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The Writer's Guild of America (WGA) is on strike as of May 2nd, after negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) broke down. While most of their demands deal with the way pay and compensation in the streaming era is structured, on the second page towards the bottom is:
I think this is an interesting first salvo in the fight over AI in creative professions. While this is just where both parties are starting for strike negotiations, and either could shift towards a compromise, I still can't help but see a hint that AMPTP isn't super interested in foregoing the use of AI in the future.
In 2007, when the WGA went on strike for 3 months, it had a huge effect on television at the time. There was a shift to unscripted programming, like reality television, and some shows with completed scripts that had been on the back burner got fast tracked to production. Part of me doubts that generative AI is really at the point where this could happen, but it would be fascinating if the AMPTP companies didn't just use traditional scabs during this strike, but supplemented them with generative AI in some way. Maybe instead of a shift to reality television, we'll look back on this as the first time AI became a significant factor in the production of scripted television and movies. Imagine seeing a "prompt engineer" credit at the end of every show you watch in the future.
It'll be interesting to see how this all plays out.
Some data about how oppressed the struggling worker masses are (https://variety.com/2023/biz/news/wga-contract-inflation-minimums-1235564920/):
In other words, their minimum wages are about 1.5x to 3x country's median wages for essentially half-time work.
I don't think it is bad for anyone to earn a lot of money, but given that the number of decent quality shows has been extremely low for many years now, and most of those that had decent quality have been based on existing literary work, what it seems to be there is extremely overpaid bunch of people producing a very low-quality product. Still, I am sure eventually they'd get what they want - this time - because AIs aren't ready to produce scripts yet. But in 5-10 years. given the immense savings it promises? I can totally see it.
I get the opposite impression on quality. We have been in a true golden age of high quality shows for the last decade. HBO alone has put out hit after hit.
I also take issue with the framing of the workers wages as “overpaid”. In union negotiations it’s an argument about how to split the pie and while 200k might sound like a lot to some the fact is Hollywood is extremely profitable. Plus if we want to talk “overpaid” Iger alone is making $27 million a year and seems like a juicer target.
Well, obviously we have very different tastes. I am looking at the list of HBO shows (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_HBO_original_programming) and what I'd be at least somewhat interested in, of recent work, let's say past 2010?
House of the Dragon - yeah, kinda, somewhat weak sauce, but there are some strong points, wouldn't put is as a hit, but as a decent offering
Westworld - started awesome, went downhill fast, dropped it.
His Dark Materials - based on existing work, kinda decent though didn't see the last season yet
Game of Thrones - based on existing work, we all know how it ended in an utter disaster once Martin lost interest in finishing it
Silicon Valley - ok, this one is a hit. Full points for this one, no questions asked.
Perry Mason - didn't see it, may be interested, depending on how woke it'd be (I have no hope for non-woke, but whether it would be tolerable?) - conditional, on the strength of the franchise
This is basically it, feel zero interest to the rest of it. Maybe it's a golden age, but not for me.
Oh, I absolutely don't think them grabbing a share of the corporate profits is something wrong. I think their product is crap (ok, 90% crap, with a rare gem buried in it), but if it finds the market, then they deserve a share in it. But I personally wouldn't care either way - because for me, their product is not valuable.
BTW I notice I can name a bunch of hits I liked pre-2010 easily: The Wire, The Sopranos, Rome, Carnivale, Oz, Angles in America, John Adams. Oh, forgot one - add Chernobyl to the hits, it's surprisingly decently done for an US series about USSR.
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