Hollywood’s video game performers are going on strike, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections.

Hollywood’s video game performers voted to go on strike Thursday, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. 

The strike — the second for video game voice actors and motion capture performers under the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists — will begin at 12:01 a.m. Friday. The move comes after nearly two years of negotiations with gaming giants, including divisions of Activision, Warner Bros. and Walt Disney Co., over a new interactive media agreement.

SAG-AFTRA negotiators say gains have been made over wages and job safety in the video game contract, but that the studios will not make a deal over the regulation of generative AI. Without guardrails, game companies could train AI to replicate an actor’s voice, or create a digital replica of their likeness without consent or fair compensation, the union said.

  • EleventhHour
    14•1 month ago

    In no way, at all, is this even remotely the same same thing

      • EleventhHour
        9•1 month ago

        That was also, in no way at all, even remotely similar to what we’re discussing here.

        But your continued parade of ignorance is somewhat amusing

        • FaceDeer
          -7•1 month ago

          I wrote:

          It used to be that if you wanted to listen to music you needed a human artist to physically play it for you, but recordings have been normalized for so long that nobody gives it a second thought.

          Yes, this is exactly what we’re talking about.

          • EleventhHour
            6•1 month ago

            Thank you for confirming my previous comments

            • @[email protected]English
              -3•1 month ago

              This is how generations have been, they usually don’t accept new things, be it culture, technology or fashion, because it breaks their routine. AI is not going to disappear, because it is a technology as old as computing, the closest thing is that an AI winter will come (it has happened several times to a greater or lesser extent).

              But this only affects the US, because in other countries it remains the same without strikes, and I think this will encourage more subcontracting in countries like India, China, Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Indonesia, because they are cheaper. Unless the government starts giving subsidies or updates the Berne Convention.

          • @RedAggroBest
            5•1 month ago

            Even recorded music had an artist behind it.

            Art is self-expression.

            AI has no self to express so trying to pass off anything it does as art on par with an artist is an insult to all of humanity.

            • FaceDeer
              0•1 month ago

              Even recorded music had an artist behind it.

              And yet, as I linked above, there was a hue and cry back when it first came out about how it didn’t have an artist behind it. A quote from one of the anti-recorded-music advertisements at the time:

              Tho’ the Robot can make no music of himself, he can and does arrest the efforts of those who can.

              and:

              300 musicians in Hollywood supply all the “music” offered in thousands of theatres. Can such a tiny reservoir of talent nurture artistic progress?

              and:

              We think the public will tire of mechanical music and will want the real thing.

              It all sounds extremely familiar now. I expect this too shall pass, and a few years from now AI-generated music will be just a routine thing.

              AI-generated voice over is already pretty common on Youtube already, to link more directly to the subject of this particular thread.

              • @RedAggroBest
                3•1 month ago

                You’re missing my point intentionally, you have to be. The song was still written and performed by a PERSON somewhere before the recording is distributed.

                An AI is not a person. It’s not even close to comparable.

                • FaceDeer
                  -2•1 month ago

                  I’m not missing your point. I’m just talking about something other than that specific point you’re making. I’m not talking about what specific involvement humans had in any of this. I know that a recording of a human playing an instrument is a recording of a human playing an instrument whereas an AI-generated piece of music was not played by a human.

                  I’m just describing what people at the time were saying. People at the time were decrying the soulless nature of “canned music”, complaining about how it was going to destroy creativity and jobs and all that. And then it didn’t, life moved on, and nobody complains about “canned music” any more. It was just their opinion and opinions changed under the weight of pragmatism.

                  I expect it’ll be the same with AI-generated stuff. Whether AI is a person, whether a human played it originally or not, that’s not going to matter. This is a question of popular opinion.

                  • @pum
                    4•1 month ago

                    The complains about Recordings and AI aren’t the same thing, why bother discussing it here? You’re comparing two different situations.

                    Recordings didn’t destroy creativity and jobs, because recordings are recordings. Not AI.