Issue link: https://digital.copcomm.com/i/1498689
t's a concerning time for creatives. Generative artificial intelligence has burst onto the scene, allowing anyone to create essays, screenplays, pictures, music and more in mere seconds, with minimal effort — even if they consider themselves devoid of creativity. The most popular of these tools parse a user's input and, using an enormous set of data, create an output that fulfills that request. So, for instance, ChatGPT can respond to a user's request to "Write an essay about snails" by pulling everything it knows about the invertebrates to create a passable article on the topic. On the visual arts side, one might ask Midjourney or DALL-E for a picture of a snail in the style of Vincent Van Gogh, and the AI will dutifully spit one out. Machine learning, which powers these tools, is being used onscreen to de-age actors, lip-synch dubbed programs, replicate an actor's voice and even generate entire performances. It's not hard to see how all this power can be misused. That's why SAG-AFTRA and other industry unions are working hard to ensure that AI is available as a tool to help creators, not a way to put them out of work. "These tools can help America's entertainers ideate and work more efficiently. They can be a welcome tool to assist in the creative process, or they can take a darker turn, threatening to replace SHANE O'NEAL National Executive Director Duncan Crabtree-Ireland speaks about how SAG-AFTRA is working with the entertainment industry on AI at SAG-AFTRA's panel track at C-Space at CES in Las Vegas in January. The panel, AI Goes to Hollywood, explored the future of AI, how it is shaping the industry and how unions like SAG-AFTRA are navigating its impact on performers. Also on the panel was Flawless CEO and co-founder Scott Mann, left, along with moderator Matt Belloni, co-founder of Puck.