As someone who’s spent half her life in the Gaming and Entertainment industries, let me tell you how FUCKED everything is.
For context, I’m a 34 year old trans woman who spent the last SEVENTEEN YEARS of my life in these industries. So half my life has been in this.
I’m currently 9 months out of work after being laid off from a huge well known company due to them “selling off half the company’s outside studios so the core company could invest in NFTs and Blockchain.”
Unemployment has fully run out for me at this point and I’m struggling.
This is not new. I’m not the only one. And what’s more is that it’s been happening to gaming and entertainment studios for years and it continues to get worse.
Day after day, week after week, month after month I’ve seen studios both big and small laying off workers and then announcing “AI! NFTS! BLOCKCHAIN!” shit constantly.
These companies have posted record profits and then have used those profits to… cut their staff and pay their execs more.
All the while they pretend to still be “FOR THE FANS” and as more of the workers unionize and try to band together shun those workers saying “HOW COULD YOU!? THE FANS WANT THEIR CONTENT!” as if the content is worth people’s lives and livelihood.
The biggest thing we, as workers, are fighting for is FAIR PAY and to not have our works or voices used for AI!
And these studios keep saying NO, and then making it impossible for us to work or live.
The studio heads have purposely stonewalled talks and contact deals because they KNOW we are all underpaid and want to WAIT US OUT until we are SO POOR we HAVE to make a deal.
So if you continue to see my post (and posts from others like me) saying “Hey, I’m still out for work, if you have some spare money I’d really appreciate it” - please consider helping us out.
We want to get back to work and they won’t let us without us selling away our souls.
Why don’t you want consumers to boycott, again? Kinda seems like we should.
Hi! Great question!
Here’s the answer:
Because the stuff you’re seeing release NOW? Movies, games, TV shows, etc?
Yeah, that was done by people. Real people. Who worked very hard to put that in front of you.
Boycotting, at the moment, only shows the execs that “okay, the people don’t want THIS CONTENT THAT WAS CREATED BY HUMANS! So we should double down on this AI, NFT, Blockchain shit!”
Any (major) content that is attempted to be made in full (or in major part) by AI or what have you, is far off.
As of now, the AI stuff you’ll see will mostly be used to do promotional stuff (see VO for movie trailers, which is already happening and easy for them to do).
Companies will use any excuse they can to “learn the wrong lesson” if it’ll save them money that they can immediately put into a CEO or board member’s pocket.
I understand. I really do, but knowing that these same human creators aren’t actually getting any of that money doesn’t sit well. At least, not for me.
This hurts my heart.
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Do you think we ever did?
We never see any of that money anyway.
Do you think if a game or movie or TV show does well that we get paid more because it succeeded?
Because we never did.
If it hurts your heart to know we aren’t being treated well right now, it should hurt more to know we never get the benefits of anything we do that succeeds and only get the ramifications of if something fails.
The companies have always pocketed the profits and paid their laborers as little as possible.
So, again, if it hurts you to hear that… imagine how much it hurts US.
Which means you should listen to us when we say “This Is What You Should Do, As Fans, While We Are On Strike!”
If a time comes where we say “please boycott these projects/companies” then do so, but until then… please support our work to show that you care about what we do.
And if you see anyone, like me, asking for financial help to get us by until the strike is over? Donate what you can or share those posts asking for help.