The Writers Guild of America East is seeking to help its members make it more difficult for their work to be ingested by artificial intelligence models.
The union has just begun offering members free access to a software called Cloak, which renders documents “unreadable” by AI models while preserving the formatting. Writers can upload a script and receive back a copy that is resistant to AI analysis, scraping and training.
The intention is to give writers peace of mind when sending scripts around town to studio execs, producers, agents, actors, editors, among others.
Non-members can also access Cloak for $10 when using the WGAE’s script registration, a service the guild already offers to all writers regardless of membership status to protect their work before going wide with it.
“The WGAE partnership with Cloak expands our efforts to protect members’ work and fight back against AI companies exploiting writers and other creative workers,” Tom Fontana, President of the Writers Guild of America East, said in a statement on Tuesday. “We’re excited about the partnership with Cloak because it means members don’t need to worry that their work will be used to train AI models after they send it to producers or agents – or simply that the product of weeks, months, or years of work will be reduced to an AI-generated summary of an email attachment.”
Added Larry J. Cohen, Co-Chair of the WGAE AI Task Force: “Generative AI models are often falsely advertised on the promise that they will make our work obsolete, but the truth is, the creative process is human and always will be. That’s why the Guild is advocating for better protections against and awareness of the risks posed by AI – not just through our contracts, but through legislation and member education. Our partnership with Cloak is a natural and necessary extension of our fight to protect our members’ creative rights and the integrity of their work.”