A new campaign launches today against AI’s sticky fingers on copyrighted material.
The Human Artistry Campaign’s “Stealing Isn’t Innovation” movement launches today with over 800 signatories. Those include many Hollywood actors, including Scarlett Johansson, Cate Blanchett, and Joseph Gordon-Levitt, as well as writers such as Jodi Picoult and Roxane Gay, and musicians like Cyndi Lauper and They Might be Giants.
The campaign has a simple message: “Stealing our work is not innovation. It’s not progress. It’s theft—plain and simple.”
Many record labels, news outlets, and other creative entities have partnered with AI companies in recent years, despite—or possibly in response to—their propensity to mine copyrighted materials.
Creatives have fought (and continue to fight) for protections, such as in the lengthy Writers Guild of America (WGA) and Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) strikes in 2023.
However, the Stealing Isn’t Innovation campaign isn’t against AI, it just wants creatives to be part of the process.
“A better way exists—through licensing deals and partnerships, some AI companies have taken the responsible, ethical route to obtaining the content and materials they wish to use,” the letter reads. “It is possible to have it all. We can have advanced, rapidly developing AI and ensure creators’ rights are respected.”
The Stealing Isn’t Innovation campaign will promote itself through ads on social media and in news publications.
Creatives in the U.K. have taken comparable action
The latest campaign focuses on American creators and takes a bit of a nationalist stance in its opening line: “America’s creative community is the envy of the world and creates jobs, economic growth, and exports.”
But artists across the U.K. have launched similar movements in response to AI’s access to copyrighted material, including a law that would require creatives to opt out of letting AI use their work.
In February 2025, the “Make It Fair” campaign ran in hundreds of publications to raise awareness of the threat of AI to creative industries. The same month saw over 1,000 musicians, from Kate Bush to The Clash, release a silent album titled Is This What We Want?—with the 12 tracks spelling out: “The British government must not legalise music theft to benefit AI companies.”
In May, creatives across industries took action again. In an open letter to Prime Minister Keir Starmer, everyone from Elton John to Kazuo Ishiguro voiced their opposition to the proposed copyright law.
The U.K. government is set to issue policy proposals on the matter in mid-March.