900 000 dollars per year to tame AI

We live in a world where episodes of Black Mirror are no longer just anticipation. In the latest season of the Netflix series, there is an episode featuring actress Salma Hayek who fights against a studio that uses her digitally cloned image without her consent. Since the production of this episode, actors and screenwriters have been on strike in the United States. The unions are demanding better salaries and regulations on the use of artificial intelligence by studios. The major companies responsible for producing tomorrow’s entertainment have turned their attention to AI. “They propose that our artists can be scanned, paid for a day, and that their company owns this scan, their image, their likeness, and can use it for the rest of eternity in any project, without consent or compensation,” says Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, chief negotiator for the actors’ union.

In an article published by, we can read that Hollywood executives “still refuse to pay actors more, with 87% earning less than $26,000 per year,” but that large companies “spend without counting for AI programs.” This is the case for Netflix, which offers up to $900,000 per year for a single AI product manager. The job offer indicates that AI goes beyond algorithms that determine recommendations to users, and that it now enhances content creation. “AI promotes innovation in all areas of the company by helping create high-quality content,” declares Netflix. The streaming giant plans to rely on AI to “shape a catalog of films and TV shows by learning the characteristics that make them successful.”

The entertainment industry and machines

As highlighted by The Intercept, Netflix is already using AI. The company has aired a Spanish reality TV series, “Deep Fake Love,” where scans of contestants’ faces and bodies are used to create deepfake simulations. The American company also utilizes generative AI in its gaming studio. On the other hand, Disney has also posted job openings for positions related to AI. One of these offers aims to “stimulate innovation in film pipelines and theater experiences.”