Video game performers protest unregulated AI use at Warner Bros. Studios

LOS ANGELES (AP) — More than 300 video game performers and Hollywood actors picketed in front of the Warner Bros. Studios building on Thursday to protest against what they call an unwillingness from top gaming companies to protect union voice actors and motion capture workers equally against the unregulated use of artificial intelligence.

Standing before the crowd, Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, national executive director of the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, said that AI has become the most challenging issue in many of the union's negotiations.

“We’ve made deals with the studios and streamers. We’ve made deals without a strike with the major record labels and with countless other employers, which provide for informed consent and fair compensation for our members," he told The Associated Press. "And yet, for some reason, the video game companies refuse to do that and that’s what’s going to be their undoing.”

The protest marks the first large labor action since SAG-AFTRA game workers voted to strike last week. The work stoppage came after more than 18 months of negotiations with gaming giants, including divisions of Activision, Warner Bros. and Walt Disney Co., over a new interactive media agreement stalled over protections around the use of AI. Warner Bros. Games is the publisher behind games including “Hogwarts Legacy” and “Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League.”

“Signs up, games down, LA is a union town,” the crowd chanted Thursday morning, many of them holding up signs emblazoned with a fist holding a video game controller. One man, dressed in a skull mask reminiscent of a “Call of Duty” character named Ghost, waved a poster that read, “Don’t ghost us for AI. It’s your call of duty to pay actors.” The first-person shooter game is published by Activision.

Members of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and the Writers Guild of America also attended the protest in solidarity.

Union leaders have billed AI as an existential crisis for performers. Game voice actors and motion capture artists’ likenesses, they say, could be replicated by AI and used without consent and fair compensation. The unregulated use of AI, the union says, poses “an equal or even greater threat” to performers in the video game industry than it does in film and television because the capacity to cheaply and easily create convincing digital replicas of performers’ voices is widely available.

Concerns over AI helped fuel last year’s film and television strikes by the union, which lasted four months.

On the picket line, Konstantine Anthony said that most people want humans — not AI — to be their storytellers.

“A lot of the algorithms that we see in our most advanced video games have been around for decades. It’s just become more and more advanced to recreate, likeness -- that’s really what they’re trying to do so that they don’t have to use us anymore,” said Anthony, a Burbank city council and SAG-AFTRA member. “That’s why we’re here today: to ask that they simply pay their storytellers.”

Seth Allyn Austin, a motion capture artist, said his involvement in his union has significantly grown as the negotiations continued over the last year and a half.

“To come here and then to be supported by your fellow artists, knowing that you’re all in this fight together, it’s like they’re all a monument standing behind me. It’s amazing," said Austin, who has worked on games such as “Horizon Forbidden West” and “God of War Ragnarok.”

Audrey Cooling, a spokesperson for the video game producers, said the companies have offered AI protections as well as “a significant increase in wages for SAG-AFTRA represented performers in video games.”

“We have worked hard to deliver proposals with reasonable terms that protect the rights of performers while ensuring we can continue to use the most advanced technology to create a great gaming experience for fans,” Cooling said. “We have proposed terms that provide consent and fair compensation for anyone employed under the (contract) if an AI reproduction or digital replica of their performance is used in games.”

SAG-AFTRA’s negotiating committee argued that the studios’ definition of who constitutes a “performer” is key to understanding the issue of who would be protected.

“The industry has told us point blank that they do not necessarily consider everyone who is rendering movement performance to be a performer that is covered by the collective bargaining agreement,” SAG-AFTRA Chief Contracts Officer Ray Rodriguez said at a news conference last week, adding that some physical performances are being treated as “data.”

The union had been negotiating with an industry bargaining group consisting of signatory video game companies. Those companies are Activision Productions Inc., Blindlight LLC, Disney Character Voices Inc., Electronic Arts Productions Inc., Formosa Interactive LLC, Insomniac Games Inc., Llama Productions LLC, Take 2 Productions Inc., VoiceWorks Productions Inc. and WB Games Inc.

The global video game industry generated nearly $184 billion in revenue in 2023, according to game market forecaster Newzoo, with revenues projected to reach $207 billion in 2026.

“We are at the table because we want to include SAG-AFTRA-represented performers in our productions, and we will continue working to resolve the last remaining issue in these negotiations,” Cooling said. “Our goal is to reach an agreement with the union that will end this strike.”

Game performers participate in a kick-off picket line for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. Hollywood's video game performers are currently on strike, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

Natasha Blasick participates in a kick-off picket line for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. Hollywood's video game performers are currently on strike, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

Jeff Leach participates in a kick-off picket line for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. Hollywood's video game performers are currently on strike, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

Game performers participate in a kick-off picket line for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. Hollywood's video game performers are currently on strike, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

A picket at a kick-off picket line for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. Hollywood's video game performers are currently on strike, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

Game performers participate in a kick-off picket line for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. Hollywood's video game performers are currently on strike, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

XXX participates in a kick-off picket line for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. Hollywood's video game performers are currently on strike, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

National Executive Director Duncan Crabtree-Ireland participates in a kick-off picket line for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. Hollywood's video game performers are currently on strike, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

SAG-AFTRA member Zachary Luna participates in a kick-off picket line for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. Hollywood's video game performers are currently on strike, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

Game performers participate in a kick-off picket line for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. Hollywood's video game performers are currently on strike, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

Picket signs in a kick-off picket line for the SAG-AFTRA video game strike at Warner Bros. Games headquarters on Thursday, Aug. 1, 2024, in Burbank, Calif. Hollywood's video game performers are currently on strike, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

FILE - SAG-AFTRA signage is seen on the side of the headquarters in Los Angeles on Friday, Nov. 10, 2023.Hollywood's video game performers voted to go on strike Thursday, July 25, 2024, throwing part of the entertainment industry into another work stoppage after talks for a new contract with major game studios broke down over artificial intelligence protections. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel,File)

ARLINGTON, Texas (AP) — Julio Rodríguez homered twice to drive in five runs, George Kirby went six innings for his 13th victory and the AL wild card-chasing Mariners beat the Texas Rangers 8-2 on Friday night.

Rodríguez put the Mariners (79-75) ahead to stay with his three-run homer in the fifth off Jack Leiter, who relieved Jacob deGrom after the two-time Cy Young Award winner made his first home start in nearly 17 months after elbow surgery.

Seattle remained two games behind Minnesota for the third and final wild card after the Twins beat Boston 4-2 in 12 innings. The Mariners stayed five back of Houston in the AL West with eight games remaining, three in Houston.

Rodríguez tied a career high for RBIs with his first multihomer game this season. His first homer put Seattle up 4-2, and he went deep off the rookie right-hander again in the seventh with a two-run shot the opposite way to right field for his 18th of the year.

Kirby (13-11) beat the reigning World Series champions again, five days after facing the minimum 21 batters over seven scoreless innings at home against them. The 26-year-old right-hander is 7-0 with a 1.15 ERA in nine career starts against Texas. He struck out four without a walk this time while allowing two runs on five hits.

Nathaniel Lowe had a two-run single for the Rangers (73-81), who have already been eliminated from the AL West race and are on the verge of being officially knocked out of wild-card contention and guaranteed a losing record.

Lowe's hit ended Kirby's streak of 34 consecutive scoreless innings against Texas in a span of seven starts since Sept. 28, 2022.

DeGrom struck out five over three innings, and the only run he allowed was when No. 9 batter Josh Rojas led off the third with a homer. Rojas later added a sacrifice fly.

Leiter (0-3) allowed seven runs (six earned) over five innings. He struck out five and walked two while throwing 57 of 92 pitches for strikes.

A week after throwing 3 2/3 scoreless innings in his season debut on the road, also against the Mariners, deGrom threw 37 of 58 pitches for strikes and had one walk. Rangers manager Bruce Bochy had said the 36-year-old right-hander would throw about 60 pitches.

It was the first start at home for deGrom since he left in the middle of the fourth inning against the New York Yankees on April 28, 2023. That was the sixth and last start in the first season of his $185 million, five-year contract.

UP NEXT

Three-time Cy Young winner Max Scherzer (2-4, 3.95 ERA) makes his second start since coming off the IL after missing 40 games with right shoulder fatigue and an arm nerve issue. Rookie right-hander Emerson Hancock (3-4, 4.83) starts for Seattle.

AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/mlb

Texas Rangers' Nathaniel Lowe (30) hits a two-run single in the fourth inning of a baseball game against the Seattle Mariners, Friday, Sept. 20, 2024, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Richard W. Rodriguez)

Seattle Mariners' Julio Rodriguez celebrates in the dugout after a two-run home run against the Texas Rangers in the seventh inning of a baseball game Friday, Sept. 20, 2024, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Richard W. Rodriguez)

Texas Rangers starting pitcher Jacob deGrom (48) delivers in the first inning of a baseball game against the Seattle Mariners, Friday, Sept. 20, 2024, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Richard W. Rodriguez)

Seattle Mariners starting pitcher George Kirby (68) delivers in the first inning of a baseball game against the Texas Rangers, Friday, Sept. 20, 2024, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Richard W. Rodriguez)

Seattle Mariners Josh Rojas (4) celebrates in the dugout after a solo home run against the Texas Rangers in the third inning of a baseball game, Friday, Sept. 20, 2024, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Richard W. Rodriguez)

Texas Rangers starting pitcher Jacob deGrom (48) and catcher Jonah Heim (28) walk back to the dugout in the first inning in a baseball game against the Seattle Mariners, Friday, Sept. 20, 2024, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Richard W. Rodriguez)

Texas Rangers starting pitcher Jacob deGrom (48) delivers in the first inning of a baseball game against the Seattle Mariners, Friday, Sept. 20, 2024, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Richard W. Rodriguez)

Seattle Mariners' Julio Rodriguez (44) hits a two-run home run against the Texas Rangers in the seventh inning of a baseball game Friday, Sept. 20, 2024, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Richard W. Rodriguez)

Seattle Mariners starting pitcher George Kirby (68) delivers in the first inning of a baseball game against the Texas Rangers, Friday, Sept. 20, 2024, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Richard W. Rodriguez)

Seattle Mariners' Julio Rodriguez reacts toward the dugout as he runs the bases after hitting a two-run home run against the Texas Rangers in the seventh inning of a baseball game Friday, Sept. 20, 2024, in Arlington, Texas. (AP Photo/Richard W. Rodriguez)