Writers' Guild of Great Britain warns of AI threat to profession

Jack Thorne, President of the Writers' Guild of Great Britain (WGGB), has issued an appeal to the UK government regarding the impact of artificial intelligence on the writing profession. Speaking at an event in London, Thorne warned that the actions or inactions of the government over the next five years will define the future of the creative sector for the next century.

Thorne highlighted concerns regarding the industrial-scale scraping of writers' work to train large language models without consent or compensation, describing it as a breach of existing UK copyright law. He noted that tech companies are engaged in an arms race to strengthen these models, often driven by the belief that competitors are utilizing similar methods. While acknowledging that AI could bring economic and scientific advances if harnessed correctly, Thorne cautioned that the potential harm to the profession could outweigh the benefits if current technological models are allowed to operate without regulation.