The Government launched a consultation on ‘Copyright and Artificial Intelligence’ in December 2024, following many months of debate about the status of copyrighted material and the ingestion of this material by AI developers without proper payment or permission.
The Government has presented four proposed options within its consultation and has stated that its preference is ‘Option 3’. This consists of changing UK copyright law to introduce a new text and data mining exception which would allow AI developers to ingest copyrighted materials for training and commercial purposes, provided that rightsholders have not reserved or ‘opted-out’ their rights. The Government says that this would be underpinned by transparency requirements for AI developers, obligating them to disclose what data they have ingested.
BPI (and many other creative organisations) strongly feels that this option presents a significant risk to the UK’s music industry. As your trade association, BPI has been strongly lobbying against any watering down of copyright protections and arguing the case for the UK’s music industry and AI industry to grow in tandem. However, your voice is an important tool to ensuring policymakers understand the ramifications of any decisions taken.
That is why on 4 February 2025, BPI held a Member Webinar where we discussed the consultation and shared a call to action to our members to engage further on this important issue. You can get involved in three ways:
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Write to and/or meet with your local MP - please find a draft email template for you to personalise and further instructions detailed here. BPI is happy to support you in engaging with your MP including joining any meeting and supplying further briefing materials.
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Submit your views to the consultation - You can respond to the consultation online here or by emailing your written response in an attached document to [email protected] to express your opposition to Option 3. UK Music has prepared a crib sheet which you may be interested in using to support any response, it is primarily aimed at individual creators, but you may find it helpful. The consultation closes on 25 February 2025.
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Raise awareness of the industry's concerns - we welcome you doing this across any conversations or online. Please look out for BPI posts via our social media on this issue: Twitter (X), LinkedIn, Instagram.
If you have any further questions about the consultation, how you can get involved or would like any further support, then please get in touch via [email protected]. We are also happy to share a recording of the webinar if you could not attend.