On 5 September, the Department of Industry, Science and Resources (DISR) released a paper setting out proposed mandatory guardrails for high-risk AI development in Australia. The paper setting out the proposals is available here, the Department’s announcement is available here, and the Industry Minister’s announcement is here. The Department is seeking feedback by 4 October. […]
Read MoreOn 31 July, the US Copyright Office released a report that recommends a new right to protect against ‘digital replicas’ – the use of digital technology to realistically replicate an individual’s voice or appearance. You can see the report here. The report says: The Copyright Office agrees with the numerous commenters that have asserted an […]
Read MoreOn 25 July, UK-based Copyright Licensing Agency (CLA) announced a new licence for text and data mining (TDM). You can see the announcement here. CLA describes TDM as ‘the process of using computational techniques to extract valuable insights and patterns from large volumes of information’. Its licence will allow organisations to carry out or perform […]
Read MoreOn 25 July, the NSW Upper House committee inquiring into artificial intelligence in New South Wales tabled its report. You can see the announcement here and the report here. The Committee commented that: The committee acknowledges the significant concerns of those within the creative industries around the inappropriate use of their work for training large […]
Read MoreOn 16 July, US copyright management organisation Copyright Clearance Center (CCC) announced its collective licensing solution for content usage in internal artificial intelligence (AI) systems. You can see CCC’s announcement here. The licence to re-use content for AI is part of CCC’s Annual Copyright Licences for businesses. Similar licensing solutions are also being developed in […]
Read MoreOn 21 June, the Data and Digital Ministers Meeting (comprising Ministers from the Commonwealth and each State and Territory) released the National Framework for the Assurance of Artificial Intelligence in Government. You can see the Framework here and related documentation here. The Framework sets out how Australian governments should align their practices to Australia’s 8 AI […]
Read MoreOn 28 May, the UK Parliament’s House of Commons Science, Innovation and Technology Committee released a report entitled ‘Governance of Artificial Intelligence (AI)’. The report addresses 12 challenges, one of which is ‘The Intellectual Property and Copyright Challenge’. Its recommendation is: The Government should broker a fair, sustainable solution based around a licensing framework governing […]
Read MoreIn a speech to the Australian Financial Review Artificial Intelligence (AI) Summit (here) the Minister for Industry and Science (Ed Husic) talked about building trust in AI in the Australian community to boost adoption of AI in Australia. He referred to current issues that are eroding trust in AI, including the unauthorised use of creators’ […]
Read MoreThe Japan Copyright Office, part of the Japanese Government’s Agency for Cultural Affairs, has published ‘General Understanding on AI and Copyright in Japan: Overview’ (May 2024). The document is available here, and there is a link to it from the webpage for the Copyright Subdivision of the Culture Council of the Agency for Cultural Affairs here. […]
Read MoreOn 22 May, Newscorp and OpenAI announced a multi-year licensing deal. You can see NewsCorp’s announcement here, and OpenAI’s announcement here. The deal follows others between OpenAI and media companies, including with the Financial Times (here).
Read MoreA Parliamentary Joint Select Committee on Social Media and Australian Society has been established inquire into and report on the influence and impacts of social media on Australian society. Its terms of reference include: (a) the use of age verification to protect Australian children from social media; (b) the decision of Meta to abandon deals […]
Read MoreThe House Standing Committee on Employment, Education and Training is conducting an inquiry into automated decision making and machine learning techniques in the workplace. The Terms of Reference (here) include: the benefits for productivity, skills development, career progression and job creation in Australia; the role of business software and regulatory technology (‘Reg Tech’) in improving […]
Read MoreOn 17 April, the UK Government responded to the February 2024 report from the House of Lords Communications and Digital Committee on large language models and generative AI. There is information about that report here. It included comments and recommendations regarding copyright compliance and transparency. You can see the UK Government’s response here. It includes […]
Read MoreThe UK All-Party Parliamentary Group on Music has published a report with recommendations relating to artificial intelligence (AI) and music. You can see the report here. The report also includes some results of research on attitudes to AI and music (full results of survey here). The research outcomes included: Over four out of five (83%) […]
Read MoreThe Financial Times (FT) and OpenAI have announced a content licensing deal that will allow OpenAI to use FT content to develop generative artificial intelligence (AI) technology. It will also allow OpenAI’s ChatGPT to respond to questions with short summaries from FT articles, with links back to FT.com. You can see FT’s announcement here and Open […]
Read MoreOn 9 April, a Bill requiring transparency about copyrighted material used to train generative AI models was introduced into the US Congress. You can see the announcement by Representative Adam Schiff (who introduced the Bill) here. You can see the Bill (titled the Generative AI Copyright Disclosure Act) here. The Bill is supported by a […]
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The Attorney-General’s Department has published the list of members of the Copyright and AI Reference Group (CAIRG) and of the CAIRG Steering Committee. You can see the 61 members of the Reference Group and the 20 members of the Steering Committee here. Copyright Agency is a member of the Steering Committee, as are Australian Society […]
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The Senate is establishing a Select Committee on Adopting Artificial Intelligence (AI), to inquire into and report on the opportunities and impacts for Australia arising out of the uptake of AI technologies in Australia. You can see its terms of reference here. The Committee has been asked to consider: recent trends and opportunities in the […]
Read MoreOn 15 March, publishers who successfully sued Internet Archive (IA) in relation to its ‘controlled digital lending’ program filed their brief opposing IA’s appeal. There is information about the case, and the publishers’ position, in the statement from the Association of American Publishers here. The District Court’s March 2023 decision, finding that IA had infringed […]
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On 13 March, the European Parliament approved the European Union (EU) Artificial Intelligence Act (AI Act). You can see our earlier post on the AI Act here. You can see the European Parliament’s announcement here. The next steps are: a final lawyer-linguist check formal endorsement by the European Council publication in the official Journal (expected […]
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On 9 February, the Indian Ministry of Industry and Commerce issued a statement headed ‘Existing IPR regime well-equipped to protect AI generated works, no need to create separate category of rights’. You can see the statement here. The statement says: there is no requirement to create a separate category of rights for AI and related […]
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On 25 February, the Government released the Australian Universities Accord final report. You can see the full report here, the summary report here, and the Education Minister’s announcement here. The report contains 47 recommendations, with a strong focus on equity and increased opportunities for students from disadvantaged backgrounds. The first recommendation is that the objective […]
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The International Publishers Association (IPA) has published its position statement on Generative AI and Copyright Policy. The IPA says: The position reaffirms that the existing legal framework is clear. Collecting, handling, storing, and copying works of authorship to train AI models implicates the exclusive rights of authors, which cannot be ignored. Generative AI companies must […]
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The Department of Industry, Science and Resources (DISR) recently announced the formation of a temporary AI reference group, which will operate until 30 June 2024 (here). The Group’s terms of reference are here, and its members are here (scroll to bottom of page). The group’s members have backgrounds in law (such as legal issues associated […]
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On 30 January 2024, copyright management organisations for music composers in France and Germany (SACEM and GEMA) released the results of a study of the impacts on Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) on the music sector. You can see the organisations’ announcement here, a summary of the study here, and the full report here. The study: […]
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On 6 February, the UK Government confirmed that a working group overseen by the UK Intellectual Property Office (IPO) had failed to reach agreement on a code of practice on copyright and Artificial Intelligence (AI). In its response to ‘A pro-innovation approach to AI regulation’ (here) the UK Government said: 28. Creative industries and media […]
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On Friday 2 February, the ambassadors of the 27 Member States of the European Union (EU) unanimously approved the AI Act. This follows a political agreement in December 2023: see here. There is information about the status of the AI Act and next steps here. They include: 13 Feb: the European Parliament’s Committees vote 21 […]
Read MoreIn January, 12 organisations representing Canadian writers and publishers issued a joint statement on copyright and Generative artificial intelligence (AI). It opposes any changes to Canada’s copyright legislation to introduce new exceptions to train large language models for AI, or to give copyright protection to AI-generated products. You can see the statement here. You can […]
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On 2 February, the House of Lords Communications and Digital Committee released its report on large language models and generative AI. You can see the Executive Summary here and the full report here. Chapter 8 of the report deals with copyright issues (here). The Executive Summary says: We have even deeper concerns about the Government’s […]
Read MoreIn January 2024, the UK Government responded to a report from the House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport Committee entitled ‘Connected tech: AI and creative technology’. You can see the Committee’s report here, and the Government’s response here. In its response the Government: confirmed that it is not pursuing a copyright exception for text […]
Read MoreOn 18 January 2024, UK-based Design and Artists Copyright Society (DACS) released a report on the findings from a survey of its artist members on artificial intelligence (AI). The findings included: 74% of artists are concerned about their work being used to train AI models. 95% of artists feel they should be asked before their work is […]
Read MoreOn 17 January 2024, a new non-profit company called Fairly Trained was launched in the US, offering certifications to AI developers that use licensed content and treat creators fairly. Its founder and CEO is composer and technologist Ed Newton-Rex, who resigned from his role leading the Audio team at Stability AI because he disagreed with […]
Read MoreOn 17 January, the Government released its interim response to the Department of Industry consultation on Safe and Responsible AI. There were more than 500 submissions to the consultation (here), including from Copyright Agency, Copyright Agency members, Australian Society of Authors, Australian Publishers Association, National Association for the Visual Arts and Media Entertainment and Arts […]
Read MoreOn 8 January, Open AI responded to the lawsuit against it and Microsoft, started by The New York Times in December 2023. You can see The New York Times article about its lawsuit here, and its complaint here. You can see Open AI’s response here. Open AI contends that using third party content to train […]
Read MoreYou can see information about the Australian Framework for Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Schools here, and download the framework here. The Framework is based on 6 guiding principles: Teaching and Learning Human and Social Wellbeing Transparency Fairness Accountability Privacy, Security and Safety Principle 4 (Fairness) includes: 4.4 Cultural and intellectual property: generative AI tools […]
Read MoreOn 6 December, the Association of American Publishers (AAP) filed comments with the US Copyright Office, rebutting claims made by artificial intelligence (AI) tech companies. AAP’s points include: these companies: have not sought to work with copyright owners, but have instead appropriated their intellectual property for commercial gain are not struggling startups but some of […]
Read MoreUK’s Copyright Licensing Agency has recently released a report on attitudes to artificial intelligence (AI) in UK’s creative industries. Titled ‘Friend or Foe? Attitudes to Generative Artificial Intelligence Among the Creative Community’, its research of attitudes found that: 79% of respondents believe that the UK’s ability to earn from its creativity will be impacted by AI […]
Read MoreOn 8 December, the European Parliament and Council of the European Union reached a provisional agreement on proposed legislation to regulate artificial intelligence (AI). You can see the announcement from the European Council here and the European Parliament here. Each refers to next steps regarding agreed text and formal adoption. You can see IFRRO’s summary […]
Read MoreOn 4 December 2023, the Attorney General convened the fourth and final copyright roundtable of a series commenced in February 2023. You can see our earlier posts on the roundtables here and here. The roundtables considered five issues: orphan works, quotation, remote learning, definition of ‘broadcast’, and artificial intelligence (AI). Copyright Agency participated in each […]
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An alliance of 22 creator and creative economy organisations representing 5.9 per cent of Australia’s workforce welcomes the announcement of a Copyright and AI reference group by Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus KC MP. Our organisations represent the emerging and established creators and artists across the creative economy and includes every genre, artform and medium. Whether it’s […]
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The Attorney General announced on 4 December that the Government is establishing a Copyright and Artificial Intelligence (AI) reference group to better prepare for future copyright challenges emerging from AI. The announcement is here. The announcement followed a series of copyright roundtables initiated by the Attorney General in February 2023. You can see our earlier […]
Read MoreAustralia’s current copyright system facilitates AI developments that deliver economic and societal benefits for Australia, in a framework of ethical policies and practices. Australian governments should require AI developers to disclose the content that they are using in connection with AI. Among other things, this will assist copyright licensing. Australia’s copyright system facilitates innovation Australia’s […]
Read MoreOn 28 September, the Australian Society of Authors (ASA) issued a statement expressing the ASA’s deep concern, on behalf of its members, about the use of Australian books to train AI. You can view the statement here. You can view the article in the Atlantic about the Books3 dataset of nearly 200,000 pirated books, referred […]
Read MoreIn February 2023, the Attorney General commenced a copyright roundtable process. The first meeting identified 5 issues for review: orphan works, quotation, remote learning, definition of ‘broadcast’, and artificial intelligence (AI). The sessions in the second roundtable considered orphan works, quotation and remote learning. Our post on the second roundtable is here. The sessions in […]
Read MoreThe Department of Industry published a discussion paper on Safe and responsible AI in Australia in June 2023, and sought views by 4 August. See our earlier news post here. The Department received more than 500 submissions. Submissions are now available online here. This is one of several government inquiries into AI. Others include: Artificial […]
Read MoreThe House Standing Committee on Employment, Education and Training is conducting an inquiry into and report on the use of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in the Australian education system. You can see the announcement of the inquiry here, terms of reference for the inquiry here, and the submissions to the inquiry here. You can view […]
Read MoreThe Department of Industry is seeking view on Artificial Intelligence (AI) by 26 July 2023. You can visit the Department’s webpage for the consultation here, download the Department’s Discussion Paper here, and make a submission here. Copyright Agency will be making a submission. If you would like assistance with making a submission, please contact the […]
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