At San Diego Comic-Con, fans from all over the world gather to celebrate all things nerdy: cartoon superheroes, sci-fi and fantasy legends, anime, video games and more. This year, those celebrations have been joined by the advocacy of some of Hollywood’s most memorable writers and actors. “To be unionized and to be part of a union is such a huge boon, I would say, to protect yourself from this kind of technology,” said actress Ashley Burch, best known for her work on the sitcom Mythic. At a press conference in front of fandom bloggers and entertainment reporters, members of SAG-AFTRA and the National Voice Actors Association (NAVA) addressed concerns cast members have about the non-consensual use of artificial intelligence. “One area where this is at the forefront is deepfakes and the abuse of many of their more prominent members in terrible ways by those who use deepfake technology,” Dunn said. Crabtree Ireland, SAG-AFTRA’s National Secretary and Chief Negotiator, notes how AI-generated caricatures and voices are being used in everything from commercials to pornography without the actors’ knowledge, consent or remuneration. Earlier this month, fans of the video game Skyrim accused tech company NexusMods of allowing some users to add pornographic voice lines using AI voice clones of the game’s original actors. NAVA founder and president Tim Friedlander said the threat of AI is of particular concern because there are no regulations on how tech companies and studios can use artists’ work without their consent. “From a voice actor’s perspective, we’ve been sending audio files for 20 years. We’re going digital,” Friedlander said. “We’ve been sending our voices all over the world for years. “What people are saying here really resonates with the public because I think everyone is concerned that elements like their private lives, their personalities, maybe their faces, are filmed and used without actual informed consent,” Crabtree Ireland said. This is why both the WGA and SAG-AFTRA are in contention. In response, the Motion Picture and Television Producers Alliance released a statement saying the major studios’ proposals included seeking consent from actors for “the creation and use of digital replicas,” while Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos also recently told investors, “We are always at the negotiating table with writers, directors, actors, producers and the industry at large, and we strongly hope to reach an agreement by now.” However, Crabtree Ireland said the proposal would also allow major studios to pay actors a day’s wages to own and permanently use scans or likenesses of background actors. “What’s not good is the one sentence: ‘We will create a digital replica of your voice, and we have the right to use it forever throughout the universe for any purpose you wish.’ Despite warnings about the use of AI, Crabtree Ireland and members of SAG-AFTRA say this is ultimately not a battle between artists and technology, but an ongoing conversation about how technology is used.” AI can be implemented in humans. It’s a central way,” Crabtree Ireland said. “AI can be deployed in a way that will lift people up instead of tearing them down. I truly feel that all of us, and indeed society as a whole, should say, ‘It’s not good for these companies to arbitrarily adopt it.’”
