Copyright Clearance Center (CCC) has launched a collective licensing solution for the internal use of copyrighted materials in AI systems. The new service, which became available July 1, is an addition to CCC’s existing Annual Copyright Licenses (ACL) service and aims to provide a streamlined method for companies to access a consistent set of rights across multiple rightsholders, while ensuring compensation for content creators.

“It is possible to be pro-AI and pro-copyright, and to couple AI with respect for creators,” said Tracey Armstrong, president and CEO of CCC. She added, “Responsible AI starts with licensing, and in developing this license, CCC enables users to efficiently gain access to a consistent set of rights across many rightsholders and returns royalties to rightsholders as compensation for use of their works.”

Lauren Tulloch, VP and managing director of CCC, clarified that the license covers internal, not public, use of the copyrighted materials. “Use cases could include people doing article summarization, literature review, and market surveillance,” Tulloch said.

In recent years, publishers have been publicly at odds with AI companies that have—largely by their own admission—used without permission copyrighted books and other materials to train their large language models. The tech industry’s defense against accusations of stealing content has been that there was no existing mechanism by which they could have licensed the material. While there has been progress with direct licenses in the past two years since the introduction of AI, and all publishing companies are employing AI internally, a general solution has been lacking.

CCCs solution aims to go some way toward rectifying the situation. “We now have a situation where you can litigate, legislate or license,” Armstrong said. “Litigating can take years, legislating can take decades, a quarter of a century in some cases…licensing is efficient, effective and time tested.”

Armstrong emphasized that a lot of thought and collaboration has gone into the product, which has been in the works since the beginning of 2023. “We have worked for a year and a half,” Armstrong said. “We held roundtables, identified rights where everybody was willing to compromise, understood the use cases, and found a license that fit the use. What we have is a practical solution and a pragmatic approach.”

The promise of the new license is to incentivize the creation of high-quality content that serves as the foundation for AI systems. Key to this is respecting copyright and compensating creators for their work.

“For AI to advance ethically and in a sustainable manner, it is essential to both protect authors and publishers from infringement and incentivize them to participate,” said Maria Pallante, president and CEO of the Association of American Publishers. She added, “Efficient, voluntary licensing solutions are a win-win for everybody in the value chain, including AI developers who want to do the right thing.”

Armstrong concured. “CCC, exists because we make complicated things simple,” she said. “We remove friction from the process We create licenses that enable people to use the content that they need, while respecting the law.”