Scott Farquhar became one of Australia’s first tech billionaires in 2015 when his company Atlassian went public, although he stepped down in 2024 to focus on his family, philanthropy and to “help further the technology industry globally”.
He may not be a name that trips off the tongue of people who aren’t either Australian or keen followers of the project-management and software-development tolls industry. So why are we telling you about him?
Well, this week Farquhar’s name is very much tripping off the tongue of Australian labels body ARIA’s boss Annabelle Herd. And not in a positive way.
Farquhar appeared at yesterday’s The Australian Financial Review AI Summit conference in his role as chair of the Tech Council of Australia, and called for copyright reform, with comments focusing on the music industry.
“If I train in Australia, I need to cut a deal with every single recording artist in the entire world, because of the way our copyright laws work – so without some government change … it is impossible,” he said.
“There is no way for someone to train a model in Australia and say, ‘I’m just going to cut a deal with five media companies in Australia’, or cut a deal with Australian recording artists.”
This argument – that AI companies are hamstrung by the country’s copyright system – was given extremely short shrift by ARIA’s Herd in her response statement.
“Mr Farquhar’s claim that you can’t train AI in Australia without signing a deal with every recording artist on earth is nonsense. The music industry is built on global licensing deals done efficiently and at scale,” she said.
“You could license around 80% of the world’s sound recordings to train AI globally – including in Australia – with four deals: one with each major record label, and one with Merlin… Global AI licensing deals between AI and technology companies and major and independent record labels are already happening. You don’t need a million signatures.”
There is plenty more in her full statement, which you can read here. It’s a good reflection of the feelings of rightsholders and industry bodies around the world, particularly at this line of lobbying from the tech industry.
As in other countries, the Australian music industry is battling to sway the government to its arguments, against strong lobbying from tech companies for changes and exceptions.
“A country that is home to one the world’s great creative and media cultures – worth $67 billion annually – will not rewrite its copyright laws on the advice of the people who stand to profit most from dismantling them,” added Herd.
“Mr Farquhar, you do not decide how to monetise or use an artist’s music for AI. That is the prerogative of the artist and copyright owner. Just like tech companies decide who uses their products and what they pay for it.”
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source musically.com ’
