The Future of Copyright and AI

FutureGaze is back! After a brief hiatus, we're excited to be bringing back this much-loved online lunchtime series for 2025.

Brought to you by Creative Edinburgh and in partnership with Edinburgh Futures Institute, FutureGaze has been designed for those eager to explore the future of our creative industries and practices.

Hosted by Caroline Parkinson, Director of Creative for the Edinburgh Futures Institute, each session features inspiring conversations with creative leaders who’ve driven innovation and transformation in their work—whether in business, the arts, academia, or beyond.

Together, we'll explore what the future holds for the creative and cultural sector through their experiences and insights.

May's Discussion: The Future of Copyright and AI

As the use of AI accelerates across the creative industries, urgent questions are being asked about authorship, ownership, and fairness. In recent months, Melissa and Caroline of Edinburgh Futures Institute—alongside academic peers and industry leaders—have responded to two key consultations: the House of Lords’ inquiry into ‘Creative Tech and Scaling AI’ and the Intellectual Property Office’s ‘Copyright and AI’ review. The latter sparked high-profile campaigns from artists and media organisations, including Kate Bush who produced a silent album in protest at the proposals, calling on the government to protect creative rights, including the now-iconic ‘Make It Fair’ protest.

In this FutureGaze session, we’ll explore the future of AI in the creative sector: how we safeguard the value of creative work, what ethical experimentation looks like, and how we can shape a future where innovation and integrity go hand in hand.

About our Guests

Melissa Terras

Melissa Terras is Professor of Digital Cultural Heritage within the Institute of Design Informatics at the University of Edinburgh. She is Co-Director of the CoSTAR Realtime Lab (Convergent Screen Technologies and performance in Realtime) – a new 6-year partnership led by Abertay University (2023-2029). The University of Edinburgh’s expertise in AI will support one of the themes in CoSTAR to explore the potential of AI-enabled tools to resolve challenges in virtual production. She is a founding Director of Transkribus, an AI-powered platform for text recognition of historical documents.

About our host

Caroline Parkinson

Caroline is Director of Creative at the Edinburgh Futures Institute, focusing on supporting innovation in data and creative technologies for the creative industries. Previously, she has led her own consultancy business, served as Director of Film, TV, Music, Creative Industries, Skills & Innovation in the early years of Creative Scotland, and before that, she was Director, Scotland & Northern Ireland for Creative & Cultural Skills.

Her early creative life included ballet and rhythmic gymnastics, fashion, singing in bands for over 30 years, and photography, becoming a professional photographer in 1999. She serves on the Board of Architecture & Design Scotland, and for 8 years has served in a voluntary capacity as Strategic Director and Presenter of the MOVE Summit, Scotland’s Animation and VFX Gathering.

About Creative Edinburgh

Creative Edinburgh is a registered Scottish Charity (SC052838) committed to helping creatives thrive. Through events, career support and advocacy, we bring together and help grow the city’s creative community, providing a space for creation, collaboration and connection at every stage of your career. Creative Edinburgh is supported by Creative Scotland as one of the Regularly Funded Organisations (RFOs).

To become a member of Creative Edinburgh, click here.