While tech warns of AI danger, Hollywood focuses on today's problems
Tech leaders are sounding the alarm about AI potentially threatening humanity's future. But actors and screenwriters say the real issue is happening right now—in their industry.
The tech world has been buzzing with warnings about artificial intelligence (AI)—the technology that can learn and make decisions like humans do—and whether it could eventually pose an existential threat, meaning a danger to humanity itself. But entertainment unions have a different message: stop worrying about the far future and pay attention to what's happening to workers today.
When The Verge reached out to major Hollywood studios like Disney, Netflix, and Amazon to ask their thoughts on these doomsday predictions, none of them responded. However, two powerful unions—the Screen Actors Guild (SAG-AFTRA), which represents actors, and the Writers Guild of America East (WGAE), which represents screenwriters—did speak up. Their message is clear: while tech leaders debate whether AI could end civilization, creative workers are already facing real, immediate job security concerns.
The unions point out that studios are already using AI tools to create scripts, generate voices, and even manipulate actors' likenesses without permission. These aren't theoretical problems from a distant future—they're happening in contracts and on sets right now. For an actor or writer, this means the technology could replace them or their work without fair compensation or credit. The unions argue that society should be focused on protecting workers from these current harms before speculating about more distant risks.
This disagreement reveals two different views of what matters most: the tech industry's focus on preventing hypothetical future dangers versus the entertainment industry's urgent concern about protecting jobs and livelihoods today. Both conversations matter, the unions suggest, but one is happening while people are losing work.
Original source: The Verge AI