SAG-AFTRA has been having a very active couple of years, ever since the writer’s strike last year led to massive pushes for change in the business compensates its creatives. The SAG union began striking over the summer, before reaching a tentative agreement in November of last year. One of the biggest concerns from the performers was the use of AI in the production process. As of now, the concerns around AI have continued to be a rather rampant fear, but as of now another set of projects might be under such protections. SAG-AFTRA has the Independent Interactive Media Agreement between themselves and Indie developers, which protects actors from AI, offers union coverage, and makes union actors an available asset for these projects. Actors will also be able to give informed consent about the use of AI replicas, and will receive additional payments based on units sold. Originally the Agreement covered projects with a 250,000 to 15 million dollar budget as three tiers, but now 15 million to 30 million dollars are protected in a fourth tier.
While Indie devs might be covered, large scale corporations are not, as SAG AFTRA failed to reach an agreement with companies including Activision, Electronic Arts, and Warner Bros. According to Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, chief negotiator for the talks, the main issue causing delays is AI protections. In an interview with Games Industry Crabtree-Ireland said:
What needs to happen in order for this to move forward and us not to end up on strike against these companies is for them to revisit their resistance and their instance on splitting off our members and protecting some and not others… That’s how this ultimately gets resolved.
So while this victory added to the Agreement is a cause for some celebration, the conversation on AI is not over and performers have not stopped calling for what they want and deserve.