Tyler Perry discusses Open AI Sora and job threats
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When OpenAI unveiled its latest AI system, Sora, last month, capable of generating video, images and screenplays with simple text prompts, reactions spanned from awe to alarm. No one was more vocal in their concern than Tyler Perry, the entertainment mogul behind the famous Madea franchise. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Perry issued a stark warning – he believes tools like Sora directly threaten the livelihoods of human creatives in the entertainment industry.
Specifically, Perry worries that AI systems that can generate scripts, scores and even finished video content with minimal human input will put writers, composers, directors and other creative professionals out of work. In his view, an amateur armed with Sora could potentially produce a credible TV show or film without hiring any human crew, instead relying entirely on the AI. Perry believes that relying solely on AI-powered systems is deeply problematic and dangerous.
In a statement to The Hollywood Reporter, Perry expressed that any entertainment professional who finds their skills and talents suddenly obsolete due to AI creativity tools will rightly feel angry and betrayed if the tech community tries to sell this as some benign transformation. He considers this as an existential threat to working artists, no matter how innovators try to spin it.
While Perry’s worries reveal a lack of imagination about AI’s possibilities, they are understandable given the livelihoods at stake. There are reasonable concerns that unchecked AI in Hollywood could, as Perry warns, wreak havoc on entertainment labor markets. This lends urgency to the need for policies and incentives that ensure AI systems empower rather than endanger human creatives.
It’s possible that Sora and tools like it need not spell disaster for the creative sector. We have been here before. When home video recording emerged in the 1970s, Hollywood recoiled in horror, certain it would destroy the film industry. Instead, it became a major new revenue stream. Again, in the early 2000s, executives predicted digital piracy enabled by peer-to-peer sites like Napster would be the death knell of music. But from the ashes rose streaming, which has driven industry growth to new heights.
AI creativity tools like Sora evoke the same doomsaying reflex. But as with earlier technologies, these systems are not stealing jobs so much as changing them. Sora cannot wholly replace the spark of human inspiration and storytelling. What it can do is supercharge human creativity in wondrous new ways.
We have already glimpsed this in fields like art, photography and music. AI programs from companies like Midjourney, Stability AI and Anthropic have amazed people with their output while allowing human guidance and artistry to shine through. Now, new tools like Sora hint at a future where AI doesn’t just assist creatives but collaborates with them as an equal creative entity.
Imagine a screenwriter using Sora not just for research and formatting help but as an ideation partner, riffing on plot and character ideas. Or an indie filmmaker using Sora to radically expand their special effects capabilities. And what about amateur creators without Hollywood budgets? For them, Sora democratizes access to tools once available only to big studios.
Recent calls for bans on AI art tools threaten to halt progress before it has even begun. It demands that systems like Sora pay royalties as if they were human creators competing for the same jobs, fundamentally misunderstanding their purpose. Sora is not an end but a means to new creative breakthroughs.
Instead of bans or backward-looking regulations, we need policies that guide us in using AI ethically while giving developers the freedom to innovate. Tax incentives for entertainment and tech companies to collaborate could catalyze an AI creativity boom. Public-private partnerships between studios and AI labs would allay Hollywood’s fears while previewing possibilities. Investments in training programs that teach entertainment professionals to utilize AI tools would address valid economic concerns.
Most importantly, we must recast the discussion from one of techno-panic to one of possibility. These systems herald a new frontier of human achievement, but only if we guide them toward empowering goals. Our task ahead is to envision an inspiring future, not stall progress in fealty to the status quo. The open AI revolution is coming either way. We might as well embrace it.
