CC welcomes the adoption of this comprehensive report by the AIDA special committee with strong, cross-party support. 

On Tuesday, the European Parliament’s (EU) Special Committee on Artificial Intelligence in a Digital Age (AIDA) adopted its final recommendations for a Roadmap, laying the groundwork through 2030.

This Roadmap concludes that artificial intelligence (AI) has enormous technological potential and should be used to benefit humans. Creative Commons commends the EP on its thorough, preparatory work undertaken over the past 18 months by the AIDA special committee and which culminated in this detailed and thoughtful report.

 AI already plays a big part in our lives and as technological innovation continues to develop at pace, the importance of AI is only likely to increase.

MEPs identified policy options that could unlock AI’s potential in health, the environment, and climate change, to help combat pandemics and global hunger, and enhance people’s quality of life through personalized medicine.

AI, if combined with the necessary support infrastructure, education, and training could increase capital and labor productivity, innovation, sustainable growth, and job creation.

CC recognizes that developments in AI present a host of opportunities to address global challenges through better sharing in the digital world. While these opportunities are likely to stimulate innovation and accelerate digital transformation, they also raise questions in copyright, especially regarding the use of data to train AI and the copyright treatment of AI-generated outputs.

 In the Roadmap, paragraph 116 mentions a need to “clarify whether AI will be able to hold intellectual property rights in itself.” CC believes that there should be no copyright on AI-generated content in the absence of human creative choices.  AI systems are not authors, cannot have human rights, and cannot be held liable for their actions as the law currently stands, so AI should not be able to hold copyright in itself. 

AI-training uses of creative content should not be considered infringing. They should not implicate an exercise of a copyright exclusive right, but if so, they should be considered fair use or allowed under an exception. 

Beyond copyright, CC is aware that several issues affecting better sharing and related to ethics, privacy and data protection need to be better understood to bring clarity to the rapidly evolving role that AI is playing in society and to ensure sharing ultimately benefits the public. 

CC will continue to holistically explore issues at the intersection of AI and copyright to support better sharing of copyright content in the public interest.

Once adopted by the plenary in May, we hope it will serve as a solid basis for ensuring the EU’s nascent legislative framework (AI Act) provides a robust regulatory regime that supports better sharing.

 We look forward to continuing to work with EU legislators and policymakers over the coming months to create a framework for AI that fosters creativity and innovation and upholds the public interest, underpinned by the EU’s values and principles of freedom of speech, non-discrimination and the rule of law’.

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