Brussels, 5 December 2023

A key meeting is taking place on Wednesday 6th December, where EU policymakers will try to reach a final agreement on the AI Act, the EU’s landmark proposal to regulate AI.

Ahead of this meeting, the European association of independent music companies IMPALA, representing close to 6,000 music SMEs across 32 European markets, is calling on the EU institutions to support effective transparency and record keeping obligations on AI models.

IMPALA takes the view that the final text needs to have clear obligations on AI models to respect copyright law, to keep detailed records of the content used for training their models and to make these records available in a way that allows rightsholders to identify if and how their works have been used.

Helen Smith, IMPALA Executive Chair, said: “Our members and the artists they work with are excited about the possibilities offered by AI as a tool to create, produce, distribute and promote music, and they are keen to explore commercial opportunities in this field. In this regard, genuine transparency is a must for creators and rightsholders to be able to engage in licensing negotiations and for the EU to achieve a functioning AI market.”

Dario Draštata, Chair of IMPALA and President of Balkan regional association RUNDA, concluded: “It is important to get this right in this regulation and seize the opportunity of the AI Act to set a proper framework around AI models. With meaningful transparency obligations on AI models in place, the cultural and creative sector as a whole will be able to firmly engage in proper negotiations for use of their works by AI companies.”

About IMPALA

IMPALA was established in 2000 and now represents nearly 6000 independent music companies. 99% of Europe’s music companies are small, micro and medium businesses and self-releasing artists. Known as the independents, they are world leaders in terms of innovation and discovering new music and artists – they produce more than 80% of all new releases and account for 80% of the sector’s jobs. IMPALA’s mission is to grow the independent music sector sustainably, return more value to artists, promote diversity and entrepreneurship, improve political access, inspire change, and increase access to finance. IMPALA works on a range of key issues for its members, runs various award schemes and has a programme aimed at businesses who want to develop a strategic relationship with the independent sector – Friends of IMPALA.