The News/Media Alliance on Friday, March 14, 2025 submitted a proposal to the U.S. government in response to the Trump Administration request for information in advance of its pending “AI Action Plan.”
Read the full submission here.
The submission outlines several ways in which the Trump administration can facilitate responsible AI development, and secure American AI leadership without risking the creative industries whose works AI systems rely on to succeed. As fundamental principles, it proposes that the nation’s AI policy and the administration’s AI Action Plan should:
- Respect intellectual property;
- Support the development of voluntary licensing in free markets; and
- Promote appropriate transparency and fair competition in the AI and technology sector.
Danielle Coffey, News/Media Alliance President and CEO, said, “The growth of AI offers an enormous opportunity for the U.S. economy, and while we embrace AI, we must honor the principles that have made our country successful for hundreds of years. We believe intellectual property rights encourage American innovation, rather than hinder it. By protecting those rights, the U.S. can be a leader in both AI and content creation industries, rather than sacrificing one to benefit the other.
“We’re grateful for the opportunity to submit a comment ahead of the President’s AI Action Plan,” Coffey added. “We are confident that by encouraging licensing solutions, respecting existing U.S. IP laws, and promoting transparency and competition, the President’s AI policy will set the stage for both the AI industry and creative industries to thrive together in the years to come.”
Key areas covered by the submission include:
Marketplace Licensing
The AI Action Plan should encourage the continued development of free market licensing to support a symbiotic relationship between content creators, publishers, and AI developers. This means ensuring that markets work consistently with U.S. law, with fair competition and adequate transparency around how content is being used by AI developers to encourage fair market negotiations and benefit the American economy as a whole.
In the AI space, emerging market licensing promotes both a healthy content-sharing economy and continued U.S. leadership in AI by delivering additional revenue streams for creators while providing AI companies with rights to access and use high-quality datasets.
NMA believes AI content licenses are continuously evolving in response to changing market conditions and technological developments, and to support innovation and new uses of content, all while minimizing the need for government intervention or regulation.
Intellectual Property
The plan states that American intellectual property law is a key component in the success of the American economy, and is capable of addressing developments related to generative AI. Core copyright industries contribute $2.09 trillion to U.S. GDP, amounting to almost eight percent of the American economy, while also employing 11.6 million workers. To sustain these investments and produce new, original works that power this industry as well as AI development, publishers depend upon intellectual property protections.
IP laws have directly driven U.S. economic growth and protected American innovation, and should guide developments in the AI space. U.S. intellectual property framework is proven able to address questions posed by new and disruptive technologies and it is not an accident that America both leads the world in the production of its cultural industries (including media), and is also home to most of the world-leading technology companies.
The Alliance believes U.S. laws set this country apart from countries like China, with notoriously lax IP frameworks, and America ought not to abandon its historical commitment to protecting and promoting the development of intellectual property. Indeed, AI innovation and content creation can and should be mutually beneficial, with the United States as a leader in both sectors, as competitive AI models and applications rely on high-quality content to thrive in the digital marketplace.
The plan states that the Trump Administration should also push back on the flawed text and data mining (TDM) opt-out frameworks being considered or recently adopted in various countries. The Alliance believes these opt-out policies do not work, have the potential to harm American creators and businesses through the uncompensated taking of their property, over-regulate content licensing, and turn copyright law and free market licensing upside down.
Transparency
For licensing markets to be efficient and competitive, market participants need accurate and reliable information about market conditions and the use of their products. Model transparency can also mitigate against the suppression of ideas and viewpoints by shedding light on whether AI is trained or operating in a biased manner or facilitating censorship.
Currently much content on the internet is crawled and scraped by “bots,” which can often be opaque, leaving creators without the ability to determine who is collecting their work, and how it’s being used. The Alliance believes reasonable transparency regarding AI developers’ collection and use of protected materials can support market-based solutions and growth, protecting U.S. cultural and AI leadership.
Competition and Innovation
The Administration should consider measures that promote competition and protect small creators and Little Tech against unfair trade practices. The Alliance believes the AI Action Plan should support measures to promote competition and reduce abusive dominance by Big Tech.
The Alliance believes that without transparency and other guardrails to protect the marketplace, AI risks being captured by Big Tech, discouraging competition, reducing investments, undermining innovation, and ultimately hurting American consumers.