On May 2, 2023, the Writers Guild of America (WGA) went on strike due to a dispute with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP). The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) soon followed WGA’s example and announced their strike on July 14, 2023. These two strikes represent larger, long-pressing disagreements on labor between these unions and Hollywood. This is only the second time WGA and SAG-AFTRA have gone on strike together—the last time being in 1960—and it has created the largest stoppage to Hollywood industries since the COVID-19 pandemic.
The WGA strike focuses on a couple key issues: residuals from streaming media and the inclusion of artificial intelligence in scripts. The residuals offered by AMPTP to writers have cut writers’ incomes dramatically compared to a decade ago. The reductions in workforce and cancellations of productions in the industry brought on by the COVID-19 pandemic had an undeniable negative impact on the writers, who saw an unprecedented loss of work and money. The WGA strike also came right after the Minimum Basic Agreement (MBA) expired. The MBA was an agreement that established a minimum wage for writers, though it did not include writers of streaming TV. Ultimately, the issue over residuals came to the disparity between the writers’ payment if decided by WGA or AMPTP: WGA’s proposals gave $429 million to writers, but AMPTP offered a mere $86 million.
Disputes over artificial intelligence are new issues within Hollywood due to the relatively recent development of such advanced technologies. The WGA was not completely against the use of artificial intelligence platforms like ChatGPT in the writing process but rather advocated for its use only for research or facilitating script ideas. Prior to this strike, AI was on its way to become a tool to replace writers, severely damaging writers’ job security and their place in the industry as a whole.
While it may sound like a far-off prospect, issues around artificial work are already sprouting up, especially with novels. Just recently, a new tool, Prosecraft, aimed to spread a linguistic analysis of published literature. The website focused on analytics such as word count, amount of passive voice, “vividness” of writing, use of adverbs, and more. Creator Benji Smith claimed Prosecraft was intended to help authors by conveying data on what made up a successful book. Instead, authors were enraged over how Prosecraft gathered this data: through the intentional stealing of novels with zero permission from their authors. The controversy raised questions about copyright issues and the disregard for authors and their rights to their creations, which culminated in the shutting down of Prosecraft.
While not exactly aligned with the issues WGA was striking about, Prosecraft and the WGA strike share a common concern: the appropriation of work from artists by AI with no compensation. At the end of the day, profit-based companies are not worried about the quality of work as much as they are worried about the cost of work. When AI enters the picture, not only does it get trained by stolen work, but it also diminishes the role of future writers in the industry, reducing them to simple editors with minimal compensation.
The SAG-AFTRA strike preached similar issues to the WGA strike, including residuals and usage of AI to digitally reproduce actors’ likeness. It also advocated for more monitoring of self-tape auditions. While the WGA strike ended on September 27, 2023 after a temporary agreement with AMPTP, the SAG-AFTRA strike is ongoing. Both strikes teach us a lesson on the rising issues surrounding the rampant use of artificial intelligence, as well as on the poor treatment of writers and actors in Hollywood. These WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes are two of the many steps in bringing about real change in the entertainment industry.
