NUJ gives evidence to Joint Oireachtas Committee on AI and copyright
Séamus Dooley, NUJ Irish secretary, called for a tech tax and stronger legislation to protect journalism and democracy while giving evidence to the Joint Oireachtas Committee on AI and copyright.
In his opening statement, Dooley told the committee that AI “is not an impending threat but a presence across our industry.”
Dooley insisted that journalists are not resistant to change and have consistently adapted to the introduction of new technology. "It is very easy to sound like the blacksmith bemoaning the introduction of the motorcar, to sound like an old fogey," said Dooley.
However, in many workplaces artificial intelligence has been “imposed without any consultation whatsoever, and it has huge implications on how you do your work, and whether you have a job at all or not.”
NUJ members are already encountering false attributions, inaccurate AI-generated stories and use of their work without consent or compensation. These practices harm workers’ ability to earn a decent living and thwart access to reliable information and impartial news reporting, leading to an erosion of public trust in journalism and risking the reputation of journalists and media organisations.
During the committee hearing, Dooley called for fair and reasonable terms of compensation for journalists’ creative work, which is a core input to AI’s commercial value.
Big tech platforms have “pillaged and profited from the media sector with financial impunity,” said Dooley.
These platforms have regurgitated editorial content, replacing local news sources while claiming they are platforms and not publishers - failing to take responsibility for the discrimination and disinformation pushed by their algorithms and published on their platforms.
“That’s a core problem. No one else gets away with saying, ‘I only lit the match’, said Dooley. “The fact of the matter is that they set the place on fire and they have done a huge amount of damage.”
The NUJ has called for a 6% windfall tax on these companies. The “only thing capital understands is cost,” Dooley added.
Dooley also called for “clear and unambiguous enforcement of copyright law” and a licensing system for the use of creators’ copyright materials.
He said: “Tech companies should be obliged to disclose their training data, the design of their algorithms and their output, and pay their fair share for the wholescale robbery of creative workers’ labour.”
You can watch the AI and copyright hearing at the Oireachtas here. You can read the NUJ’s full submission to the Joint Oireachtas Committee here.