I'm a professional voice actor. ZeniMax Media, a Bethesda associated, reached out to me earlier this year to offer me a job in the localized version of the upcoming Indiana Jones game. They wanted me to sign an agreement, too: they're planning to buy the rights to use the actors' voices to generate lines using AI. Either a small amount for this project (and we'd get paid as much as if we went to work) or an infinite amount to be used in
all future games by ZeniMax (point iii of the agreement, see screenshot).
They're basically asking me and all the actors involved how much we'd like to be paid for the full rights to clone and use our voices without asking permission anymore, with no control on what the voices will say and how the lines will be acted. We're more than our voice, we're actors. There's more to it than the sound.
In Germany, Spain, Italy and France the work of localization of the game has stopped. If the issue isn't solved soon the game may come out with subtitles only.
They're trying to take away our job, a job made of emotions, and have the machine do it instead. If we sell our voices now, we'll be unemployed tomorrow.
People need to know how big companies plan to use AI to dehumanize artistic jobs. They're companies, so it's no surprise their only interest is money-making, but how much of the human touch in art are we willing to sacrifice?
Here's a screenshot of the agreement as proof.
www.spaziogames.it
