#FreeAllWords: International Text and Translation Fund of the European Writers‘ Council (EWC) gives a voice to authors from Belarus and Ukraine
Artificial intelligence relies on our creative content to function at all. Without it, AI is blind, empty and speechless.
Europe’s creative soul is being exploited.
Let’s take action! Let’s get the EU to act! Protect Europe’s creative soul!
We, the European Writers’ Council, and many other artists’, authors’ and performers’ unions and organisations are stepping up to support our stand and our rights and this joint open letter by the EU cultural sectors.
We kindly invite you to:
Sign the open letter together with many other creatives from all sectors.
JOINT LETTER: Open Letter Creators-for-europe-united.eu
Generative AI systems use millions of creative works, usually without consent, without transparency and without licensing, i.e. remuneration.
With every signature, the pressure on the EU to finally act grows. As individuals, we have little to counter the tech giants – but together we cannot be ignored.
Because:
Without your creativity, AI systems would be empty and meaningless. It’s time for this contribution to be recognized and respected.
Our rights as creators and rights holders are being systematically eroded under the guise of ‘promoting innovation’. Billions of creative works are being used as the basis for AI systems without our knowledge, without our consent and without remuneration. The EU Commission has done too little to protect us from this.
We therefore call for decisive and swift action:
- Full transparency about all works, contributions and performances that have been and will be used for training generative AI models and other purposes.
- Adequate remuneration for the use of our works.
- Consistent enforcement of applicable copyright laws – including against global tech companies.
- Involvement of the culture, creative and media industries in all regulatory processes for AI governance.
We strongly call on you, Ms Virkkunen:
Protect Europe’s creative soul, protect European values and works. Act now to ensure a fair, transparent and legally compliant development of artificial intelligence. Europe cannot stand idly by while its cultural foundations are devalued.
With emphasis and great concern, but also with hope for strong and fair regulation.