Hollywood Unions Reject AI Doomerism, Push for Worker Protections — SkimNews
Get the Tech newsletter
Daily tech — startups, AI labs, chips, the launches that shape the next decade. Free.
- SAG-AFTRA chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland told The Verge the union recognized early how AI could threaten actors' livelihoods and bargained for "enforceable, meaningful guardrails" during the 2023 strikes that cover US entertainment companies but not firms like OpenAI, Anthropic, or Google directly.
- Crabtree-Ireland acknowledged existential AI warnings could be "hyperbole and overblown," but said messages from "the CEOs of these companies or the billionaires who've made their billions" are hard to trust — while conceding former Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon's exit gave the warnings "traction with the public."
- WGAE executive director Sam Wheeler said the union "has long warned that unregulated artificial intelligence poses an existential threat to workers, to our democracy, and to the world," calling the push by "tech oligarchs" reckless and dishonest, and stressing that collective bargaining is not a replacement for government regulation.
- WGAE members spent 148 days on strike in 2023 before securing AI safeguards in their contracts, and Wheeler praised states like New York for enacting meaningful AI regulations in the absence of federal action.
- Anthropic alignment lead Evan Hubinger has said the technology could "kill all humans" "within the next decade," and former researcher Jacob Coxon quit his job over safety concerns, according to the article.
- Disney, Netflix, Amazon, Lionsgate, and entertainment-focused AI startups all declined The Verge's request for comment on the existential AI warnings.
Why it matters: SAG-AFTRA and WGAE are drawing a sharp public line: the existential-risk debate is largely a distraction from documented worker harms they say they secured protections against only through a 148-day 2023 strike. Their push reframes AI regulation as a labor and accountability fight, putting pressure on lawmakers in states like New York and on studios that stayed silent when asked.
Ask SkimNews
