LOS ANGELES (AP) — More than 300 video game performers and Hollywood actors protested Thursday in front of the Warner Bros. studio building. As they say The unwillingness of major gaming companies to provide equal protection for union voice actors and motion capture workers from the use of unregulated artificial intelligence.
Duncan Crabtree Ireland, national executive director of the Screen Actors Guild/National Federation of Television and Radio Entertainers, told the crowd that AI has become the toughest issue in many of the unions’ negotiations.
“We’ve made deals with studios, we’ve made deals with streamers, we’ve made deals with major record labels and countless employers without strikes, providing informed consent and fair compensation for our members,” he told The Associated Press. “But for some reason, video game companies are refusing to do that, and that will be their downfall.”
The protest marks the first major labor movement since SAG-AFTRA games workers voted to strike last week. The work stoppage comes after more than 18 months of strike action. negotiation The company is in a battle with major gaming companies including Activision, Warner Bros. and Walt Disney over a new interactive media deal that has stalled over protections for the use of AI.
“Sign it, stop gaming, LA is a union city,” chanted the crowd Thursday morning. Many held signs depicting fists gripping video game controllers. A man wearing a skull mask reminiscent of the Ghost character from “Call of Duty” waved a sign that read, “Don’t ignore us for the AI. It’s your duty to pay your actors.” The first-person shooter is published by Activision.
Members of the International Alliance of Theater Employees and the Writers Guild of America also joined the protest in solidarity.
Union leaders say AI is an existential threat to performers. The likenesses of game voice actors and motion capture artists can be replicated by AI and used without their consent or fair compensation, they argue. The unregulated use of AI poses as much or more of a threat to performers in the video game industry as it does in the film and TV industries, the unions say, because of the widely available ability to cheaply and easily create digital replicas of performers’ voices.
Concerns Fueled by AI Last year, labor unions staged a four-month strike in the film and television industry.
At the protest on Thursday, Constantine Anthony said most people want humans, not AI, to be the storytellers.
“Many of the algorithms we see in cutting-edge video games have been around for decades; they’ve just gotten more and more sophisticated at recreating our likenesses. What they’re really trying to do is make it so they don’t have to use us,” said Anthony, a Burbank City Councilman and SAG-AFTRA member. “We’re here today to demand that they pay the storytellers.”
Audrey Cooling, a spokesperson for the video game studios, said that in addition to protecting AI, the studios proposed “significantly increasing wages for SAG-AFTRA-represented performers in video games.”
“We have worked hard to offer reasonable terms that protect the rights of performers, allowing us to continue using cutting edge technology and provide a great gaming experience for fans,” Couling said. “We have proposed terms that provide consent and fair compensation to everyone employed under the (contract) if an AI facsimile or digital replica of their performance is used in the game.”
SAG-AFTRA’s negotiating committee argued that the studios’ definition of who constitutes a “performer” is key to understanding the question of who is protected.
“The industry has been very clear that we do not necessarily consider everyone who performs a moving performance to be a performer covered by a collective bargaining agreement,” Ray Rodriguez, SAG-AFTRA’s chief contracts officer, said at a press conference last week, adding that some physical performances are treated as “data.”
The union was negotiating with the Industry Bargaining Group, which is made up of the contracted video game companies: Activision Productions Inc., Blindlight LLC, Disney Character Voices Inc., Electronic Arts Productions Inc., Formosa Interactive LLC, Insomniac Games Inc., Llama Productions LLC, Take 2 Productions Inc., VoiceWorks Productions Inc. and WB Games Inc.
According to the games market forecast, the global video games industry will generate revenue of approximately $184 billion in 2023. New ZooRevenues are projected to reach $207 billion by 2026.
“We came to the bargaining table because we want the performers represented by SAG-AFTRA to participate in our productions, and we will continue to work to resolve the last remaining issues in these negotiations,” Couling said. “Our goal is to reach an agreement with the union and end this strike.”
