Australia's creative and media workers welcome the federal government's commitment to establishing ongoing protections and monitoring of AI developments to ensure good jobs and the maintenance of robust creative and media sectors.
Australians need and deserve to have confidence in a strong media industry that is untainted by AI deception and a cultural sector where human creativity is the foundational value.
The National AI Plan, released today, commits the government to consultation and responses to industrial and workplace risks and issues created by AI.
Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance Chief Executive Erin Madeley said the union would seek to ensure the government honoured this commitment to reduce negative impacts on creative and media workers already suffering due to the unregulated and often unlicensed use of generative AI.
"MEAA welcomes the comments by Minister Ayers indicating the need to strengthen copyright and related regulation to guarantee workers fully benefit from AI developments, and we will continue to campaign for business and big tech to 'pay up'," Ms Madeley said.
"MEAA also welcomes the announcement of the AI Safety Institute, which will act as a necessary watchdog to ensure businesses and AI developers are compliant with Australian law.
"However, in doing so, we reiterate our call for comprehensive protections that would proactively mitigate against potential harms caused by AI."
MEAA harbours serious concerns over the release of voluntary guidelines for transparency and watermarking. Voluntary guidelines have a poor record in protecting workers and consumers.
"MEAA calls on the government to work towards making these guidelines mandatory as a simple and effective step in mitigating some of the most well-known dangers of AI: the devaluation of human-made art, media and creative work, and the spread of misinformation and disinformation," Ms Madeley said.
"By opting for voluntary guidelines, the government risks undermining copyright protections by exposing Australian creative and media workers to being squeezed out by cheap, AI-generated replacements.
"Australians should have the right to choose human-made creative work over AI-generated material."
MEAA is also concerned about lingering uncertainty around how the government intends to require transparency from AI companies when it comes to the data that they have used to train their systems.
Transparency of training data is essential not just for ensuring that copyright can be enforced, but also to ensure that AI is developed without breaching privacy or building in bias.
MEAA looks forward to the government providing clarity on this issue in the coming months.
