Authors Guild protests Australian AI copyright carve-out
The Guild says the proposed law would let AI companies use any author's work worldwide without a license if the training happened on Australian soil.
The Authors Guild is joining a global effort opposing proposed Australian legislation that would change the country's copyright law to let AI companies use authors' work to build their models without a license, according to the Guild. The Guild says the law would apply to authors from anywhere in the world, with eligibility turning on whether the AI training occurred on Australian soil.
According to the Guild, the legislation would also preempt the lawsuits authors have brought against AI companies and would allow companies to move their training operations to Australia while continuing to deploy the resulting models in the U.S.
The Australian government plans to let copyright owners opt out of having their work used, but the Guild says opt-outs are difficult to implement and "are no substitute for copyright's opt-in licensing that allows creators to control who gets to use their work for what purposes." The Guild is asking creators to sign a public statement condemning the planned legislation, which states: "The Australian government must not legalize the theft of the work of the world's creators on their soil. Our work must only be used to train AI models in Australia with our explicit permission."
Here's the trick in this one: it doesn't matter where you live or publish. If an AI company trains on Australian soil, the Guild says your work is fair game under this proposal, no license needed. An opt-out sounds like a concession, but the Guild calls it what it is — no substitute for opt-in licensing, where you decide who uses your work and for what. This is still a proposal, not a law, which is exactly why this week's the week to make noise about it, not next month.
From the Coral Wire edition of Tue, Oct 27 2026 · Coral Index 82/100 (Green light)