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Paper short abstract

This individual paper provides a comparative analysis of how EU and Japanese legal frameworks regulate copyright protection in the AI training process. It examines how both systems balance the protection of rightholders’ interests with the promotion of innovation and technological development.

Paper long abstract

Finding the right balance between protecting the interest of copyright holders and between accessing and using creative content to promote innovation is an ‘ancient old problem’ related to copyright. With the emergence of digital economy and new technologies like machine learning, big data and artificial intelligence (from now on “AI”) the discussion has developed in a new spirit, in that of promoting or not AI business. This individual paper presents and analyzes exactly how the current legal framework of the European Union and Japan regulate copyright exceptions for AI training (AI business promotion).

These two legal systems warrant comparison, because they confront the same issue through two fundamentally distinct approaches. The EU is giving copyright holders an ‘opt out’ right to text and data mining (from now on “TDM”) exceptions while trying to set a global standard of public policy with the AI Act like they did with the GDPR. In the other hand, Japan has decided to be a TDM and ML heaven for AI model providers in allowing copyright exploitations as long as they’re not considered to be done for ‘enjoyment’ purposes.

While we must wait for more court decisions that interpret the respective legal frameworks to come to practical conclusions, the outcome of the debate presented by this individual paper will affect many of today’s digital economy players like those in the journalism industry, music industry (e.g. how will music creators be fairly remunerated if their works are used in the context of AI?), game industry and so forth.

For the EU to be competitive in the digital market, it is still uncertain whether the European lawmaker needs to take a page from the JCA book and include the ‘enjoyment’ purpose in its TDM exceptions or not. Or is the tertium comparations highlighted in this individual paper between the Japanese and EU legal systems going to be settled by the judiciary interpretations of the TDM exceptions and the AI Act of the Court of Justice of the European Union. Regardless the countries' respective outcomes, the concern remains global.