Geena Davis Institute Has Partnered With Disney Studios to Ensure Scripts Are Assessed for Bias

Last week, actress and activist Geena Davis attended the New Zealand Power of Inclusion Summit, where she gave the closing keynote speech, in which she announced her partnership with Disney. Within the collaboration, Davis is using a new AI tech tool called the GD-IQ: Spellcheck for Bias. THR reports the following description of the technology:

The new tool leverages patented machine learning technology developed at the University of Southern California Viterbi School of Engineering to rapidly analyze the text of a script to determine its number of male and female characters and whether they are representative of the real population at large. The technology also can discern the numbers of characters who are people of color, LGBTQI, possess disabilities or belong to other groups typically underrepresented and failed by Hollywood storytelling.

Davis made the following statement at the summit regarding the partnership:

"I'm very proud to announce we have a brand new partnership with Walt Disney Studios using Spell Check for Bias," Davis said onstage. "They are our pilot partners and we're going to collaborate with Disney over the next year using this tool to help their decision-making, identify opportunities to increase diversity and inclusion in the manuscripts that they receive. We're very excited about the possibilities with this new technology and we encourage everybody to get in touch with us and give it a try."

Davis went on to say that the service is not meant to shame or blame anyone, but to just reveal unconscious biases within the creators. This sounds like it could be a positive asset to some media projects. But I wonder if there are any downsides, like changing characters in a story where the original character is imperative to the core of the story. Hopefully it helps overall instead of hinders the storytellers.

What do you think about this technology?