Equity has hailed the publication of the government’s consultation on copyright and artificial intelligence as “vindication for the creative industries” and urged the government to heed the “clear consensus on the need for protections”.
Responding to the progress report, which was published on Monday 15 December, Equity general secretary Paul W Fleming said: “The government must listen to the weight of the unequivocal view of consultation respondents.
“The results are overwhelming and a vindication for the creative industries. With 95% backing strengthening or maintaining copyright protections, there is clear consensus on the need for protections. The government’s preferred option for a data mining exemption must be dead in the water, with only 3% of consultation respondents backing this unpopular proposal.
“Contrary to the Secretary of State’s comments in parliament on Monday, there IS consensus on this issue. Equity members are clear and the creative industries are united. This is one of the biggest issues in our industries and one which Equity members in film and TV are currently being balloted on. As their union, Equity will fight for protections for their professional work through all means possible.”
More than 11,500 responses were received in the consultation. Equity sent a submission and also supported members to make individual submissions to the consultation.
The options offered in the consultation were:
· Option 0: Do nothing: Copyright and related laws remain as they are
· Option 1: Strengthen copyright requiring licensing in all cases
· Option 2: A broad data mining exception
· Option 3: A data mining exception which allows right holders to reserve their rights, underpinned by supporting measures on transparency (government’s preferred option)
In the progress report, it says: Of those who responded through the government’s online survey service, Citizen Space, 88% expressed support for option 1 - require licences in all cases. The remaining options presented in the consultation, in order of preference were: making no changes to copyright law (option 0, supported by 7% of respondents); introduction of an exception to copyright for all text and data mining purposes with rights reservation (option 3, the preferred option in the consultation, supported by 3% of respondents); and introduction of an exception to copyright for all text and data mining purposes with no rights reservation (option 2, supported by 0.5% of respondents). 1.5% of respondents did not indicate a preferred option. Although not all email responses explicitly stated a preference, these same sentiments were generally reflected across those responses.
Equity is currently (at time of publication) balloting film and TV members in an indicative industrial action ballot over AI protections, asking if they are prepared to refuse digital scanning on set in order to achieve adequate AI protections. The ballot closes at 12noon on Thursday 18 December and the result is expected to be announced around 1pm the same day.
