AI Protection Bill Heading To Gov. Gavin Newsom’s Desk Soon; SAG-AFTRA Praises “Huge Step Forward” Of Digital Replica Legislation
deadline.comEven Elon Musk wants to see California legislation to safeguard against the unrestricted rise of artificial intelligence and today politicians in Sacramento moved one giant step closer to protecting actors from a virtual afterlife of sorts.
On a third reading, the state Senate Tuesday passed a bill that would require studios, streamers and other employers to seek specific permission from performers to create digital replicas.
Well before Assembly Bill 2602 was introduced back in April, the bill has been strongly supported by SAG-AFTRA. On all political fronts, the guild has pressed over the year for federal and state legislation to codify many of the provisions in their strike ending agreement with the AMPTP last fall. “We are thrilled that one of our top legislative priorities, bill AB 2602 has passed in the State of California,” Duncan Crabtree-Ireland SAG-AFTRA National Executive Director and Chief Negotiator Duncan Crabtree Ireland told Deadline tonight. “The bill which protects not only SAG-AFTRA performers but all performers, is a huge step forward,” the guild leader added on the legislation that he has testified in favor of up in Sacramento. “Voice and likeness rights, in an age of digital replication, must have strong guardrails around licensing to protect from abuse, this bill provides those guardrails”, Going through the usual revisions that almost all legislation does, AB 2602 currently defines a digital replica as a “computer-generated, highly realistic electronic representation that is readily identifiable as the voice or visual likeness of an individual that is embodied in a sound recording, image, audiovisual work, or transmission in which the actual individual either did not actually perform or appear,
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