ITSme Society illustration agencies introduce protection against AI clause in contracts

ITSme Society illustration agencies, which include Advocate Art, Yeon Agency, Artistique Int and Illo Agency, have announced a new protection against AI clause into all of their client contracts “to protect the rights of illustrators’ original illustrations against reproduction and/or otherwise use of their works in any manner for purposes of training and Artificial Intelligence (AI)/Machine Learning (ML) models”. 

The agencies say their goal is to be “at the forefront of protections in the fight against an AI-generated visual future”.  

The clause states that the illustrator must give prior consent to permit the client/publisher to use technologies that are capable of generating works in the same style or genre as their work. The press statement said the agencies aim “is to get ahead of these advancing technologies and to protect the artists and their artwork against the use of AI/ML models”.