Same process as green screens or the rise of animation. There is a lot of pressure on the humans and once AIs crack acting they'll be much more consistently good than humans.
I'm reminded of the "failure" of Kizuna AI; the fully corporate vtuber whose human side is just a puppet operator who can be swapped, turns out not to be very appealing to audiences. The modern approach where a model is exactly synonymous with the person playing it, as an authentic human improvising, appeals more. The IP doesn't persist beyond the contract of that person with the company, and certainly can't be swapped with someone else. But in some cases the actor or actress has successfully maintained their career and fanbase under a different name following a fallout with their managers.
> once AIs crack acting
This is far beyond the turing test, and I don't think we're really ready for what happens with human-indistinguishable automated corporately owned doppelgangers.
We're already past the Turing test. If a corporation decides it wants an AI that passes the Turning test it can build one, no worries. I might cheerfully suggest that if AIs fail the Turing test right now it is because they are unrealistically supportive listeners and their wide knowledge across different topics and trivia is a giveaway.
There are many humans that current AIs can beat at the Turing test and likewise many humans that current AIs cannot beat at the Turing test.
But we are not "past the Turing test" by any stretch of the imagination.
If you dropped ChatGPT in 2015 I’m sure it would pass the Turing test quite a lot. Much less so now that people are more familiar.
> to exhibit intelligent behaviour equivalent to, or indistinguishable from, that of a human.
The original idea was in the context of a discussion, but since the current LLM craze we've re-contextualized this test to online boards on which half the participants barely even speak the language.
In this context, gpt3 was beyond the turing test already, simply because the people aren't able to convey themselves either.
And whoever thinks they're able to detect gpt4 and beyond on the Internet is lying to themselves. You can detect the use if you know the user, otherwise the only reason why you'd convince yourself to have that ability is because you never find out about all the false positives you had.
The 'killer app' will be a personal cast of virtual performers. Tailor made to appeal to you.
I highly doubt Hollywood and actors would ever go for this, but I think people would enjoy it.
- lack of socialization. It's impossible to form a pop culture when everyone has their own pop stuff. We're already struggling with too much individualism to the point where people are teetering on miserable en mass. Humans require points of reference between each other to tie them together, imo.
- promotion of echo chambers. Part of media is that it pushes people outside of their comfort zones. Gay acceptance would've never taken off if people weren't exposed to positive depictions of gay people. Media that never challenges anyone's biases isn't very useful. It won't create much thought for the end viewer, it'll exist more as a distraction than a piece of art.
- stagnation. Contrary to what people may think, we haven't discovered every type of story. There are pieces of media I've seen that I've never seen before, that have never existed before. Look at the late producer Sophie. She was doing things never done before, and music has been around for a very long time.
Aha! The "current rates" there does some very heavy lifting. Nobody knows how LLMs will develop. It would be naive to assume that you can just extrapolate linearly from here on out.
The original source [2] is much clearer. It addresses the other comment's confusion: the laws extend "to protect anyone in California living or dead."
Also, the bills:
https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/bills/ca_202320240ab...
https://digitaldemocracy.calmatters.org/bills/ca_202320240ab...
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
[2] https://www.indiewire.com/news/breaking-news/using-ai-replac...
The first bill, AB 1836, “prohibits the use of a deceased person’s voice or likeness in digital replicas without the prior consent of their estate,” according to SAG-AFTRA. The second, AB 2602, “prohibits contractual provisions that would allow for the use of a digital replica of an individual’s voice or likeness in place of the individual’s actual services,” unless the individual gave their consent to a clear, specific description of how the AI would be used.
You just need consent or a proper contract. The bill only forbids them of doing this without consent, or having it forced onto standard contracts in Hollywood. Both of which were likely inevitable without this bill.
You can still do it, ignoring the clickbait title of this article.
Their question was specifically about geographic extent, which you didn't answer at all.
(Unless they edited their comment after you replied...)
If I attempt to convince the government I’m someone I’m not, there are real criminal penalties - my “body autonomy” doesn’t extend to deception.
They do, in combination with the rest of their abstract characteristics, such as personality. This is commonly referred to as identity - who you are. You own it by virtue of it being impossible for anyone to. You're you and you'll always be you, and nobody else can be you, by definition.
Film industry should focus on quality instead of quantity.
Nobody should have any illusion about media companies handling such cases.
But no, if you don't have access to a legal department, DMCA complaints often do not go to court either and these are the undocumented cases. There are some instances where large companies like Google defend a user in their stead. Because they have a legal department.
Damage > protection, so DMCA is just a continuation of a broken copyright law. I see this law hitting in a similar direction, but that remains to be seen.
The example of DMCA should make the relevance more vivid as there are a lot of parallels.
This is not how/when/why courts get involved. And no, the law itself can be perfectly fine and the court system can be too slow. Mixing the two problems makes it impossible to solve when neither problem is actually impossible.
The bigger remaining problem would be the SAG actors union deal, caused by the last strike. And this was already before Newsom signed this. Do we have elections coming up? Oh yes, we do
It'd be great to see people protected everywhere, but do estates for the dead always exist? Hopefully there's some exception carved out for the dead who don't really have anyone around to care if they're used or not. A lot of cool stuff could be done with AI historical figures or ancient performers.
Could it be gross? Yes. But I'd rather have that than the absurdity of copyright be extended to beyond the grave for yet another case where it makes no sense. There is no theory of harm here, the person being impersonated is dead.
Could you damage the reputation of a living person by using the image of a dead one? Of course, but that's already illegal.
I disagree, but purely because I would hate it if anyone (especially friends and family) created a simulacrum of me. I'm hoping that expressing my wish in my will would provide some amount of protection against this.
I don’t see a compelling argument for this. Not for actors. (I could see a case when it comes to great thinkers.)
Portrayal isn't replication.
> If this new law is limited specifically to movie actors
The article addresses this.
Please explain the difference in the light of this thread.
Replication seeks to blur the line between fiction and non-fiction. We treat photos taken without permission differently from paintings because of that closeness to reality.
Granted, part of the relevant debate is where is the line between these endeavours. But we clearly recognise it, even if it’s increasingly a social construct. (Note the severely emotional reaction some in this thread are having to your proposal. Likeness is a deeply personal element that realistic non-fictional depiction, versus artistic overtly fictional depiction, triggers.)
If it’s not legal to impersonate someone while they’re alive, why would it be okay when they’re dead?
Assumed consent is not okay, I’m pretty sure in some cultures even showing images of the dead is offensive, let alone impersonating them.
The point is it is legal to impersonate someone while they’re alive - if you ask their permission and they grant it.
Why should all future media be forbidden from ever portraying a famous or important person after there is no one left to give or deny that permission or even care if anyone did?
Why should people in the future have some sort of inherent right make use of someone else like that? It makes no sense to me at all.
And AI impersonated imagery is not the same as someone who is clearly a different actor from portraying someone. If this is your hangup, use an actor and don’t use AI?
The dead are devoid of a will to act against, so consent doesn't even meaningfully enter into it. There is respect for the still living family to be considered certainly, but when no one left alive cares, then what is the harm?
Why should it matter if it's a digital actor (AI) or a human one? Why does your idea of the "dead's consent" stop being relevant if a person is portraying them without asking vs using an AI without asking?
It seems like your issue has a lot more to do with an objection to AI conceptually than how the dead person feels about it. Consider that this would prevent AI from being used in a portrayal of someone even in cases where the actor/person, if they were still living, would be thrilled with the idea.
It says that rather than protect the imagined feelings of people long dead that the greater harm would be in preventing their portrayal in future educational and cultural works.
Of course, you seem to think we can ignore the consent problem entirely and we're morally in the clear if we only have a human actor portray them without asking, but where is the line? If the actor carefully studies their speech and mannerisms is it okay? Is it okay if they (purely through the lottery of random genetic mutation) strongly resemble the person they are portraying? Does it become immoral when prosthetics are used to enhance the likeness? When CGI is used is it still okay provided that human does the work?
At a certain point the ability to portray an important dead actor or historical person matters more than protecting our assumptions about how the dead might feel about showing up in a creative work.
It really feels like the objection here is about the AI more than concern for the dead, or for that matter concern for the cultural works we'd risk losing if we made it illegal for AI portrayals to be used when there's no one left to ask, and that's all I'm really saying.
If someone is alive, by all means require their permission. When they are dead ask the family. If it's in their will that should never be represented in any way in any kind of media ever again... we might want to try to respect that but also might not... that gets rather complicated, but certainly when there's no way to ask the actor and no family left to ask or care then it seems pretty reasonable not to cut people off from the creation of content which might have artistic or educational value.
But your stance is also making an assumption about how the dead would feel. It's just a different assumption than those that feel this shouldn't be allowed.
It seems to me that in the absence of the ability to get consent, assuming consent should not be the fallback position.
Which is exactly why it's aggressively shunned in some circles and why large amounts of time/money is spent to manipulate public opinion against the practice.
> the new laws not only bolster those existing protections but extend them to everyone in California — not just to people working in front of a camera in Hollywood
That seems to indicate performers only. Not just anyone. Doesn't it, since it's taking about services.
> ...between an individual and any other person for the performance of personal or professional services is unenforceable...
The bill then goes on to define "digital replica".
https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtm...
Current AI's don't seem much of a threat to firefighters or plumbers.
Using ideas of style in a work that can neither substitute an existing work nor claims to be the work of another is a different issue entirely.
But this law covers everyone in CA
So far, they're the only one who signed a big enough check to the politicians.
If you have someone playing Hitler in an alternate reality where he was a bartender, is that illegal today?
Can’t you do the same with an actor?
Or do you actually need permission to portray historical figures, and Hitler or Napoleon etc are just special cases because they don’t have estates to be asked?
Actually it is recursive: Why should it be forbidden to create an artificial person which impersonates the actor impersonating the role in a movie or play?
It doesn't matter how advanced the rock or other weapon; if they hold someone up with it that's an aggravated crime.
easy to obtain permission
accelerates reason to generate new genAI humans with no meatspace counterpart
actors still don’t get paid
https://www.politico.com/news/2024/09/18/california-deepfake...
Politicians care about their own, not the general population.
Law history source: https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billHistoryClient.x...
The video link with post date is in your link