News & Commentary Sept 1, 2023 striking actors and writers demand probe into entertainment industry

https://onlabor.org/september-1-2023/

By Greg Volynsky

Greg Volynsky is a student at Harvard Law School.

In Today’s News & Commentary, AI ignites competing narratives about Luddites, striking actors and writers demand probe into entertainment industry consolidation, NLRB broadens scope of protected concerted activities, and UAW alleges General Motors and Stellantis are not fulfilling their duty to bargain.

On Tuesday, President of the AFL-CIO Liz Shuler made pointed comments about artificial intelligence. “We [in the labor movement] feel afraid that technology is going to make us earn less, it’s going to make our jobs worse. It’s going to dehumanize us,” she said, adding, “We better be damn sure that the benefits and wealth created are shared by all of us.”

The comments come in the midst of a battle of historic narrative. In an article published a week ago, renowned author Stephen King explained his view that attempting to forbid AI from being trained on his writing would be futile and misguided. King writes, “Would I forbid the teaching (if that is the word) of my stories to computers? Not even if I could. I might as well be King Canute, forbidding the tide to come in. Or a Luddite trying to stop industrial progress by hammering a steam loom to pieces.” With another clever literary analogy, King suggests the possibility that we may one day “love and respect” sentient artificial intelligence.

Yesterday, Brian Merchant, the technology columnist for the L.A. Times, penned a response. Merchant, who authored the forthcoming “Blood in the Machine: The Origins of the Rebellion Against Big Tech,” took no issue with characterizing those concerned about artificial intelligence as Luddites, but rather extended and reinterpreted the analogy. Luddites, Merchant explains, were not protesting the industrial technology itself, but were protesting “the bosses that were using those machines to cut their pay and shepherd them into factories.” Merchant characterizes Luddites not as “ignoramuses who smashed machines because they didn’t understand them,” but “skilled, proud cloth workers who understood all too well how machinery was being deployed against them, and fought back.”

FULL story at link above.