AAVA’s response to the Australian Senate Select Committee on Adopting Artificial Intelligence (AI) Report

AAVA’s response to the Australian Senate Select Committee on Adopting 

Artificial Intelligence (AI) Report

 

The Senate report from the Select Committee on Adopting Artificial Intelligence (AI) was released last week. This is the months-long inquiry held within Australian Parliament House that AAVA President Simon Kennedy, Vice-President Teresa Lim and Industry Liaison Lesley Chambers gave evidence at in July 2024. 

The report is a mammoth 200 pages long – an indication of the deep interest from the committee members, and the breadth of organisations and individuals that AI has touched.

For your reference, the report is HERE.

 

1. A Summary

 

• Many of the recommendations contained in the report are relevant to the creative industries and are largely supported across both sides of government.
• The voice-over community would benefit from the suggested transparency of training datasets (inputs to Large Language Models) and licensing of copyrighted material.
• Suggested creation of wide-ranging, dedicated AI laws to manage the high-risk uses of AI.
• Suggested increased government support of sovereign AI capability, i.e. that our country create its own AI programming rather than rely on overseas companies.
• Sadly, there are no new rights suggested around voice, image and likeness.
  AAVA is disappointed that the vital protection of Australian citizens’ identities and biometric data is overlooked in the report’s recommendations.
• Suggested continued consultation with creative workers, rights holders and their representative organisations through the *CAIRG to find appropriate solutions to the unprecedented theft of work by multinational tech companies. 

 

*CAIRG is the Attorney General Department's Copyright AI Reference Group, of which AAVA is a member.

 

2. The Recommendations

 

Among the 13 recommendations, five relate to the Voice Actor sector.

 

Recommendation 4

That the Australian Government continue to increase the financial and non-financial support it provides in support of sovereign AI capability in Australia, focusing on Australia’s existing areas of comparative advantage and unique First Nations perspectives.

We welcome this recommendation as it reinforces the need for AI technology to be created in this country, operating under the current and future national laws, put in place to protect Australia’s citizens.

Recommendation 7

That the Australian Government ensure that workers, worker organisations, employers and employer organisations are thoroughly consulted on the need for, and best approach to, further regulatory responses to address the impact of AI on work and workplaces.

This recommendation, if followed, opens government channels even more than the ones we have been accessing in 2024, to ask for the protections from AI abuse of our existing and future work.

Recommendation 8 

That the Australian Government continue to consult with creative workers, rights holders and their representative organisations through the CAIRG on appropriate solutions to the unprecedented theft of their work by multinational tech companies operating within Australia.

This recommendation is encouraging and disappointing. We are encouraged by the Government’s acknowledgement of the important role the CAIRG plays in this landscape. However, AAVA, as members of the CAIRG, are disappointed by how much education and work is yet to be done to protect performing artists’ voice, image and likeness. 

Recommendation 9

That the Australian Government require the developers of AI products to be transparent about the use of copyrighted works in their training datasets, and that the use of such works is appropriately licenced and paid for.

It would be a major win to have this legislated. Retrospective payment would probably be out of reach but going forward, it would be a win.

Recommendation 10

That the Australian Government urgently undertake further consultation with the creative industry to consider an appropriate mechanism to ensure fair remuneration is paid to creators for commercial AI-generated outputs based on copyrighted material used to train AI systems.

We appreciate the urgency of this recommendation. We understand a prototype for that mechanism is already being beta tested in the USA, and the AAVA Executive Committee are engaging in an open dialogue with various Australian industry organisations to encourage the development of a similar framework here.

 

3. Conclusion

 

Whilst AAVA is pleased that the government has acknowledged the impact that emerging technologies has on Australian creative industries, as well as the need for a robust framework to be built at government level with transparency at its core, it’s fair to say there is a lot more work to be done to protect our members and the wider voice-over community.

This report is mostly focused on regulating large tech companies that are training AI models, with little-to-no attention paid to future-proofing the moral rights of artists, or even humans in general!

AAVA will continue to work with federal and state ministers and members, intergovernmental agencies and local industry, as well as key stakeholders at large local and off-shore tech companies.

Using the momentum of this report, AAVA is committed to protecting the future of its members and the wider voice-over community, through the establishment, and championing of, ethical best practices. We’re aiming for yet more positive outcomes in 2025.