Introductory meeting of Slovenian GPAI experts
On Tuesday, 14 July 2020, Slovenian experts that are part of Global Partnership for Artificial Intelligence (GPAI) met for the first time at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The purpose of the introductory meeting was to improve the information flow between experts and state officials, to introduce areas where Slovenia is already active, and to form an informal network that would lay foundations for state-experts cooperation within GPAI and other international initiatives.
The GPAI was founded upon the initiative of Canada and France, with Slovenia being one of its founding members.
Dr. Maja Bogataj Jančič, who acts as a co-chair of the GPAI Data Governance Working Group, together with Jenni Tennison, Open Data Institute Vice President, took part in the introductory meeting as well. Dr. Maja Bogataj Jančič explained at the meeting that there had already been several meetings with government representatives and the representatives of International Centre of Expertise in Montreal with the aim of commencing the working group’s activities. The first challenge of the working group’s co-chairs is to shape the working group mandate in a way so that data governance will be understood as data being collected, used, shared, archived and deleted in ways that are consistent with human rights, fundamental freedoms, shared democratic values, inclusion and fairness. Co-chairs were unanimous that the working group itself is in need of diversification and should include representatives of different groups from all over the world.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs specifically asked dr. Maja Bogataj Jančič about her views on governance of personal and non-personal data, to which co-chair replied that personal data protection should follow European values and European acquis, which bases legal grounds for personal data protection upon right to privacy, and added that any attempts to govern personal data with new proprietary rights are unacceptable. Additionally, she emphasised that in case of non-personal data, contents protected by copyright should be distinguished from others. She reminded that at the moment the implementation of the EU Directive 2019/790 on Copyright and Related Rights in Digital Single Market is underway, with the Directive finally introducing a Text and Data Mining (TDM) exception. She expressly pointed out that it is crucial, especially if Slovenia intends to be at the forefront of machine learning and AI, to listen to researchers and others included in AI creating processes, who insist that broad and clear exceptions are necessary for enabling data analytics in a safe and burden-free manner, as well as data storage, especially for content available on the open web.
In any case, inclusion of experts in the GPAI’s working groups presents an opportunity for the participating states to keep their legal frameworks aligned with the technological development caused by AI.
The Internet Archive is a non-profit organization that maintains the Open Library, a digital library index, and is dedicated to preserving knowledge. As many of the works in the Internet Archive are under copyright, the Archive uses a system of controlled digital lending based on digital rights management to prevent unauthorized downloading or copying of copyrighted books. In March 2020, due to the circumstances surrounding the COVID-19 pandemic, the Internet Archive established the National Emergency Library, eliminating the waiting lists used in the Open Library and expanding access to books for all readers. In June 2020, the Emergency National Library faced a lawsuit from four book publishers and was ultimately closed.
The 43rd session of the WIPO Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights (hereinafter SCCR) made substantial progress on the issues advocated by the A2K Coalition (Access to Knowledge Coalition), which IPI is a member of. This year’s session was the most productive on the issues of exceptions and limitations. James Love (Knowledge Ecology International), a long-time observer at WIPO, described the outcome and the impact of the public interest community as the strongest since the conclusion of the Marrakech Treaty, which brought global copyright exceptions for the benefit of the blind and visually impaired.
Today, March 17, 2023, a symposium on law in the information society is taking place in the golden lecture hall of the Faculty of Law in Ljubljana. Dr. Maja Bogataj Jančič will present copyright aspects of artificial intelligence at the symposium.
The third day of the 43rd session of the WIPO Standing Committee on Copyright and Related Rights is intended for discussion on the topic of exceptions and limitations to copyright, especially in connection with the right to research.