Despite blocking thousands of illegal streaming sites, Italy’s ‘Piracy Shield’ anti-piracy program has failed to deliver increased viewership for legal services like DAZN. This revelation appears in data provided by telecoms regulator AGCOM, which oversees the blocking regime. It adds fuel to the already heated discussions, which divide stakeholders and copyright representatives.
Source: ‘Piracy Shield’ Fails to Convert Pirates to Paying Subscribers, Data Suggest * TorrentFreak
The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) today released an official Artificial Intelligence Strategy aimed at outlining the challenges faced by the Office both internally and externally, as the reach of AI impacts all aspects of innovation and society. According to the report, AI-related patent applications are up 33% since 2018 and appeared in 60% of all technology subclasses in 2023.
Source: USPTO Presents AI Strategy as AI Patent Applications Soar by 33%
Among the many initiatives in a 50-point AI Opportunities Action Plan presented to Parliament on Monday (January 13) is a commitment to reforming the UK’s text and data mining regime to be “at least as competitive” as the European Union. “The current uncertainty around intellectual property (IP) is hindering innovation and undermining our broader ambitions for AI, as well as the growth of our creative industries,” the plan states.
Source: UK’s plan to make copyright law more AI-friendly raises concerns
The UK’s competition watchdog has launched an investigation into Google‘s search services, beginning a process that may ultimately see the tech giant regulated under the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act. The CMA said the investigation “will assess Google’s position in search and search advertising services and how this impacts consumers and businesses including advertisers, news publishers, and rival search engines.
Source: CMA to investigate Google search dominance and impact on news publishers
The members of the U.S. Supreme Court are generally not known for being tech-savvy. However, in a recent First Amendment decision involving online platforms content-moderation policies, several justices flagged an even bigger question — how should the First Amendment be applied to content generated by artificial intelligence (AI)?
A trio of major music publishers suing Anthropic over the use of lyrics to train its AI system have reached a deal with the Amazon-backed company to resolve some parts of a pending preliminary injunction. U.S. District Judge Eumi Lee on Thursday signed off on an agreement between the two sides mandating Anthropic to maintain existing guardrails that prevent its Claude AI chatbot from providing lyrics to songs owned by the publishers.
Source: Music Publishers Reach Deal With AI Giant Anthropic Over Copyrighted Song Lyrics
For the past several years, the recording industry has branded stream-ripping services the leading piracy threat. On the near horizon, the industry claims that the rise of generative AI presents a new and rapidly evolving challenge for the music ecosystem that threatens its long-term sustainability. According to global industry group IFPI, stream-ripping is likely fueling this secondary threat.
Source: IFPI: Stream-Ripping Fuels Generative AI From Which Existential Threats Emerge * TorrentFreak
The European Data Protection Board (EDPB) issued a wide-ranging report on Wednesday exploring the many complexities and intricacies of modern AI model development. It said that it was open to potentially allowing personal data, without owner’s consent, to train models, as long as the finished application does not reveal any of that private information.
Source: European authorities say AI can use personal data without consent for training
The Data Protection Authority said Friday that the Californian darling of the artificial intelligence sector processed users’ personal data to train its ChatGPT chat service without identifying an adequate legal basis and violated the country’s rules on transparency for users. It also said the company did not notify it of a March 2023 data breach.
Source: Italian Privacy Watchdog Fines OpenAI $15.5 Million Over ChatGPT Data Use
The injunction, issued by Judge Victor Torres in Rio de Janeiro’s sixth commercial court, requires Adele’s record labels, Sony Music and Universal Music Group, to stop “immediately and globally, from using, reproducing, editing, distributing or commercializing the song Million Years Ago, by any modality, means, physical or digital support, streaming or sharing platform.”
Source: Brazilian judge imposes streaming ban on Adele’s ‘Million Years Ago’ in plagiarism dispute