Australia should not capitulate to Big Tech on copyright
Our music is not free training data. We have to protect the right of artists and rightsholders to be paid for their work.
Our books, songs, art, journalism and ingenuity — the things that make us uniquely Australian — are at the centre of an intense lobbying campaign playing out in the corridors and offices of parliaments around the country.
This year, the skies between the US and Canberra have been lined with the contrails of planes carrying AI and tech company CEOs and senior executives to Australia. They arrive waving very large cheques and promising generation-defining investment in Australia, provided we make some “tiny” tweaks to our laws.
That is, a carve-out from Australian copyright law that would allow these companies to legally suck up songs, books, films, TV shows, articles and art to train AI without permission, and without the consent of the people who invested in making and commercialising them. These businesses want to monetise highly valuable content without asking or paying for it, including by creating new substitutable works.
The window is narrow, we are told. Without fast action from government, data centre investment and innovation will be strangled. Australia will be left behind in the AI future.
