Writers Guild of America, “What are the Protections around AI?”

Authors Guild “FAQs on the Authors Guild’s Positions and Advocacy Around Generative AI”

Reading Questions:

1. In their statements on AI, both the WGA and the Authors Guild focus on the importance of fair compensation for a writer’s work and disclosure with regard to AI use. Why do these two values matter so much? What are the arguments for their importance?
2. Other values that are highlighted in both guilds’ documents include choice, consent, and credit. Do you think that choice, consent, and credit are basic rights that should be protected? Why or why not? What are some other instances in which terms like choice, consent, and credit are used? How does a consideration of those instances relate to matters of choice, consent, and credit when it comes to safeguarding a writer and protecting their creations?
3. Both professional writers guilds offer a definition of AI as something other than a writer. The WGA says, “Neither traditional AI […] nor generative AI […] is a writer, so no written material produced by traditional AI or GAI can be considered literary material.” Similarly, the Authors Guild rejects the use of the term “training AI” because the word “train” suggests that robots are human–it “serves to anthropomorphize machines” when “the reality is that … [t]here is no generative AI without the material—mostly in-copyrighted works—that AI is so-called ‘trained’ on.” What are your thoughts on this definition of AI as not-a-writer and AI-generated writing as not literary material? If we apply the two guilds’ definition of AI as not-a-writer to a college student’s work of essay writing, the analogous statement would be: since neither AI nor GAI is a writer nor a student, no written material produced by traditional AI or GAI can be considered student writing. To continue the thought process: if a student uses AI to generate an essay, since AI is neither a writer nor a student, can an AI-generated essay that a student turns in actually be considered a student essay? What is your response to this question? How do you think members of the WGA would respond to the question of whether an AI-produced essay turned in by a student can be considered a student essay?

Writing Question:

1. The Writers Guild of America and the Authors Guild have taken public stances on behalf of the professional writers that they represent in their advocacy and collective-bargaining efforts. Analyze the guilds’ published statements on the topic. Explore additional pages on the guilds’ websites that are relevant to this topic. Then write a Synthesis Essay that compares and contrasts the two guilds’ stances on AI in their industries.

The following readings offer a detailed synopsis of WGA’s labor union strike as part of the negotiations for fair working conditions, including limits put on studio owners use of AI to exploit writers by using AI in place of human writers or crediting AI with script first-write credits in order to undermine writers from receiving fair compensation.

The readings are presented in chronological to present a timeline–from the writers’ growing concerns that the studio owners were eager to use AI unethically to replace or degrade the work of the writers–to the writers ultimate victory to afford themselves guaranteed protection for the three-year term of the union’s collective-bargaining agreement.

January 2023

Katie Kilkenny and Winston Cho, The Hollywood Reporter, “Attack of the Chatbots: Screenwriters’ Friend or Foe?”

April 2023

Joe Flint, Wall Street Journal, “Hollywood Braces For Potential Writers’ Strike”

May 2023

Ashley Cullins and Katie Kilkenny, The Hollywood Reporter, “Is Chat GPT a Scab?”

Michael Cavna and Samantha Chery, Washington Post, “Could AI Soon Help Write a Hit Sitcom? Many Striking Writers Fear So

August 2023

Adrian Horton, The Guardian, “‘Embrace It or Risk Obsolescence’: How Will AI Jobs Affect Hollywood?”

Erica Werner, Washington Post, “Hollywood Writers are Still on Strike”

September 2023

Elyse Tyson, The Guardian “The Writers’ Strikes aren’t Just about Hollywood: British Workers Like Me are Now out of Work”

Joe Flint and Sarah Krouse, Wall Street Journal, “Hollywood’s Writers Emerge From Strike as Winners—for Now”

Erica Werner et al, Washington Post, “Hollywood Writers to Return to Work with End of Strike”

October 2023

Dani Anguiano and Lois Beckett, The Guardian, “How Hollywood Writers Triumphed over AI and Why It Matters”

Reading Questions:

1. The readings in this section are pulled from multiples sources, including a quintessential entertainment industry trade journal, the foremost serial publication for the world of business and finance, and newspapers from Los Angeles, Washington DC, and London. How does each source’s functional purpose and ethos, target readership, and city of publication influence the content of the article and author’s tone with regard to the writers and the studio owners?
2. The two articles from The Hollywood Reporter illustrate how swiftly–within just a few months in 2023–AI writing programs went from being a fun novelty to a phenomenon that had the potential to replace and devalue human beings. What do you notice about the differences in the tone between the article published in January 2023 and the one published in May 2023? In addition to descriptive words such as “scared,” “fear,” “worry,” and “ripped” in the reading “Is ChatGPT a Scab?,” what other techniques do authors Ashley Cullins and Katie Kilkenny use to illustrate the writers’ realization that AI and GAI threatened not only their strike’s success but also their job survival? What specific demands did WGA add to their contract negotiations when they realized they needed to thwart the studio owners power to use AI against them?
3. In “The Writers’ Strikes aren’t Just about Hollywood – British Workers Like Me are Now out of Work,” Elise Tyson’s underlying assumption is that actors are more essential to the entertainment industry than writers. Tyson writes, “Somehow, we’d survived writers going on strike but you can’t shoot a TV series without actors.” Practice your rhetorical skills by arguing both sides of the debate. First, make the case that actors are more important to the entertainment industry than writers. Then, make the case that writers are more important to the entertainment industry than actors. Luckily, in real life, the two groups recognize their symbiotic relationship. Actors, probably more than any other profession, appreciate and revere writers because they understand how crucial well-written scripts are to their job and their success. How did this symbiotic relationship play out during the strikes against the studio executives? Do you think that the Writers Guild of America would have been successful in their negotiations if the members of the Screen Actors Guild had not also gone on strike just a few months later? Conversely, in what ways did the Screen Actors Guild gain leverage and strategies during their strike by following the lead of the Writers Guide of America?
4. Based on Adrian Horton’s reporting in “‘Embrace It or Risk Obsolescence’: How Will AI Jobs Affect Hollywood?” were Hollywood writers and actors justified in worrying about AI robbing them of their jobs? One of Horton’s sources remarks, “[W]riters and actors could both be replaced by AI in the near future, along with everyone who works to create a movie using real human actors. We could see entire movies generated by AI without any human involvement […] easily […] within the decade.” What evidence does Horton provide to support that claim? What evidence does Horton provide to counter it?
5. On November 11, 2023, Timothee Chalemet hosted Saturday Night Live and opened with a song (written by the show’s writers, of course–not by Chalemet) celebrating the fact that he was no longer on strike and was now able to promote his films Wonka and Dune 2. According to the sources in this section, what were the specific restrictions on the writers and the actors while they were striking against the studio executives? When halting all production of US movies and shows, who are the people who stand to lose the most? What are other examples of times in history that workers have gone on strike in order to demand fair treatment by their employers and industry owners? Why is striking such an effective tool for the writers?

Writing Question

1. Select four of the readings above and write a Synthesis Essay, comparing and contrasting the viewpoints on the 2023 WGA strike.

Brian Merchant, “Workers Lead the Resistance as AI Risk Emerges”

Brian Merchant, “With their Strike, Writers Score a Victory for Humans Over Artificial Intelligence”

Naseefa Allen, “AI for Writers: A Threat or a Boon?”

Mary Rasenberger, “How Will Authorship Be Defined in an AI Future?”

Reading Questions:

1. In “With their Strike, Writers Score a Victory for Humans Over Artificial Intelligence,” Brian Merchant warns us that “Hollywood is far from the only industry eager to cut costs by automating work with generative AI,” arguing that “[Hollywood screen]writers are leading the way in showing workers everywhere how to resist potentially exploitative uses of AI in the workplace.” What is your anticipated career, and what are the current trends, expectations, and ethics of AI use in that professional field?
2. In “Workers Lead the Resistance as AI Risk Emerges,” Merchant draws attention to other creative fields whose work is threatened by AI, including “illustrators” and “digital content creators” in addition to writers. One of Merchant’s sources contends, “There is no ethical way to to use the major AI image generators” because “all of them are trained on stolen images.” Have you ever had any of your written work or creative work taken and used to program an AI system? What about the course work you have done as student? What would you think if another student took the A-grade essays you had written and used your essays to train a GAI program to generate essays that would earn the other students A’s in their college courses? What would you think if illustrations you had created were taken to “train” AI and then other people, but not you, made a lot of money off of the illustrations that AI generated for them based on your creative work?
3. In the same article, Merchant asks the question: “Whose future does AI really serve?” His answer is “big tech” owners and managers–including billionaires at Meta, Open AI, and Google. Merchant makes the case that corporate executives already see AI as a tool to garner more power and money for themselves whereas average workers like you and me will be exploited. Summarize Merchant’s presentation of his argument. What claims does he make? What evidence does he use to support his claims?
4. Do you have a different answer to Merchant’s question? “Whose future does AI really serve” in your opinion?
5. Writing in late 2022, Naseefa Allen hypothesized that “role that AI will play in the future will be a supporting one. It will help us confirm that humans are still behind the words. Because it’s pretty clear when they’re not. Magazine articles look fake when AI produces them wholesale. The errors are egregious and obvious and people want to know they are reading something a human wrote.” Reading her argument years later, do you agree with her claims? Can you tell when you are reading AI-produced writing?
6. Allen explains that, for her, using AI in writing means she has to work more, not less. She writes, “my client started using artificial intelligence tools to save on costs, which had the effect of making my editing job much harder.” What has your experience been with AI? In what ways has it made projects easier for you and in what was has it made projects more difficult for you, or “robbed” you “of time” as Allen puts it?
7. Allen points out, “Some of what we don’t consider AI—spellcheckers, auto-fill text on your email, and Grammarly—are also AI-based tools that have become ubiquitous.” She takes a more tempered view toward the potential of AI, admitting, “AI is the pillar upon which much digital business content is built, and I suddenly felt that my initial disdain may have been because I hadn’t figured out how to harness it properly.” How would you rate your own proficiency in using AI? Do you think that it is a “tool” that needs to be “harness[ed]?”
8. In “How Will Authorship Be Defined in an AI Future?” Mary Rasenberger poses the question “Do we want humans or AI creating our literature and other arts?” What is your answer to that question? Do you want books, movies, streamed shows, video games, and the Super Bowl broadcast to be written by people like you or to be written by a machine?

Writing Questions:

1. Brian Merchant is a journalist who writes a technology column in the Business section of the LA Times. As a professional journalist and a professional technology expert who is writing for readers in the field of Business, Merchant straddles multiple industries with varied opinions on AI use. Analyze Merchant’s persuasive strategies in his two articles. How does Merchant’s multi-focal perspective as a writer and a tech expert affect his authorial ethos? Where does he appeal to logos to make his case? Where does he appeal to pathos? Write an Analysis Essay in which you answer these questions.
2. Piggybacking off of Allen’s argument that AI-generated writing is obvious to reader, locate an example of a piece of writing on the internet that you think wasn’t entirely written by a human being. Analyze the AI-produced written piece that you have found, applying your definition of how to recognize AI-produced writing. What are the obvious signs to you? Write an Analysis Essay in which you share your findings.
3. Write a Synthesis Essay in which you synthesize Allen’s and Rasenberger’s arguments on the benefits and drawbacks of using AI to produce writing, comparing and contrasting the claims and evidence provided by the authors.

1. Annabelle Timsit, et al. “Hollywood writers reach tentative deal to end strike. What’s next?” 
2. “Screenwriters Strike: Hollywood’s AI battle” 
3. Christopher Soto, “AI’S ROLE IN THE ‘CREATIVE CHURN’; in Conversation with L.A. Scholar-Poet Jackie Wang on what the Technology Portends for the Future of Writers and their Art” 
4. Brian Contreras, “AI Isn’t a Worry for just Actors and; A Poll Finds nearly Half of Americans are Concerned it Will Affect their Line of Work, but 29% Aren’t”
5. Authors Guild, “AI Best Practices for Authors”
6. Writers Guild of America, “Schedule of Minimums”
7. Writers Guild of America West, “Screen Credits Manual”
8. Writers Guild of America West, “Guide to the Guild”
9. Writers Guild of America West, “The Craft”
10. Writers Guild of America West, “A History of WGA Contract Negotiations and Gains”
11. Writers Guild of America West, “3rd & Fairfax: The WGAW Podcast”