Thousands of creatives sign petition against AI data scraping
What do the actor Kevin Bacon, the novelist Kazuo Ishiguro, the musician Robert Smith and the journalist and historian Sidney Blumenthal have in common? They are among the 11,500 signatories of a petition against unlicensed use of creative works for AI training.
The unlicensed use of creative works to train generative AI is a major, unjust threat to the livelihoods of the people behind those works, and must not be permitted,” warn signatories.
The petition lands at a time when lawmakers are weighing options on how to react to data scraping for generative AI development. Last week, the Financial Times reported that the U.K. government intends to consult on an ‘opt-out’ model for AI content scraping.
According to the Guardian, the petition was led by British composer Ed Newton-Rex, a former executive at Stability AI, on behalf of creatives whom he says are particularly concerned. He says that by referring to people’s artwork as “training data,” AI corporations are “dehumanizing” it.