ABC and SBS Advocate for AI Companies to Support Australian News Industry
ABC and SBS want AI companies to pay for Australian news, specifically advocating for the country’s news bargaining incentive to extend to these entities. This would encourage them to strike commercial deals with Australian media to support journalism. Their calls were made in submissions to Parliament’s Joint Select Committee on Artificial Intelligence.
Key Points:
- The broadcasters argue that AI companies should adhere to the same copyright, defamation, and privacy rules as traditional media outlets, describing the current system as "anti-competitive."
- SBS highlights the issue of large language models using news content without permission, attributing, or compensating, threatening the sustainability of the news industry.
- Anthropic, a company proposing to train AI on Australian content, suggests a "narrow form of conditional approval" for model training, respecting copyright holders' rights through robots.txt files. However, SBS disagrees, stating that these mechanisms are often ignored or bypassed.
- Anthropic acknowledges the risks posed by AI but also emphasizes its potential benefits, including economic transformation and significant investments in Australia.
This debate centers around balancing the advantages of AI with the need to protect intellectual property rights and sustain the news industry in Australia.