Artificial intelligence

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France’s key cinema and culture unions have called on the government to protect intellectual property from the threat of artificial intelligence (AI).

In a joint statement addressed to French prime minister Elisabeth Borne, more than 70 French creative organisations signed an email titled “Let’s build world-class AI that respects literary and artistic property!” urging a more ethical approach to the rapidly advancing technology.

Among the signatories are the country’s National Federation of French Cinemas (FNCF), directors’ guild the SRF, producers’ guilds the SPI, UPC and ARP, authors’ rights organisation the SACD and screenwriters union the Guilde des Scénaristes.

The move is a response to the Prime Minister launching the country’s first-ever “Committee on Generative Artificial Intelligence” in late September focusing on the both the opportunities and threats posed by AI.

AI has become a major talking point within the French film and audiovisual industries in recent months as the various local guilds work to protect their members amidst fears over how generative AI tools could potentially cost actors and writers their jobs, revenue and rights.

“Our approach to you is as much a matter of urgency as of responsibility: the rapid development of AI tools calls for the adoption of a framework guaranteeing real transparency on the works and content used to train the machines,” the joint email stated.

The letter argues that generative AI services often make content available to the public “without having to make the investments inherent in literary and artistic creation” and called the technology “a black box that does not allow authors, their assignees and beneficiaries to know whether their works have been used.”

The groups say that their aim “is not to create new intellectual property rules, but to ensure that our rights are effectively enforced” and that they hope that “tomorrow we are involved in sharing the value created from our works, articles and content.”

The European Union is preparing its own AI legislation, set to be voted upon by the European Parliament in June, which could become the world’s first comprehensive legal framework for artificial intelligence.