Hollywood-backed nonprofit launches machine-readable AI consent registry
A Hollywood-backed nonprofit has launched a machine-readable AI consent registry, aiming to help creators manage how their works are used by artificial intelligence systems through a standardized consent mechanism.
Background
- **RSL Media** (Responsible AI for Self-Directed Media) is a new nonprofit, backed by major Hollywood studios and talent agencies, that aims to give actors, writers, and other creative professionals a way to register their consent (or refusal) for their work to be used in training AI models.
- The registry is "machine-readable" — meaning AI companies can query it programmatically to check whether a given person's image, voice, or creative output is authorized for training use.
- This comes amid deep anxiety across the entertainment industry after the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strikes, which were partly about AI protections. Many performers fear that without a clear consent mechanism, their work will be scraped into AI training sets without permission or compensation.
- The registry is voluntary and does not have enforcement power; its effectiveness will depend on whether studios, AI firms, and platforms choose to honor its listings — and on whether it gains enough adoption to become an industry standard.