A Hollywood writer recounts working as an “AI trainer” for Mercor, Outlier, and others, as AI gig work becomes the new waiting tables for entertainment workers
For screenwriters like me—and job seekers all over—AI gig work is the new waiting tables.Forums:Hacker Newsandr/longformSee also MediagazerForums:Hacker News:I Work in Hollywood. Everyone Who Used to Make TV Is Now Training AIr/longform:I Work in Hollywood. Everyone Who Used to Make TV Is Now Secretly Training AISee also Mediagazer
Context & Ripple Effects
Hollywood’s AI debate began with writers’ and actors’ efforts to set rules around AI-generated material, while the WGA-AMPTP agreement reportedly preserved compensation for script work when AI tools are involved. More recently, support staff have been adopting AI in day-to-day and creative-development workflows amid cost pressure.
The writer’s account adds a labor-market dimension: creative workers are not only encountering AI in their employers’ workflows, but selling their expertise to companies building and refining the systems.
First-order effects
- Mercor, Outlier, and similar AI-data-work platforms gain access to workers with screenwriting and editorial judgment for training and evaluation tasks.
- For entertainment workers facing reduced or uncertain traditional work, AI training becomes a supplemental, gig-based income source rather than a conventional production job.
Second-order effects
- Studios and creative employers can draw on a labor pool whose AI-tool familiarity is increasing, potentially speeding AI’s incorporation into development and support workflows.
- The split between higher-value creative authorship and lower-paid work that makes AI output usable may widen, echoing copywriters’ reports of being paid less to humanize generated text.
Third-order effects
- If this pattern persists, entertainment labor may increasingly combine contracted creative work with platform-mediated AI tasks, shifting more income volatility onto individual workers.
- Union protections focused on credited script work will face pressure to address adjacent AI-training and evaluation labor, where compensation, ownership, and bargaining power may be less clearly defined.
The trend: AI is moving from a contested production tool to a parallel, gig-mediated labor market that recruits the creative workers whose jobs it is reshaping.