The proposed new law will hand over artists’ copyright so their competitors can be trained for free. The government must reconsider

On Monday morning, a couple of hours after the UK government’s AI opportunities action plan was published, I started getting messages from artists. “We are not going to continue drawing so that the founders of [AI companies] can get rich. I am quitting this job now,” said one. Another told me: “I have given up at this point.” I’ve heard similar messages from people for months – they are abandoning their creative jobs because AI companies are taking their work without asking, and using it to train models that compete with them.

There is actually a lot I agree with in the action plan, which seeks to make the UK a global leader in artificial intelligence. Written by the venture capital investor Matt Clifford, it proposes making it easier for British AI companies to access “compute” (essentially the servers needed to train AI models), updating visa regulations to bring more AI experts to our shores, and much more besides. These are sensible ideas that could boost our economy.

Ed Newton-Rex is the founder of Fairly Trained, a non-profit that certifies generative AI companies that respect creators’ rights, and a visiting scholar at Stanford University