ALCS response to Lords Committee report on AI

The report’s recommendations included:

• Rejecting a broad copyright exception for AI training
• Supporting a “licensing-first” approach to AI development
• Establishing meaningful transparency requirements around AI developers’ training data

We are glad to see this report acknowledge the importance of protecting the UK’s gold standard copyright system and supporting the development of measures to enable a licensing regime that will balance use of content with appropriate compensation to authors.

The Report suggests a potential future where “the UK becomes a world-leading home for responsible, licensing-based artificial intelligence (AI) development, where commercial model developers using UK content obtain permission, pay fair remuneration to rightsholders and can deploy their models without questions of legal liability” and acknowledges the importance of “a “gold-standard” copyright framework, which rewards creativity, supports sustainable business models for creative work, and commands international respect” to achieve this.

A key takeaway from the Committee’s report is the importance of the UK getting it right to deliver a world-leading solution that supports creators. That is why we have been working closely with our partners to explore and develop a licensing framework aimed at ensuring that authors are properly recognised and remunerated when their works are used to train and develop generative AI systems. Collective licensing for AI is still in its early stages but represents an important step towards bringing about transparency, accountability, and fair value exchange into the AI ecosystem.

Richard Combes, ALCS Deputy CEO said:

“As generative AI licensing markets and models continue to evolve, we welcome the Committee’s call to respect and work with our existing copyright framework to deliver a future where AI is developed responsibly and transparently, with fair remuneration paid to authors and other creators. We look forward to working with industry partners and the Government to ensure that the proposals outlined later this month respect these principles, delivering a UK licensing market that supports our world-class creators and creative industries.” 

You can learn more about about our work around generative AI here.