Your round-up of the latest, greatest data stories

Hello ODI Supporter,

It’s been a brilliant week for billionaire Sam Altman - although I’m not sure when it isn’t a brilliant week for billionaires. OpenAI raised $40 billion thanks to a fundraising round by Japanese investment firm Softbank, in a deal that now values the AI giant at $300 billion. The deal would allow the company to “push the frontiers of AI research even further”. In the same week, Altman said there was ‘biblical demand’ for ChatGPT as it added one million new users in an hour, thanks to its new image-generation features. I sat through a lot of church services as a kid, waving incense and ringing bells and I don’t remember AI cropping up. But yeah, well done Sam.

Not such a good week if, y’know, you create actual stuff. Since the launch of the new image generation tool on ChatGPT-4o, there has been a flood (maybe that’s the biblical bit Sam meant) of Studio Ghibli-style images all over social media. The demand has been so great, roll-out for free users has been delayed. But the ability to post images in the distinctive style of Hayao Miyazaki, famed for his hand-drawn approach to animation, has again raised ethical concerns about AI tools trained on copyrighted material - not to mention what can happen to your photos when they’re uploaded. Meanwhile, as one writer in the New Yorker put it, this could bode worse for audiences than for artists. There will always be the urge in an artist to create…while the bar lowers for an audience who could become accustomed to settling for AI slop. Landfill AI anyone?

Elsewhere, the chief executive of broadcaster Channel 4 told MPs that AI firms are ‘scraping the value’ out of the UK’s creative industries, which are worth around £125 billion. She warned the government against its proposed plan to let AI companies access creative properties unless the copyright holder opts out. Just last week, author and broadcaster Richard Osman urged writers to ‘have a good go’ at Meta after it was revealed that the tech giant’s boss approved of the company scraping The Library Genesis’s dataset of 7.5 million books to train its AI model. LibGen’s anonymous operators (which originated in Russia) were ordered by a New York federal court to pay publishers $30 million last year for copyright infringement. Authors gathered at Meta’s HQ yesterday to protest against this use of pirated material. Leading architects also called on the government to protect their intellectual property rights. However, a report by the Tony Blair Institute published this week urged the UK to relax its copyright laws, insisting that enforcing copyright would strain relations with the US, and merely see the development of new products move to jurisdictions with less strict copyright laws. The government is apparently offering concessions to backbench MPs and peers who have raised concerns about copyright in its proposals. We’ll have to wait and see how this one plays out.  

Back in October, the ODI took stewardship of Solid, an open-source initiative led by Sir Tim Berners-Lee, that is reimagining data use, reuse and sharing. Solid gives everyone the option to share a range of data securely, for social and economic benefit. We’re looking for leaders across government, civil society, commercial, research sectors, and the open source community to help guide us in reshaping the Web and global data infrastructure for the good of everyone - through the ODI Solid Advisory Committee. If this sounds like you, we’d love to hear from you. Find out about all the roles we’re looking for and apply by Monday 14th April, 10:00 BST. 

And finally…it was April Fool’s Day this week. Did you spot any fake stories? A data leak at X revealing 2.8 billion profiles? No, not that one. Video waiters in London restaurants? Yeah, that’s true. A probe into data quality at the Office for National Statistics? Erm…that’s real too. It’s quite tricky these days. Even for…you guessed it…AI! Journalist Ben Black wrote an April Fools’ Day story for news site Cwmbran Life back in 2020 - about the town having a Guinness World Record for an unholy amount of roundabouts - only to see it presented as fact this week by Google’s AI search tool. Didn’t see that one coming. 

Until next time

David and Jo

From the outside world

OpenAI raises up to $40bn in record-breaking deal with SoftBank

The Guardian

Japanese investment group says it wants to realise ‘artificial super intelligence’ – smarter than people – in biggest capital raising ever for a start-up.

ChatGPT adds 1 million users in one hour after adding new AI feature

Independent

OpenAI boss Sam Altman says there is ‘biblical demand’ for AI chatbot.

Ghibli effect: ChatGPT usage hits record after rollout of viral feature

Reuters

The frenzy to create Ghibli-style AI art using ChatGPT's image-generation tool led to a record surge in users for OpenAI's chatbot last week, straining its servers and temporarily limiting the feature's usage.

ChatGPT’s new AI image feature is delayed for free users

TechCrunch

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced on Wednesday that the rollout of ChatGPT’s viral new AI image features to free users would be delayed, citing significantly higher demand than the company expected.

ChatGPT’s viral Studio Ghibli-style images highlight AI copyright concerns

AP

Fans of Studio Ghibli, the famed Japanese animation studio behind “Spirited Away” and other beloved movies, were delighted this week when a new version of ChatGPT let them transform popular internet memes or personal photos into the distinct style of Ghibli founder Hayao Miyazaki.

AI firms are ‘scraping the value’ from UK’s £125bn creative industries, says Channel 4 boss

The Guardian

Government plan over copyright-protected work would put industries in ‘dangerous position’, Alex Mahon tells MPs.

Richard Osman urges writers to ‘have a good go’ at Meta over breaches of copyright

The Guardian

The author was responding to news that the company used a notorious publicly available database of more than 7.5m books to train artificial intelligence.

Society of Authors to hold protest at Meta's London HQ after 'pirated books used to train AI'

The Bookseller

Kate Mosse, Tracy Chevalier, Daljit Nagra and other Society of Authors (SoA) members will be demonstrating outside Meta HQ at King’s Cross in London today, Thursday 3rd April, after millions of pirated books were allegedly used to train Meta’s artificial intelligence (AI) model, Llama 3. 

Architects voice copyright fears over government’s plans for AI

Architects’ Journal

Leading architects including David Chipperfield and Amanda Levete have called on the government to protect the profession’s intellectual property rights from AI.

UK needs to relax AI laws or risk transatlantic ties, thinktank warns

The Guardian

Tony Blair Institute says enforcing stricter licensing rules for copyright-protected material will threaten national security interests.

UK government tries to placate opponents of AI copyright bill

The Guardian

Economic impact assessment is one concession aiming to head off opposition from MPs, peers and creatives such as Paul McCartney and Tom Stoppard.

X leaks data on 2.8 billion profiles in alleged insider job

Computing

400GB leaked, but no personal information

London diners' orders being taken by AI 'video waiters' for first time

The Standard

LoveBite claim diners who view videos of dishes typically spend 5% to 10% more.

Probe launched into ONS governance and data quality

City AM

The government has launched an independent investigation into the UK’s beleaguered statistics watchdog to ascertain how its official data and surveys have become so unreliable.

'Google AI presented my April Fools' story as real news'

BBC

Every year, journalist Ben Black publishes a playful fake story on his community news site Cwmbran Life for April Fools' Day.

From the ODI

Solid Advisory Committee

We are opening the call for members of the Solid Advisory Committee.

Shaping the National Data Library: key considerations for the AI age

Free webinar, Thursday 10 Apr 2025 11:00 BST, book now 

Join us to contribute your perspectives on how Britain can lead the world in building this essential digital infrastructure for the AI age.

Data-centric AI webinar #9 Unveiling AI-Driven Collective Action for a Worker-Centric Future

Free webinar, Wednesday 23 Apr 2025 16:00 BST, book now

Join Dr Saiph Savage, Assistant Professor at Northeastern University in the Khoury College of Computer Sciences, as she discusses how AI can be used to make working conditions better for workers.

How to use Generative AI to support learners

Free webinar, Thursday 24 Apr 2025, 02:00 BST book now

A practical deep dive into the benefits and challenges of using task-specific AI tutors

Data Ethics Professional webinar #4: using demographic data ethically

Free webinar, Wednesday 30 Apr 2025 16:00 BST, book now 

Join Washington Technology Solution’s Cathi Greenwood, the state of Washington’s Open Data Program Manager, for her presentation on the importance of data ethics in organisations.

The Week in Data

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