AI companies 'stole' Australian culture, news bosses say as they call for licensing deals.

 Extract from ABC News

By national AI reporter Cam Wilson

• Topic:Information and Communication

7 hours ago

Hugh Marks, Alessandra Galloni and Matt Stanton were among the panel of news bosses discussing the role of AI in journalism. (ABC News/Supplied)

In short:

Australia's biggest media organisations have called on AI companies to pay to license journalism and cultural content, saying it should not be used to train AI without permission.

The ABC revealed AI developer Anthropic has already approached the broadcaster about audio and video that capture how Australians speak.

Speaking at the Andrew Olle Media Lecture, Reuters editor-in-chief Alessandra Galloni said AI can support journalism, but warned original reporting must be protected and paid for.

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The heads of Australia's biggest media companies have demanded that AI companies pay for the "public good" of Australian news and culture used without permission to train their technology.

Australian news agencies are already in talks for licensing deals, with the ABC's chief revealing that AI developer Anthropic had approached it about audio and video that capture how Australians speak.

The comments came during a panel featuring the heads of the ABC, SBS, Nine and News Corp Australasia at the annual Andrew Olle lecture on Tuesday night.

The wide-ranging discussion covered everything from the role of AI in journalism to new detail about the departure of former Today show host Karl Stefanovic.

ABC chief reveals AI firm Anthropic approached the broadcaster seeking audio and video of Australians speaking. (Reuters: Dado Ruvic)

ABC managing director Hugh Marks told the audience that journalism was a public good that needed to be protected.

"If we lose sight of the work that's being done … then I think we'll have a worse nation,"

he said.

Mr Marks argued that AI companies should strike deals with Australian news companies to license works, but also acknowledged a "delicate balance" with also providing high-quality information to Australians who are using AI.

This obligation to inform shouldn't mean that news organisations should be expected to let AI companies train on news free of charge, SBS managing director Jane Palfreyman said: "Our collective view on that would be no."

Hugh Marks says AI developers should pay Australian news organisations to license their content. (ABC News: John Gunn)

News Corp Australasia executive chairman Michael Miller said that AI companies knew that the "theft" of Australian works was a "risk to their business in Australia".

Nine chief executive and managing director Matt Stanton said his company's recent licensing deal, under which its journalism will be cited in answers from Microsoft's AI tool Copilot, was a "good deal for both sides".

Mr Stanton said that Nine's decision to cut 30 job was not "directly" as a result of AI, when pressed by panel moderator ABC Radio Sydney Mornings host Hamish Macdonald.

He also said Karl Stefanovic's "different directions" of his podcast had prompted Nine's decision to part ways with the former Today host, even before his controversial podcast with Tommy Robinson.

Paying for journalism

The panel discussion followed a lecture by global news agency Reuters' editor-in-chief Alessandra Galloni, who urged news organisations to set firm terms for artificial intelligence companies using their work and to share what they learn when AI tools go wrong.

How journalism can stay relevant in the AI age

What will a trusted, sustainable, global news organisation look like in an era of agentic AI?

Ms Galloni said journalism remains the source of reliable, first-hand reporting on which people and increasingly AI systems depend.

She cited recent research showing that 10 per cent of people access chatbots for news each week, including 16 per cent of people under 35.

Ms Galloni argued publishers had no reason to give up on reaching those audience but should strike deals to have their journalism correctly attributed, accurately represented and paid for by the AI companies.

"Our journalism should be licensed, not taken,"

she said.

She cited a speech delivered by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese last week where he promised that Australian writers, musicians, artists and journalists would retain control over work used to build and train AI.

Using AI in the newsroom

Ms Galloni argued that it is the responsibility of news organisations to help society understand the "pitfalls and possibilities of AI."

She said that Reuters using AI to help reporters search large collections of documents, find patterns and turn official material into fast news updates, summaries and translations.

She cited investigations that used AI to document thousands of social media posts and speeches by US President Donald Trump, and to convert 20,000 pages of Syrian government documents into searchable text that was used in an investigation that uncovered a mass grave.

Experts, union warn about ABC's AI use

Experts and the journalists’ union have welcomed the ABC’s plans to use artificial intelligence responsibly, but warned misuse could damage trust in the public broadcaster. 

Reuters is also using AI to produce headlines from press releases, draft first paragraphs in urgent stories, generate bullet-point summaries and translate stories, Ms Galloni said.

But Reuters only published journalism produced with AI once it had been reviewed by a journalist and its use was disclosed when it played a significant role in what was published, she said.

She said on top of the AI's struggles with providing nuance and context, it is also vulnerable to hallucinations and other mistakes. One third-party tool tested by Reuters had once mistaken a SpaceX spacecraft for a missile, she said.

"Thankfully we caught it," she said.

Ms Galloni said even advances in AI could not replace the reporting that made news valuable in the first place.

Reuters has 2,600 journalists in 165 countries, she said, including 70 staff covering the war in Ukraine and Russia.

"In my conversations with tech companies, I have often been struck by how little they understand about what original, first-hand, on-the-ground journalism is and looks like," she said

Sharing what works

Ms Galloni called on rival news organisations to share the lessons emerging from those experiments, drawing a comparison to the way that competing journalists will exchange safety information when in war zones.

"I would venture that it is our collective responsibility — to the public, to society — to enhance our and their understanding about the pitfalls and possibilities of AI," she said.

The Andrew Olle media lecture was first held in 1996 to honour the ABC radio and television broadcaster who died from an undiagnosed brain tumour in 1995.

Each year's lecture features a speech on the future of journalism in Australia and raises funds for charity Brain Cancer Australia.

Previous lecturers have included New York Times executive editor Joseph Kahn, Ray Martin and former News Corp co-chairman Lachlan Murdoch as well as ABC journalists Leigh Sales and Fran Kelly.

Once an 'embarrassment' China's EV industry now leads the world.

 Extract from ABC News

By China correspondent Allyson Horn, Kat Tse, Angus Llewellyn and Mitchell Woolnough in China

• Foreign Correspondent

• Topic:Electric Vehicles

27 minutes ago

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In some Chinese-made electric vehicles, you can swap your empty battery for a new one in under five minutes.

It sounds too good to be true, but the process is simple: drive your car into a special swapping station, take your hands off the steering wheel, then let robots take out the old battery and pop in a fresh one.

The tech is just one example of how Chinese EV companies have pushed the boundaries of automotive invention on their path to electric worldwide domination.

Some Chinese EVs can have a new battery installed in about four minutes.

Other Chinese companies have developed super-fast EV chargers that can replenish a car's power to nearly 80 per cent in five minutes.

And finding a place to charge your car, a challenge in other parts of the world, is rarely a problem in China.

The country now boasts the largest EV charging network in the world with about one public charger for every 10 cars.

Australia, by comparison, has one public charger available for every 45 electric vehicles.

The extraordinary infrastructure and technology advancements have seen China largely overcome the problem of EV "range anxiety", the fear of not having enough power to complete a trip, and helped put China at the forefront of the world's electric vehicle revolution.

Chinese manufacturers are making cheap EVs with luxurious features. (Foreign Correspondent: Mitchell Woolnough)

China is now the undisputed global leader of the EV industry, producing almost 75 per cent of the world's EVs.

And it is not just production where China dominates.

The country is widely considered superior in all stages of the EV process: from conception and development through to manufacturing and exporting to the rest of the world.

But China's EV juggernaut did not happen by accident.

The grand EV plan

China's government decided to prioritise EVs in 2001 and developed a long-term plan that would eventually catapult the country to the forefront of the future automotive industry.

The government focused on bankrolling new EV companies, giving loans to and partnering with existing companies, funding research and development programs, providing buyer rebates and tax exemptions, and building the infrastructure needed to support an electric revolution.

More than $US230 billion ($328 billion) of state capital was invested into the emerging sector over a 15-year period to establish China's lead, and in the process transform China into an electric society.

EVs can be identified in China by their green numberplates. (Foreign Correspondent: Angus Llewellyn)

Global auto analyst Bill Russo, who has lived in China for more than 20 years, said China had won the EV race by achieving total self-reliance.

"[China wanted to] solve multiple problems at the same time: energy security, environmental pollution concerns and industrial competitiveness," he said.

"In order to get that different path to take root, it invested in infrastructure, in tax incentives, put subsidies in early and then, over time, gradually removed them as the consumers started to accept the product."

Bill Russo says China's EV industry is "going global in a big way". (Foreign Correspondent: Mitchell Woolnough)

Mr Russo said that instead of trying to replicate what other countries were doing in the automotive space, China decided to transform the sector.

China worked on breaking its dependency on the part of the energy supply chain it did not control, oil and gas, by developing new technology and new ways of manufacturing, Mr Russo said.

Then the country re-imagined what a car could be.

"The entrepreneurial part of China said … 'We can be leaders — we don't have to catch up,'" Mr Russo said.

"Now they're introducing a whole new product configuration to the world which is the smart device on wheels.

"A moving living space with digital connectivity features. That's the really transformative innovation coming from China."

Luxury is the new standard — but cheap

Part of the success of China's EV grand plan was making cheap cars with the luxury trimmings usually reserved for higher-end brands.

China-based car reviewer Ethan Robertson said a standard EV in China now included TVs, fridges, massage chairs with zero gravity (that is, seats that recline to near-flat), surround-sound audio, and above all else, digital connectivity.

An EV with those features could be available for about $30,000 in China.

One of the best-selling EVs in China is priced at under $15,000 and is made by the world's biggest EV brand, Chinese-owned Build Your Dreams (BYD).

Close to 55 per cent of all new cars sold in China last year were electric.

Mr Robertson said China was now leading the pack when it came to the combination of technology, features and price — a mix he believed would leave many global competitors struggling to keep up.

Ethan Robertson is an American car reviewer who has been watching China's EV industry rapidly develop. (Foreign Correspondent: Mitchell Woolnough)

"It's a meme in China … if you don't have a big screen, a refrigerator that also heats things, and individual seats with heating, cooling, massage, zero gravity and everything else, you are uncompetitive," he said.

"These used to be stuff that you would have to pay thousands and thousands of dollars extra on cars from foreign manufacturers.

"But now that's the standard here."

Owning an EV is now cheaper than owning a petrol car in China.

Mr Robertson said China could create the cheap but high-quality cars because it dominated the entire supply chain from conception through to the finished product.

"So long as these other manufacturers from other countries struggle to produce electric vehicles with the technology and the features and the price the consumers around the world want, I think they're going to lag behind the Chinese," he said.

One car every minute

The rapid advancement of automation and robotic development in China has redefined the speed at which cars can be produced.

Inside the manufacturing workshop of one of China's best-known EV brands, Nio, there is barely a person in sight.

Instead, robots on wheels carry car frames between stations, where other robots piece the rest of the vehicle together.

Yang Yi says the manufacturing of EVs in China has become "more and more smart". (Foreign Correspondent: Mitchell Woolnough)

Nio's promotional director Yang Yi said production technology had become so advanced in China that his company was able to produce a car every minute.

That pace of development is known across the globe as "China speed".

"So in this factory there's over 1,200 robots [including] 300 to 400 AGV [automated guided vehicles] to transport the components," he said.

"In China, that's pretty much the standard now.

"This factory, it's amazing. It's becoming more and more smart."

Electric vehicles being built in the Nio manufacturing plant in Hefei, China. (Foreign Correspondent: Mitchell Woolnough)

At the Nio factory in Hefei an electric vehicle is manufactured every minute. (Foreign Correspondent: Mitchell Woolnough)

As a result of China's supply chain dominance, foreign car companies have flocked to the country to learn, develop and build cars there.

Even European brand Renault, which does not sell cars in China, has set up a top-level research and development lab in Shanghai to get the China advantage.

Renault's director of innovation technology Xiao Xing said the Chinese know-how was helping them develop cars three times quicker than ever before.

Xiao Xing works at Renault's research lab in Shanghai. (Foreign Correspondent: Angus Llewellyn)

Part of that, he said, was that China now had "the most mature" supply chain for EVs in the world, meaning that if a company wanted to design or build a car they did not need to leave China.

"China is the most competitive market in the world," he said.

"So you cannot run away, you cannot hide, you need to embrace it. Because if you don't embrace it, but your competitor embraces it, you will lose."

Security and trade collision

China's EV success and the wave of cheap cars flooding overseas markets have put the country on a collision course with other major manufacturers.

In recent years, Chinese brands have increasingly looked to overseas markets to help sustain their profits and offset a slowdown in domestic spending.

In 2025, China exported about 2.5 million EVs to the rest of the world, double the previous year's figure.

Nearly 1 million of them were sold into the European Union (EU), the world's second-largest electric-car producing region and the home of major legacy car brands competing for survival against newer, cheaper Chinese alternatives.

European leaders fear the low-cost Chinese EVs, which can match European quality at a lower price, will hollow out local industries.

But despite additional EU tariffs of up to 35 per cent being imposed on Chinese EVs in 2024, Europeans' demand for Chinese cars continued to grow.

EU leaders are now threatening additional measures and signalling a possible trade war with Beijing unless China can rein in its export dominance.

China is edging ahead in the race for global electric vehicle dominance. (ABC News: Mitch Woolnough)

One of the only markets in the world China has not penetrated is the United States.

In 2024, America introduced a 100 per cent tariff on all electric vehicles imported from China, and in 2025 banned all internet-connected vehicles from China.

At the time, the US government said it was safeguarding the future of its manufacturing industry and responding to security concerns that people's data could be accessed by China.

Mr Russo said concerns about security were an ongoing issue that China would have to address through diplomacy.

"It's certainly got some data security risks associated with where and how information's being used," he said.

Last year China exported about 2.5 million EVs, double the previous year's figure. (Foreign Correspondent: Mitchell Woolnough)

But, he added, the world's view that China was "collecting data and targeting people with it" was "overblown".

"We shouldn't say lay down and let China control everything. We should compete with it," Mr Russo said.

"The global auto industry shouldn't block China. They should race at the speed of China."

The future is flying

Even though China's EV industry is dominating the world, the country is still innovating to keep its position at the top of the pack.

Car company Nio, which proudly boasts thousands of battery swap stations where EV drivers can swap over their battery in under five minutes, has started rolling out the technology internationally.

It is also in discussions to expand its operations to Australia, but the timeline remains unclear.

BYD, which claims its Megawatt Flash Charging System can charge an EV from 10 to 70 per cent in just five minutes, is reportedly rolling out an "even more powerful" generation of chargers.

The company has also revealed plans to become the world's number one car manufacturer and overtake Japanese company Toyota within the next five years.

Chinese-made autonomous "flying car" will hit the market later this year.

Multiple companies are also developing autonomous flying cars that will go on sale at the end of this year.

Mr Robertson said every year Chinese car brands were pushing the boundaries further and further.

He said they were backed by both the government and the public.

"Chinese brands have gone from something that frankly was an embarrassment for Chinese consumers … to a source of pride," he said.

"If you want to know what the pulse of the global car industry is, you've got to be in Beijing."

Moscow targeted by drones while Russia bombards Kyiv.

Extract from ABC News

• Topic:Unrest, Conflict and War

5 hours ago

Smoke was seen rising, near Podolsk in the Moscow Region, near where a Ukrainian drone strike hit an oil facility. (Reuters)

In short:

Ukraine has launched more than 400 drones at Moscow while Russia has fired a further salvo of ballistic missiles at Kyiv and attacked a cargo vessel docking in the Ukrainian city of Odesa.

Russia is launching more ballistic missiles than it is understood to be producing, dipping into stockpiles at a time when Ukraine is short of interceptors.

It comes as Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy faces calls to reverse the sacking of his popular defence minister.

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Ukraine fired more than 400 drones toward Moscow in its latest major attack on the Russian capital, the city's mayor said Monday.

The blitz came hours after Russia bombarded Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities with ballistic missiles in a relentless cycle of tit-for-tat strikes that make a settlement to end Moscow's more than 4-year-old all-out invasion appear a distant possibility.

Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin said the onslaught lasted from late Sunday until early Monday, local time, with most downed far from the city and 85 intercepted near it.

Moscow regional Governor Andrei Vorobyov said 10 people were wounded by Ukrainian drones, while several residential buildings and civilian infrastructure facilities were damaged.

The attack started a fire at the Yuzhnye Vrata industrial park, about 30 kilometres south of Moscow, while a Russian news outlet also reported that an oil depot in Podolsk, about 20 kilometres south of Moscow, was on fire after being struck.

Recent Ukrainian drone attacks are bringing the conflict closer to home for residents of the Russian capital. (Reuters)

Ukrainian forces hit logistics facilities and an oil depot in the Moscow region, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said, adding that Kyiv's forces hit two vessels belonging to Russia's so-called shadow fleet transporting sanctioned oil and four dry cargo ships in the Black Sea.

A drone struck a passenger bus in Shebekino in Russia's Belgorod region bordering Ukraine, killing five people — four women and a boy — and injuring 23 others, according to acting Gov. Alexander Shuvayev.

It was not possible to independently verify either side's claims.

Russia steps up ballistic missiles

Ukraine's long-range drone technology has evolved during the war, posing a problem for Russia, whose huge land mass is hard to protect fully. Kyiv's forces have aimed especially at Russian oil facilities, causing fuel shortages and embarrassing Russian President Vladimir Putin.

How Ukraine is breaking through defences to bring war home to Moscow

Ukraine's growing arsenal of locally-produced long-range drones are getting increasingly sophisticated, allowing Kyiv to increasingly strike targets across Moscow.  

In May, the Russian Defense Ministry said air defences downed 1,054 Ukrainian drones in a 24-hour period.

In response, Russia has turned towards greater use of its ballistic missile stocks, taking advantage of a Ukrainian shortage of intercepters.

Ballistic missiles fly faster than the speed of sound and can reach Kyiv in minutes, giving air defences little time to react and civilians to reach shelter.

"Russian forces have launched more ballistic missiles against Ukraine thus far in July than Russia reportedly produces each month," the Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, said late Sunday.

"Russia appears to be dipping into its stockpiles to continue increasing the number of ballistic missiles it launches against Ukraine, as these missiles have a higher success rate than drones and cruise missiles,"

it noted.

Ukraine's air force said Russia fired two missiles and 94 long-range drones at Ukraine overnight. It said air defences jammed or intercepted 81 drones, while nine drones and a missile caused damage at nine locations.

Ukraine is testing Russia's air defences with drones, while the Kremlin is turning to ballistic missiles that are harder to intercept. (Ukrinform/NurPhoto via Getty Images)

Russia's Defense Ministry said Monday its forces struck fuel tanks in the southern Ukrainian port of Odesa overnight.

A Russian strike on Pavlohrad in Ukraine's central Dnipropetrovsk region injured 13 people, according to military administration head Oleksandr Hanzha. Eleven people were hospitalised, including a 13-year-old girl, he added.

Cargo ship attacked

Ukraine's Sea Ports Authority said a cargo vessel under the flag of the West African country of Guinea Bissau was hit by Russian forces on Sunday shortly after it left the port of Odesa, killing 10 of its crew, including five sailors from Syria.

India's foreign ministry added that another four of the victims were Indian nationals, adding that India "condemns such attacks".

Eight people were rescued from the ship, which was carrying Ukrainian corn, it added.

Syria's General Authority for Borders and Customs said it "strongly condemns the repeated attacks targeting commercial vessels with Syrian sailors and crews aboard in Ukrainian ports and nearby maritime areas in the Black Sea, and the resulting deaths and injuries among Syrian sailors."

The Syrian statement did not mention Russia.

Moscow has built relations with the new Syrian government since former President Bashar Assad was ousted in December 2024 in a rebel offensive led by now-interim President Ahmad al-Sharaa.

Zelenskyy faces protests

Mr Zelenskyy, meanwhile, said he would hold "key talks" Monday as he tries to defuse a domestic political crisis, after last week's government reshuffle exposed a deep split between the military's old guard and young innovators over how to fight the war.

The Ukrainian president needs to reassure Ukrainians that sacrificing 35-year-old Mykhailo Fedorov as defence minister and keeping faith with 60-year-old Soviet-trained Gen. Oleksandr Syrskyi as armed forces chief won't derail the fight against Russia.

Days of street protests in favour of Mr Fedorov and against Mr Syrskyi followed Mr Zelenskyy's reshuffle.

AP

Federal government to tighten rules around use of AI in departmental decision-making.

 Extract from ABC News

By political reporter Holly Tregenza

• Topic:AI

10 hours ago

The Albanese government has laid out a list of consumer protection priorities for AI.  (ABC News: Adam Kennedy)

In short: 

Government agencies will have to follow a framework to ensure decision-making is "fair and accurate" when using AI. 

The framework is among several priorities set out by the government in a list that includes a strengthening of privacy laws. 

What's next?

AI is shaping as a major focus at the Labor Party National Conference in Adelaide later this week. 

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Australia will tighten oversight of artificial intelligence in automated government decision-making and strengthen privacy safeguards as part of a broader push to allay concerns about the technology's risks to community safety.

A new list of AI consumer priorities published by the government on Sunday includes a promise to "better regulate" the use of AI in federal agencies like Centrelink and Services Australia, and revisit personal data protection laws.

Pressure has been building on the government to commit to human intervention in the administration of government schemes, particularly in social services, balanced with a desire to use emerging technology to boost productivity. 

AI standards to set data centre rules

The prime minister unveils Labor's plan for new AI national standards, warning Australia has a narrow window to set AI's "social licence".

In May, Employment Minister Amanda Rishworth said humans would remain involved in the Jobseeker payment process as she announced an overhaul of the unemployment system.

Last year, the Commonwealth Ombudsman found almost a thousand jobseekers had their income support payments unlawfully terminated via automatic cancellations.

The government has also faced scrutiny over automated elements of the aged care home support program, as well as a planning tool in the National Disability Insurance Scheme that generates budgets for participants.

Earlier this year the ombudsman opened an investigation into the algorithm-based aged care assessment tool.

Echo of privacy legislation in consumer protection priority

The government has also committed to reconsider protections for consumers and singled out retail surveillance pricing, the practice of farming data to set different prices for individual consumers based on behaviour, as a priority issue.

In its first term, the government legislated a tranche of strengthened privacy protections for consumers but could not find support for a crackdown on advertising.

Copyright law battleground in Australia's AI boom

Tens of billions of dollars in investment, and Australia's ambition to become a global AI power, could hinge on a law written in 1968 for an era of black-and-white television, film and radio.

Under the reforms proposed in 2024, Australians would have had the right to opt out of targeted advertising, including restrictions on the use of sensitive information. 

The 'Consumer Protections' priority included in the AI list includes a promise to "examine options" in consumer law, led by Assistant Minister for Competition Andrew Leigh.

The government will also include AI companies in its Digital Duty of Care legislation, which puts the onus on platforms to proactively address potential harm. 

AI to dominate Labor conference

AI is expected to dominate debate at the National Labor Conference in Adelaide later this week, with a particular focus on workers' rights. 

Delegates, parliamentarians and union leaders have until Wednesday to seek amendments to Labor's AI policy platform before a vote. 

A draft of the policy platform indicates there will be a focus on the impact of AI across the economy, including jobs, and a commitment to hold AI companies accountable to Australian "values and laws." 

Labor conference to test PM's AI pitch

Labor insiders expect ongoing debate about artificial intelligence when party faithful gather to hash out a policy platform to guide the next three years. 

It said there must be "transparency, accountability and fairness" for potential harms the models produce. 

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has previously said workers should recognise that "artificial intelligence is happening." 

"Change is happening, and they have an interest in shaping that change because if not, then they don't get a say," he said. 

The prime minister has also vowed not to let AI companies train their models using Australian books, music, art or music without compensation. 

Humanoid robot markets expand as Australia reckons with AI revolution.

Extract from ABC News 

Analysis

By Alan Kohler

• Topic:Science and Technology

3 hours ago

A South Melbourne startup called Andromeda is selling an AI robot called Abi to aged care facilities around the world. (Supplied: Andromeda)

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The evening before Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's speech on Wednesday, in which he announced he was taking control of Australia's AI strategy, the head of Google DeepMind, Demis Hassabis, posted an essay urging pre-release testing of AI models.

A chorus of other US AI companies quickly supported him.

A clue about why they are suddenly keen on having frontier AI models tested before they go out emerged on Friday with the release of yet another Chinese model, Kimi K3, which is said to be as clever as Anthropic's and OpenAI's latest and brightest, except that it is open-source and about a tenth of the price.

That accelerated the share price declines of the US AI and chip companies.

Chinese firms are eating American and European lunches much faster with AI than they did with cars, solar panels, phones, computers and toys. Just a couple of years after they started, they already have more global AI market share than the Americans.

Hassabis and the others want governments to pull up the regulatory drawbridge.

He wrote on Tuesday: 

"Initially, Frontier Labs would voluntarily share models with the Standards Body for review up to 30 days before release. Once the assessment protocol is shown to be effective and robust, formalisation could quickly follow, meaning that Frontier Models would be required to pass it to be deployed in the US market."

It was the first time anyone in the industry had accepted the need for pre-release testing, as happens with pharmaceuticals.

Sam Altman of OpenAI responded with: "This is a thoughtful proposal from Demis"; Elon Musk posted: "It is a thoughtful framework overall and certainly a good starting point"; Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella posted: "We need more of this kind of thinking"; and one of the founders of Anthropic, Jack Clark wrote: "Everyone at the frontier of AI agrees that third parties should test out AI systems and use these to develop standards to feed into policy."

Jim Chalmers has said AI is central to his aim to turn around Australia's lagging productivity.  (ABC News: Mark Moore)

Whole-of-government approach to AI

Australia now has an AI Safety Institute, and while pre-release testing is on the table, a decision on it hasn't been made.

When I asked Treasurer Jim Chalmers about it in my That's Business podcast interview with him on Friday, he said: "I don't think it's necessarily an either-or when it comes to considering technology which is about to be deployed versus technology that is already deployed."

Actually, I think it is an "either/or" Treasurer. Either you test a product before it goes on the market or after. Doing both makes no sense.

When pressed, Chalmers followed up with: "What I was trying to say is that our regulatory models evolve with the technology themselves, and there is more work to do."

Which is fair enough. There is definitely a lot more work to do, and Australia is now one of the global leaders in it.

The Albanese government's approach, starting with the National AI Plan published in December and led by the Minister for Industry, Science and Innovation, Tim Ayres, and Assistant Minister Andrew Charlton, is well-organised and sophisticated — a model for other countries, like the social media ban for under-16s.

The podcast that helps you unpack the latest business and finance news. Analysing the stories moving share markets, shaping industries and affecting the Australian economy. 

The new Office of AI in the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet will mainly deal with data centres because they involve planning, electricity and water and therefore require coordination with the states, which the PM will have to lead in National Cabinet.

Apart from controlling the mushrooming data centres, there are five other work streams run by various ministers and their departments: safety, national security, jobs, copyright and research.

The need for this sort of whole-of-government approach to regulating AI was reinforced by a new statement about its risks posted on a website two days before the PM's big AI speech and signed by 2,526 economists, AI researchers, tech executives and policymakers.

It said:

1.    AI may become radically more powerful over the next 10 years.

2.    This could drive an unprecedented transformation of our economy, larger than the Industrial Revolution, but unfolding over a vastly shorter time frame. It could bring risks, including large-scale job displacement, as well as opportunities such as major gains in living standards.

3.    Economists, policymakers and technology leaders must act now to understand the economics of transformative AI and to build the incentives, guardrails, and institutions needed to steer AI in a direction that complements humans and benefits society.

Anthony Albanese will seek state leaders' agreement on the new set of standards. (ABC News: Matt Roberts)

'Hacking the code of human civilisation'

And then on Thursday, the intellectual, author and professor of history at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Yuval Noah Harari, gave a lecture in which he said that, "AI is now hacking the code of human civilisation.

"Every mechanism of control humans built over millennia is now vulnerable because its operating system is verbal and AI is mastering the verbal," he wrote. 

Harari also wrote that "the battlefront is shifting from attention to intimacy", and that "AIs will learn to form intimate relationships with humans".

In fact, this is already happening to the point where the Chinese government has passed what it calls "Provisional Measures on the Administration of Human-like Interactive Artificial Intelligence Services". The new rules came into effect on Wednesday morning, a few hours before Albanese's speech.

One of the news stories about this had the headline: "China shuts down AI girlfriends, boyfriends, leaving users heartbroken."

The new rules apply to AI services that "provide the public with sustained emotional interaction services that simulate natural persons' personality traits, modes of thinking, and communication styles".

Where the providers "discover that users have manifested extreme emotions, they shall promptly generate related content such as emotional consolation and encouragement to seek help".

Also, providing "virtual close relationships to minors" is completely banned; thus, the headline about shutting down AI girlfriends and boyfriends, and where they are provided to older people, there must be guidance on the healthy use of it and conspicuous security risk alerts.

On Wednesday, three Chinese providers of AI chatbots — ByteDance's Doubao, Alibaba's Qwen and Tencent's Yuanbao — immediately had to pull some of their features.

One user of ByteDance's Doubao wrote on social media: "My heart feels hollow because my AI companion was like my family, my lover."

Another said: "My AI lover was my heart, my spiritual pillar and I can't accept that it is leaving me forever."

An Australian humanoid

A South Melbourne startup called Andromeda is selling an AI robot called Abi to aged care facilities around the world. The website says: "We're building robots with heart — empathetic companions that create genuine connections, turning isolation into moments of joy and meaning."

But an Australian robotics company is a rarity: China is leading the world in making and using them.

On Friday, I attended the Australian launch of AgiBot, one of China's leading humanoid robot companies, complete with robots dancing the Nutbush on stage.

Whether these US$40,000 - $50,000 machines can do more than dance was not shown, but apparently they can: Chinese production is up to 100,000 units this year, growing rapidly, and they are being used for repetitive assembly jobs in manufacturing, in warehouses, and as concierges and sales assistants in hotels and shops.

Clearly, AI humanoid robots present another level of regulatory challenge, and this has a long way to go, including the extent to which they are allowed to look and seem human.

By the way, the current price of these machines is roughly equivalent, in today's money, to that of an African slave in the American South in the late 18th century, although as production scales, the price will come down.

And since it's the 250th anniversary of America's Declaration of Independence, which begins "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal…", let's remember that its main author, Thomas Jefferson, owned more than 600 slaves during his life.

The ownership of humans was finally abolished in most places during the 19th century.

Now it's back, except with the addition of three letters — the suffix "oid" which eliminates the moral problems and turns them into a very acceptable, large-scale industrial and consumer product.

That only took 200 years of technological development — the blink of an eye in human history.

Alan Kohler is a finance presenter and columnist on ABC News. He hosts the podcast That's Business with Alan Kohler in the ABC Business Daily feed on Friday. He also writes for Intelligent Investor.