The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has ruled that Apple and Disney must include shareholder votes on their use of artificial intelligence (AI) in their annual meetings. The requests made by both companies to exclude these calls for reports on AI usage were rejected by the SEC. Concerns have been raised about the potential replacement of creative and professional workers and the unfair utilization of their work. The AFL-CIO, the largest labor union federation in the US, filed similar shareholder proposals at Apple and Disney, requesting reports on their AI usage.
Apple
and
Disney
will have to include
shareholder votes
regarding their use of
artificial intelligence
(AI) in their upcoming annual meetings, as ruled by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The requests made by both companies to exclude these calls for reports on AI usage were rejected by the
SEC
.
The use of AI technology by corporations has gained popularity due to its promised efficiencies.
However, concerns have been raised about the potential replacement of creative and professional workers or the unfair utilization of their work. These issues have been a part of recent labor disputes in Hollywood and even led to a lawsuit by The New York Times.
The AFL-CIO, the largest labor union federation in the United States, filed similar shareholder proposals at Apple and Disney, along with four other technology companies. The AFL-CIO's pension trust requested a report on Apple's use of AI in its business operations and the disclosure of any ethical guidelines adopted by the company. A similar request was made to Disney, asking for a report on its board's oversight of AI usage.
The AFL-CIO stated in its supporting statement that AI systems should not be trained using copyrighted works or the voices, likenesses, and performances of professional performers without transparency, consent, and compensation to creators and rights holders.
Brandon Rees, deputy director of the AFL-CIO's office of investment, believes that the SEC's decisions could lead to agreements with Apple and Disney, aligning them with other companies like Microsoft in terms of AI disclosures. Rees expressed concerns that Apple and Disney have not yet addressed these ethical issues surrounding AI.
Both Apple and Disney have not yet responded to requests for comment.
The companies had argued that the proposals should be excluded from the ballot as they relate to ordinary business operations, such as the choice of technologies. However, the SEC disagreed with this argument, stating that the proposals go beyond ordinary business matters and do not seek to micromanage the companies.
OTT platfroms rely on AI to curate content and ads for users
OTT platforms curating content for users based on their viewing preferences is not a new idea. However, with AI, things have become much easier for them as they usually use the viewing algorithm from users and use AI to curate similar type of content that the viewer might be interested in. The same applies to ads as well.
English (US) ·