Source: Dataphyte

This article from Dataphyte delves into a critical and growing debate: the use of African stories, cultural narratives, and creative works to train generative AI models, often without permission or compensation for the original creators. It highlights the concern that large technology companies, primarily based in the Global North, are scraping vast amounts of data from the internet, including content rich in African cultural heritage, to build powerful and profitable AI systems. This raises profound questions about digital colonialism and the equitable distribution of the benefits of AI.

The piece explores the legal and ethical dimensions of this issue, focusing on the challenges African creators face in protecting their intellectual property. Existing copyright laws are often difficult to enforce in this new technological context, and the concept of "fair use" is frequently invoked by AI developers. The article calls for a new framework to ensure that African authors, artists, and communities are fairly compensated when their cultural and creative outputs are used to fuel the AI industry, advocating for licensing agreements and benefit-sharing models that acknowledge the value of their contributions.