Sir Elton John (right) performs at Verizon Center in Washington, DC
Kyle Gustafson | For The Washington Post | Getty Images
Celebrity musicians from Elton John to Dua Lipa are urging the UK government to rethink controversial plans to reform copyright laws to allow AI developers to access rights-protected content.
An open letter signed by John, Lipa and many other high-profile artists called on Prime Minister Keir Starmer to support an amendment proposed by British MP Beeban Kidron to make AI model makers more stringent in the legal framework for copyrighted content.
"We are the creators of wealth, we reflect and promote national stories, we are the innovators of the future, and artificial intelligence needs what we need and what our computer skills need," they said in the letter.
“If we follow the requirements of a few strong overseas tech companies, we will lose huge growth opportunities.”
What is the UK proposing?
Late last year, the UK government began a consultation on a proposal that would allow tech giants like Openai and AI labs to use legally reasonable ways to train their advanced basic models.
Under these proposals, artists will have to opt out of copyrighted works scratched by large language models. LLMs such as OpenAI's GPT-4 and Google's Gemini rely on a lot of data to produce human-like responses in the form of text, images, videos and audio.
This has led to concerns in the UK's creative industry, as it means putting the responsibility on content creators, demanding that their data not be used to train AI models - which, they believe, would be the same as giving up their valuable work.
“Our job is not your donation”
An open letter issued on Saturday called on the government to accept an amendment proposed by Beeban Kidron, a member of the Upper House of Lords.
The amendment would require tech giants and AI labs to tell copyright owners the personal work they use to train AI models - and according to the letter, “put transparency at the heart of the copyright system and allow AI developers and creators to develop licensing systems so that content humans can create fully understand the future.”
"For all aspects of the political field and members of both houses, we urge you to vote for the UK creative industry," the letter reads. "Support us to support future creators. Our job is not your job."
When CNBC contacted, the UK Department of Science, Innovation and Technology did not immediately comment.