with things getting so bad that he was literally booed while giving a commencement speech at Boston University back in May, where students could also be heard chanting, “Pay your writers.”



As for his Venmo exploits, stranger than Zaslav’s lack of grammatical ability is a payment he received from CBS executive David Theodosopoulos on the day of the Warner Bros./Discovery merger with the message, “Zas, didn’t have your email and want to congratulate you!!! Way to go!!! Exciting group of assets!!”


It’s a depressing reminder that what is a beloved TV show or movie to you and me — or what is a crew member or actor’s livelihood — is ultimately just part of a “group of assets” to craven studio executives.