Hollywood stars launch Creators Coalition on AI
A group of entertainment industry workers has launched a new coalition aimed at defending creators’ rights amid the growth of the AI industry.
The group, called Creators Coalition on AI, was founded by 18 people, including writer-director Daniel Kwan, actors Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Natasha Lyonne, and producer Janet Yang, former president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
Gordon-Levitt said the group is not limited to Hollywood luminaries and is open to all creators and the skilled workers around them, including podcasters, digital content creators and newsletter writers.
“We all frankly face the same threat, not from generative AI as a technology, but from the unethical business practices that many big AI companies are guilty of,” he said in a video posted on X on Tuesday. “The idea is that through public pressure, through collective action, possibly through litigation, and eventually through legislation, creators actually have a lot of power if we come together.
The formation of the coalition comes at a time when Hollywood is grappling with the rapid growth of artificial intelligence tools. Many artists have raised concerns about tools that have used their image or work without their permission or compensation.
The tech industry has said it should be able to train its AI models with content available online under the “fair use” doctrine, which allows limited reproduction of material without permission of the copyright holder.
Some studios have partnered with AI companies to use these tools in areas such as marketing and visual effects. Last week, Walt Disney Co. signed a licensing deal with OpenAI, the San Francisco-based maker of ChatGPT, for its popular Disney characters such as Mickey Mouse and Yoda, which will be used in the startup’s text-to-video conversion tool, Sora.
Kwan told The Hollywood Reporter that when the deal between Disney and OpenAI was announced, many people felt “completely blindsided.”
“On the one hand, you can say this is just a licensing deal for the characters and it’s no big deal, and it’s not going to completely change the way our industry works,” Kwan told THR. “But for many people, it symbolically shows a willingness to work with companies that have failed to resolve or reconcile issues.”
Lawsuits have also been filed against some AI companies. Earlier this year, Disney, Universal and Warner Bros. Discovery have sued AI company Midjourney, accusing it of copyright infringement.
The Creators Coalition on AI announced plans to convene an AI advisory committee “to establish common standards, definitions and best practices as well as ethical and artistic protections if and when AI is used.” Some of the principles the group lists on its website include the importance of transparency, consent, oversight and compensation in the use of AI tools, sensitivity to potential job losses, safeguards against abuse and deepfakes, and protection of humanity in the creative process.
“This is not a total rejection of AI,” the group said on its website. “The technology is there. It’s a commitment to responsible, human-centered innovation.”
“This is not a dividing line between the tech industry and the entertainment industry, nor is it a dividing line between workers and corporations,” the group said. “Instead, we draw a line between those who want to do things quickly and those who want to do them right. »
The idea for the coalition was started by Kwan, who produced a documentary on AI, which will be released next year, Gordon-Levitt said in her video. He said work on the group began in the middle of this year. The collective already has many signatories, including actors Natalie Portman, Greta Lee, Kirsten Dunst and Orlando Bloom.
