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Striking Distance

This makes for sad reading on what is next for the WGA strike -  that people who are in power want to completely break down those that do not before negotiations can begin. The way this plays out will likely pave the way for workers in other parts of the economy who are at risk of being made irrelevant by AI. 

“We want to be able to scan a background performer’s image, pay them for a half a day’s labor, and then use an individual’s likeness for any purpose forever without their consent,” the union said. “We also want to be able to make changes to principal performers’ dialogue, and even create new scenes, without informed consent. And we want to be able to use someone’s images, likenesses, and performances to train new generative AI systems without consent or compensation.”

The AMPTP said in a statement in response that its offers included an “AI proposal which protects performers’ digital likenesses, including a requirement for performers’ consent for the creation and use of digital replicas or for digital alterations of a performance.”

The truth is somewhere in between and the when the full weight of the legalese needs to be fought, things will unlikely go in the favor of some low-paid performer whose humanity was stolen to create a digital likeness. What is happening here is only a continuation (and extension) of the current ways in which everyone's data is being monetized by large companies who hold and control it without any benefits accrued to the producer of data.

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