Test Pattern welcomes the opportunity to contribute to this important work. 

This brief submission does not seek to replicate the research work and industry expertise of arts and cultural industry bodies, but instead to complement their work with three urgent recommendations.

A future made in Australia is premised on protecting and championing the work created by Australians. The Australian Government has taken a world-leading stance on communications technologies and social media, ensuring their impacts benefit all Australians. At this pivotal moment, it’s essential that our leadership on Indigenous Cultural and Intellectual Property (ICIP), copyright, text and data mining protections, social media and young people, data sovereignty, safe workplaces and digital duty of care, extends into ambitious policy convergence to maximise AI’s advantages and redress its significant harms.

The current situation warrants a cautious approach:

  • The unchecked roll-out of AI gives foreign multinationals unprecedented, unaccountable and unconscionable access to every public and private workplace in Australia, with every engagement an instance of surveillance as well risking Australian data sovereignty breaches;
  • The unchecked roll-out of data centres breaches planning conventions, consumes unacceptable levels of water and power, and negatively impacts local amenity and quality of life, with significant detrimental impact on the environment in the long term; 
  • The unchecked implementation of AI agents and applications in workplaces has consistently been demonstrated by national and international research to have a deskilling impact that sends productivity backwards (see estheranatolitis.net/tag/ai/ for access to current research).

There is no safe, ethical use of AI at this time. This is therefore not the time to frame AI as an area of opportunity and productivity when global research and workplace experience demonstrates the reverse. 

RECOMMENDATIONS:

  1. All policy touching on AI must embed the clear acknowledgement that this technology has been created via the unauthorised, uncompensated and unlawful use of Australian ICIP, IP and copyrighted material;
  2. The Australian Government should halt its universal AI roll-out, and cease approaching embedding AI as an inevitability, until this work can be informed by further research, international benchmarking and policy development;
  3. The Australian Government should continue its world-leading policy stance by undertaking responsible policy work
    1. that positions AI as akin to any other new technology – requiring rigorous assessment and expected to operate subject to Australian law;
    2. that ambitiously converges urban and regional planning, education, industrial relations, workplace surveillance and cultural policy;
    3. that keeps Australian sovereignty, data sovereignty and all Australians safe.