SAG-AFTRA is holding a vote to potentially strike against major videogame publishers

pcgamer.com:

The national board of actors' union SAG-AFTRA has sent a strike authorization vote to members over the renegotiation of its Interactive Media Agreement. The potential strike would affect voice acting and motion capture work for major publishers in the industry.

The current Interactive Media Agreement was set in 2017 and was originally supposed to expire in 2020. As reported by Variety, it was first extended to 2022, and then had another year's extension after that. SAG-AFTRA notes that the agreement's signatories include major videogame publishers like:

This agreement is separate from SAG-AFTRA's negotiations for its TV, theatrical, and streaming contracts that underpin the current historic double strike with the Writers' Guild against major Hollywood studios.

Though the agreements are separate, the potential for companies to abuse generative AI tech at the expense of performers is front and center for both. SAG-AFTRA president Fran Drescher (yes, that Fran Drescher from The Nanny and This Is Spinal Tap) explains: «Here we go again! Now our Interactive (Video Game) Agreement is at a stalemate too. Once again we are facing employer greed and disrespect. Once again artificial intelligence is putting our members in jeopardy of reducing their opportunity to work.

“The overlap of these two SAG-AFTRA contracts is no coincidence, but rather a predictable issue impacting our industry as well as others all over the world. The disease of greed is spreading like wildfire ready to burn workers out of their livelihoods and humans out of their usefulness. We at SAG-AFTRA say NO! Not on our watch!”

Elias Toufexis, the voice of Deus Ex's Adam Jensen and Starfield's Sam Coe, echoed those concerns about AI in a recent conversation with PC