✍🏼 The First Ai Workers Strike Ends: Hollywood Writers Reach Settlement With Studios Over Ai
"Society is Indeed a Contract" [Edmund Burke]
Can a simple framework change your life?
Doubtful. But it can change the way you think. Which can change the way you act.
Here's a simple way to understand why the subject of Ai will dominate strikes for knowledge work. It’s all about the horizontalization of skills
In the News: Hollywood writers have ended their five-month strike after union leaders and studio executives reached a new three-year contract agreement.
Key Details:
New Concessions: Writers have won critical changes, including more transparent viewership numbers for streaming platforms and minimum staffing in pre-development “mini rooms.”
AI Guidelines: The contract addresses writers' concerns about the use of artificial intelligence in content creation.
Impacted Executives: High-profile industry leaders like Disney CEO Bob Iger and Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos were part of the negotiations.
The bigger picture:
As traditional revenue streams get disrupted by the rise of streaming services and AI, these strikes represent a larger tension in the industry.
They could set the tone for future negotiations and strikes, not just in Hollywood but also in related sectors like the video game industry, where actors are considering extending their strike.
Source: Hollywood Reporter / The Guardian
So What?
Two important themes stand out from the agreement
Minimum staffing &
Traditional revenue streams getting disrupted by the rise of streaming services and Ai
Now What?: A Framework
As top line margins get squeezed, media will look to squeeze bottom line costs
Writers are a bottom line cost that they [the studios] think Ai could help reduce
The strike was about the writers and actors pushing back
Round one went to the writers, but the fight goes on.
Takeaway: Locus of Value
When a vertical skill is in danger of horizontalized, the horizontalizee [made up word] will need to find a new Locus of Value.
Example:
In 2001, the locus of value for a web agency was HTML/CSS code. Just getting the website online was valuable
In 2011, no code websites like GoDaddy, Wix and Squarespace horizontalized the code element, so now agencies could just focus on the design elements for value add
In 2021, a raft of sexy design templates and WebFlow horizontalized the design element of websites, so now web agencies need only focus on the messaging, copywriting elements
Will LLM’s horizontalize the writing, messaging part soon? Maybe. Eventually.
Either way, back to the Hollywood writers - it’s time to start ideating a new locus of value.
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