Justine Bateman
@JustineBateman
May 13 • 18 tweets • 4 min read Twitter logo Read on Twitter
SAG ACTORS:
I want to talk about AI and how it will affect you.
I’m a former SAG Board Member and former SAG Negotiating Committee member.
I’m also WGA and DGA. 1/
As a coder and someone with a computer science degree I want to tell you where I believe AI is going. 2/
- AI-written scrips & digitally-scanned actors (image and/or voice). Both already exist. Some talent agencies are actively recruiting their clients to be scanned. You choose the projects and get 75 cents on the dollar. 3/
Your digital image can be triple and quadruple booked, so that bodes well for a 10 percenter. 4/
Films customized for a viewer, based on their viewing history, which has been collected for many years. Actors will have the option to have their image “bought out” to be used in anything at all. 5/
Films “ordered up“ by the viewer. For example, “I want a film about a panda and a unicorn who save the world in a rocket ship. And put Bill Murray in it.” 6/
Viewers getting digitally scanned themselves, and paying extra to have themselves inserted in these custom films. 7/
Licensing deals made with studios so that viewers can order up older films like STAR WARS and put their face on Luke Skywalker‘s body and their ex-wife‘s face on Darth Vader‘s body, etc. 8/
Training an AI program on an older hits TV series, and creating an additional season. FAMILY TIES, for example, has 167 episodes. An AI program could easily be trained on this, and create an eighth season. We only shot seven. 9/
AI has to be addresses now or never. I believe this is the last time any labor action will be effective in our business. If we don’t make strong rules now, they simply won’t notice if we strike in three years, because at that point they won’t need us. 10/end
Addendum: Actors, you must have iron-clad protection against the AI use of your image and voice in the SAG MBA or your profession is finished. Demand it from @sagaftra and do not accept any AMPTP proposal that does not have it.
Needless to say, no @IATSE crew members, no @Teamster drivers, and no #DGA directors will be needed. At first these efforts will be run by software project managers, and eventually even they won’t be needed.
Here are some visual aids (and they are probably outdated):
https://twitter.com/mrgreen/status/1656372134854160393
instagram.com/reel/CqyD53pA1…
(Wrong tag for @Teamsters)
AI is being used to replace human expression for the sake of greed. The #WGA fight can become a template for other industries. I’ve heard of paralegals being replaced with ChatGPT at a legit law firm, & medical grad student being replaced by ChatGPT for medical research. 1a/
And the thing about #AI replacing the arts is that it will have a devastating effect on society. Talented artists are tubes through which God, or the universe or magic or whatever you want to call it, comes into society. It is profound. 2a/
You cut that off and you cut people off from the future of life. 3a/
