“The AFL-CIO stands in solidarity with the SAG-AFTRA voice-over and motion-capture performers who are on strike after failed negotiations with eleven video game employers,” Trumka said. “Performers deserve a modern contract that offers the protections necessary to work in today’s video game industry.”
5 comments:
I think there are a lot of interesting dimensions to this labor issue. I can't help but wonder if part of it is video game companies not understanding how SAG-AFTRA operates and SAG-AFTRA not understanding how video game companies operate. I have to imagine that in a way, voice acting for video games is kind of out of the normal wheelhouse for SAG-AFTRA. And definitely the notion of paying residuals is likely a foreign concept to video game developers. So at least to me I guess it is not surprising that this has boiled over into a full blown strike against some major name brand companies.
I really do wonder how this will be resolved. SAG-AFTRA has a lot of clout, but so do these companies. And great voice acting really is a crucial part to making great video games. I wonder if the voice actors who act for video games make most of their wages from video game voice acting, or if that is just one component of their regular jobs. I suppose a parameter like that could determine how long this strike can be maintained and whether these companies fold. Even a strike of a few months could seriously delay the development and on time release of major AAA video games.
This is interesting to hear. I wasn't aware that video game companies were covered under the jurisdiction of SAG-AFTRA. But I suppose that makes sense as computer and TV screens also display Video Games. One of the most interesting requests I've heard here is that they want to know what video game they are working on. I don't see this as an unreasonable request. If producers are interested in protecting their rights to works, they can easily have the actor sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement so protecting their next "top secret ground breaking game" shouldn't be a concern, really. I'm not sure how the fair-wage portion of the requests apply here because I'm not aware of the variances in salary here. I do feel as though there should be equal compensation based on the other standards set forth by SAG-AFTRA. I'm also surprised to here there are some major players involved in the strike here. Electronic Arts alone is a major producer, and so is Disney. It's interesting to here they won't even "come to the table" to discuss this. I'm certainly interested to learn what comes from this. I'm not surprised to see DayBreak Games (formerly Sony Online Entertainment) isn't among the list as they just finished battling a similar lawsuit.
We recently finished our lesson on unions in Tech Management, which really allows me a better understanding of what’s happening in this article. I was surprised to learn that artistic unions are some of the strongest around this day and age. I had always assumed the largest, most powerful unions were things like plumbing, electricians, industrial workers, etc. And that the artistic unions were kind of on the side. But clearly the AFL-CIO is involved and invested with the artistic unions in a pretty significant way, especially since they are monitoring a strike happening in just one (small) subset of just one artistic union. I think sometimes people tend to overlook voice over and motion capture actors, especially in the video game industry. So I can imagine SAG-AFTRA would have some trouble gaining attention and turning popular opinion on their side. This official recognition and support from AFL-CIO could really go a long way in bringing this strike to the attention of the public.
I've been reading about this conflict for a while and it continues to baffle me. Most of the literature I've been reading has been coming from the SAG-AFTRA end but not the video game companies. While it makes sense to us for the game company to tell the actor what game they're working on, what's the other side of the coin? From my limited understanding of video games, I know that you probably have to record a lot more different sound bytes for a game than you would a regular movie with a script. One point that really stuck out to me is that over 96% of the people affected by this issue voted to approve strikes. When a group of people organize (almost) unanimously like this, you have to consider what they're protesting against. I was also surprised to see Disney in the list of game companies allegedly being unfair to their employees. Since Disney is such a diligent company, I would have thought they would have had the oversight into paying their voice actors fairly. How did they let this go on?
The most interesting part of this, to me, is that the main issue for the strike is the transparency. It seems silly that this is the issue. My guess is that the issue is that the companies don’t want people they hire going around and talking about which new games they are working on. It seems like the best solution to this is to add a non-disclosure clause to the contract. It also seems reasonable that the actors get residual compensation. Just as musicians and recording contracts have residual clauses in them, so should voice over artists. I’ll admit – I don’t play video games, but I know what goes into creating them. I understand the perspective of the artists, and I can understand the perspective from the companies and it seems like an issue that could be resolved easily. With the gaming industry being what it is, my guess is that the artists will eventually get what they want.
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