Google wants copyright law to allow AI to scrape internet
Google is urging Australian policymakers to revise copyright laws, allowing generative AI systems to scrape the internet while providing an opt-out option for publishers. The tech giant proposes a community-developed web standard, similar to the robots.txt system, enabling publishers to control access to their content. However, this approach could shift the responsibility onto content creators to decide whether AI systems can use their content.
Opt-out system risks disrupting copyright norms
Copyright experts have warned that an opt-out system could turn copyright on its head, potentially harming smaller content creators. Meanwhile, some believe that Google's proposal might be an attempt to establish early norms that exempt companies from paying for content use. Google has always talked about a fair use exception for AI systems but an opt-out option is something new.
AI companies don't want to pay for scraping data
As AI systems require millions of data points to produce useful results, copying and potential copyright breaches are inevitable. News articles are rich sources of data for AI systems. Some news companies have already started conversations with AI companies about payment for scraping. The goal of the opt-out system seems to be to evade making payments for data scraping.
