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Big tech companies are asking for Australian copyright laws to be watered down, to allow them to scrape Australian output – including journalism, music and books – in order to improve their AI models.

Guardian Australia this week reported on an industry proposal under which companies would commit more than $50bn in investment in datacentres and set up a $350m fund to compensate creatives in exchange for weaker copyright laws. Senator David Pocock has described it as the “ultimate dirty deal”.

The Albanese government has insisted it has no plans to weaken copyright protections, after ruling out the potential text and data mining exemption last year – but creatives are sounding the alarm. Loudest among them this week are musicians, some of whom discovered last month that their work was already being scraped.

Albanese is known for his love of Australian music. Guardian Australia spoke to some of his favourite bands to hear what they had to say to him.

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Bernard Fanning from Powderfinger: ‘Please do the right thing’

In 2022, the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, gave former New Zealand PM Jacinda Ardern a Powderfinger record during a diplomatic vinyl swap. He has also featured the band’s music in playlists, as DJ Albo.

It feels like a violation. We have always been very careful about where our music is placed, and this upends that consideration. Aside from that, it’s bad manners. A robot could never write Flame Trees, Highway to Hell, Took The Children Away or Am I Not Pretty Enough?

We have an important opportunity to put down a marker that says, “Our government is prepared to be on the side of Australian artists and storytellers”, some of the very people that help shape our cultural identity. Humans should be telling our stories, ones that come from deep thinking about our experiences and how we process them, not from data aggregations.

Anthony Albanese: you’re an avowed lover of Australian music and have made it part of your identity as a public figure. You’ve spent most of your life fighting to relieve people of disadvantage. Any partial or wholesale waiving of our rights as copyright holders would put Australian artists at a massive disadvantage. At the absolute minimum, we should have the secure legal right to opt out of this horrible idea. Please do the right thing by our past, current and future artists.

Lindy Morrison of the Go-Betweens: ‘We need new laws’

Cattle and Cane by the Go-Betweens was listed among Albanese’s top 10 Australian songs of all time. The prime minister also featured the band when guest programming Rage in 2013 and the Go-Betweens have often featured in his DJ Albo playlists.

I like what the drummer Clyde Stubblefield (James Brown) said in 2016 to the Philadelphia Inquirer: “I can dig that others try to do what I do, and am happy when people try to play what I play, but I do not appreciate not getting paid.”

I didn’t write a single Go-Betweens song but I know AI has sampled 95 of them, and I’d be pissed off if my drum beat in Cattle and Cane was used anywhere without attribution or payment.

From sampling (look to Milky sampling Streets of Your Town) to P2P filesharing, I’ve always cared about copyright infringement. Every time there’s a new technological change, we need new laws. That’s the reason the right of communication to cover infringements across the net was introduced into the Copyright Act.

My beef goes further and is this: how will artists who self-release get paid for the use of the recordings?

Janet English from Spiderbait: ‘How is this fair?’

Buy Me A Pony by Spiderbait was listed among Albanese’s top 10 Australian songs of all time. One of the band’s albums was also among the gifts Albanese presented to Ardern.

As musicians we are appalled that our life’s work has been stolen from us. We haven’t given consent or been compensated, it’s just been swiped. How is this fair? It’s as if you walked on to a farm and stole all the crops. You can’t just steal the output of an industry.

Music is the cornerstone of Australian culture – our stories, our work, our passion. We want to keep telling our stories but, if our work gets stolen, we can’t – and the industry dies.

It’s not just the musicians who are affected but everyone in the industry: roadies, engineers, radio stations, venues, festivals and more. And then there’s the new bands coming through, writing the songs that will define our lives. Will there be an industry left for them?

This isn’t an anti-AI thing for us; we feel music is a unique cultural asset that needs protection and fair treatment.

Tech companies are taking the piss. We appeal to the Australian government: don’t let the lifeblood of our culture be ripped off by bullies with deep pockets. To Albo: go and get us a fair deal. Don’t kill music in Australia.

Hannah Joy from Middle Kids: ‘AI cannot perform live’

Albanese voted for the Blessings by Middle Kids in the 2024 Hottest 100; the band also featured as his #3 most-played artist on his 2025 Spotify Wrapped.

I’ve always thought of Australia as an artist-friendly country, and our band has been fortunate to have had meaningful support. We are at a time where we need to decide what kind of culture we want to have in Australia moving forward.

Protecting artists and their livelihoods is a part of this not only because of their artistic contributions but because of how they shape spaces and places.

Live performances provide important connection and a way to be together, which is something we need more than ever in order to keep community alive. AI cannot perform live.

If artists can no longer be artists because of their work being scraped by AI, it will come at a great cost to Australian culture. We’re grateful for the government’s call to not change the Copyright Act, and really implore them to hold this position.

Andrew Cox of the Fauves: ‘Great music will always exist on the margins’

Dogs are the Best People by the Fauves was listed among Albanese’s top 10 Australian songs of all time. In an ABC radio interview, he said the song reminded him of his “own little friend”, Toto the cavoodle.

I recently searched and found that a large chunk of the Fauves’ catalogue had been scraped to train AI models. I was kind of flattered, although it’s doubtful the scraper is discriminating, so I’m kidding myself there. The Fauves have spent 40 years unsuccessfully trying to make people like our music. Maybe AI will do a better job? I’m not that fussed if it wants to try.

I think an artist’s job is to sit outside of the conventional economy, to expect to be exploited and ripped off. How else can they stay angry? Historically, artists have always been poor and there’s something romantic about that. Getting rich is for dull tech bros and boring investment bankers.

If I turn on the radio, most stuff already sounds like it was written by AI. Great music will always exist on the margins for those who want to seek it out. For everyone else, maybe it doesn’t matter whether their favourite song was written by AI or a human?

I’m not sure Mr Albanese knows much about the Fauves apart from the one song he likes. If I could speak to him, I’d ask him to stop native forest logging and increase the foreign aid budget.