AI transparency campaigner scores another victory in battle to persuade UK government to 'act now on copyright theft'
Baroness Kidron tells Charting: 'The house is on fire and they are playing croquet'
CREATIVES’ CHAMPION Baroness Kidron has defiantly called on the UK government to “start upholding UK law and stop pretending it is not enabling the widespread theft of copyrighted material with its inaction”. Speaking exclusively to Charting Gen AI shortly after dealing ministers another blow in the latest parliamentary clash over AI and copyright, the multi-award winning filmmaker said she supported their desire to look closely at the issue.
“But the house is on fire and they are playing croquet,” said Baroness Kidron as she urged ministers to act now on transparency so creators knew whether their copyrighted works had been used for generative model training. “Only then do they know what is going on.”
Earlier peers backed Baroness Kidron’s revised AI transparency amendment by a decisive 287 votes to 118, an increased margin of 22 when a similar vote took place in the House of Lords last week, only for the so-called “Kidron clause” to then be removed by MPs in the House of Commons.
Addressing the Lords in the latest round of parliamentary ‘ping pong’ — the bill to which Baroness Kidron attached her amendment will go back and forth between both houses until one side backs down — the independent peer said ministers had failed to come forward with plans that would effectively deal with transparency.
“Undermining copyright is a multi-generational harm, because copyright not only supports today’s creatives, but it is also essential to create opportunities for the creators of the future,” said Baroness Kidron. “And I want to put on record that young people refute the suggestion that emanates from government that everything is already stolen. Not only do models constantly need to be retrained, fine-tuned and augmented with up-to-date information but some people have not yet started their creative journey, and some things remain to being created. It is our duty as parliamentarians to ensure that we do not squander the future of the young.”
Looking towards the government’s front bench in the upper house she declared: “The government has got it wrong. It has been turned by the sweet whisperings of Silicon Valley which has stolen and continues to steal, every day we take no action, the UK’s extraordinary, beautiful, and valuable creative output.” She said the hi-techs had also managed to persuade “the government that it is easier for it to redefine theft than make them pay for what they stole”.
Baroness Kidron urged members of the upper house to put aside party allegiances and “stand behind our creative industries and our indigenous AI community”. “I have tried everything, to persuade the government in private. Everything,” exclaimed Baroness Kidron, adding that if the government continued on its path “with no meaningful alternative then we will begin to see the corrosion of our powerful industry, an industry fundamental to country and democracy”.
“It will be a tragedy, and it’s entirely avoidable. But it is a choice that the government, and we in this house, can make today. The UK creative industries embody our history. They hold our shared truth and they tell our national story. A nation with a contested story is a troubled nation. A nation that gives away its capacity to tell its own story is a fragile place indeed.”
Peers from all sides of the house spoke in favour of Baroness Kidron’s amendment, with several applauding her determination to have her transparency clause adopted.
✨COMMENT: It’s déjà vu all over again. The Data (Use and Access) Bill with the Kidron clause now makes its way back to the Commons where once more it is likely to be removed. The government’s line has three components: first, it’s arguing that this isn’t the right vehicle with which to deal with AI and copyright. Second, it says it wants to look at the entire issue in the light of 11,500 responses to its consultation on plans that will essentially water down copyright laws in favour of the AIs. And third, it says it wants to set up two working groups, one looking at transparency (with creators wanting total granularity and the AI developers resisting that) and the other exploring technical solutions that might allow creators to manage and protect their works. All three components spell one thing: delay. There is no declared timeline. And now, there’s no sense of what the government’s preferred option is either, having briefed newspapers that it no longer backs a reserved rights model similar to that which exists in Europe where creators say ‘opt-outs’ are unworkable. Baroness Kidron told Charting Gen AI the government is “still stuck on the view that they have to balance the interests” of AI developers and creatives. If only it had set out to work with both sectors and ask how everyone could benefit. It still can. There’s time for the government to admit its approach to AI and copyright has been fundamentally flawed from the get-go, and think again. In short: it’s time for leadership.
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◾️Further reaction to this breaking story and the key developments that threaten to reshape the global AI regulatory landscape will be in this Friday’s Weekly Newsletter.
Suggestion for you: Why don’t you ask her for an interview? If you don’t “do” podcasts, that’s all right. Do it the old-fashioned way and report on it. Either-or.
Let her know she has allies.