The Albanese government is weighing proposals that would give AI companies default access to Australian creatives' work as it seeks a deal with American tech giants, according to consultation documents tabled in the Senate.

Independent senator David Pocock said the compromise would throw copyright protections "under the bus" in pursuit of datacentre funding, putting AI companies' interests over everyday Australians by granting access to their content unless they opt out.

The proposals, titled "AI on Australian Terms", raise the difficulty of striking voluntary deals with the many small individual creators online. One option would require rights holders to digitally protect their material if they don't want it used for AI training - something rightsholders call unworkable. Another would let AI companies train on unprotected material once they struck enough business deals, or extend licences won by rightsholder organisations to creators who aren't members.

The revelations came as OpenAI's vice president for global policy, Ann O'Leary, met ministers and officials this week, saying the company wasn't ready to discuss training models locally without resolving "the gating problem of the copyright barriers". Industry minister Tim Ayres had said the government's forthcoming AI rules would "in no way" reduce copyright protection, while deputy prime minister Richard Marles said the government was working at pace and called collaboration with frontier companies a significant opportunity that must come on national-interest terms. He confirmed talks with tech companies in San Francisco over the past fortnight.

Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young called the suggestions "abhorrent", saying every Australian deserves payment for their work. Assistant technology minister Andrew Charlton said he had seen no ultimatum and would reject one, adding: "If we lose some datacentres over this, so be it."

Source: The Guardian