Unions don't rely on the generosity of others, they rely on shared economic interest.
In any supply chain whoever is able to consolidate and monopolize has economic power over their suppliers and customers. This sets off a chain reaction of consolidation as everyone else has to get bigger in order to protect their margins from being eaten by Amazon and Wal-Mart.
Unions are no different. If your industry is two or three companies you can't leave for a better job. So you have to either collectively negotiate or not negotiate at all.
While I disagree that AI is presently capable of replacing voice actors, I don't think it matters. We already have a global agreement that impacts AI, which is the copyright on the training data used in the models[0]. While you probably can't stop someone from training on public data entirely[1], you definitely can prohibit the use of derived models to generate work that competes in the same market using copyright.
US businesses were able to break the backs of working-class unions like UAW using free trade agreements with countries that don't respect organized labor. Mexico and China[2] are hideously anti-union in ways that would be patently illegal in the US. I'm not entirely sure this process would work for creative talent. It would require Hollywood to completely undermine their cultural hegemony and shut down their own productions in favor of foreign cinema from Japan and the EU - countries that have explicitly been in favor of ML training on public data.
[0] Unless you're worried about the North Korean film industry adopting AI, in which case...
[1] There are some lawsuits attacking generative AI on this basis but I expect fair use to block those cases
In any supply chain whoever is able to consolidate and monopolize has economic power over their suppliers and customers. This sets off a chain reaction of consolidation as everyone else has to get bigger in order to protect their margins from being eaten by Amazon and Wal-Mart.
Unions are no different. If your industry is two or three companies you can't leave for a better job. So you have to either collectively negotiate or not negotiate at all.
While I disagree that AI is presently capable of replacing voice actors, I don't think it matters. We already have a global agreement that impacts AI, which is the copyright on the training data used in the models[0]. While you probably can't stop someone from training on public data entirely[1], you definitely can prohibit the use of derived models to generate work that competes in the same market using copyright.
US businesses were able to break the backs of working-class unions like UAW using free trade agreements with countries that don't respect organized labor. Mexico and China[2] are hideously anti-union in ways that would be patently illegal in the US. I'm not entirely sure this process would work for creative talent. It would require Hollywood to completely undermine their cultural hegemony and shut down their own productions in favor of foreign cinema from Japan and the EU - countries that have explicitly been in favor of ML training on public data.
[0] Unless you're worried about the North Korean film industry adopting AI, in which case...
[1] There are some lawsuits attacking generative AI on this basis but I expect fair use to block those cases
[2] Yes, communist China, ironically enough