Tallinn: Europe’s landmark AI law is moving from drafting rooms into daily practice, and the companies that build large language models now face a calendar rather than a consultation. The Commission’s voluntary code governing how firms disclose machine-made content, a cornerstone of the wider push for AI transparency, closes its signing window on 22 July, and providers that miss it still answer to the same obligations without the cover of an agreed template.

The General-Purpose AI Code of Practice, published in July 2025, splits into chapters on transparency, copyright and safety. It gives developers a ready-made way to show they meet the rules that took effect on 2 August 2025 for every model released after that date. Signing creates no new law; it signals that a provider follows the Commission’s preferred method and lowers the risk of a dispute later.

The stakes rise sharply this summer. From 2 August 2026 the Commission gains the power to act, not just advise. It can demand information, request access to a model, and in the most serious cases order a provider to pull a system from the market. Regulators held those tools in reserve for a year to let the industry adjust, and that grace period now ends.

Older models carry a softer timeline. Systems placed on the market before August 2025 have until 2 August 2027 to comply, a staggered approach meant to avoid forcing an overnight rewrite of code that predates the rules. Newer releases enjoy no such cushion.

For firms outside the bloc, the code matters as much as for European ones. Any general-purpose model offered to users in the single market falls within reach, so developers in California or Shenzhen weigh the same choice as those in Paris. The transparency chapter asks them to document training data, flag machine-generated text and images, and keep records that a supervisor could later inspect.

Critics argue the voluntary route hands too much interpretive power to the Commission and leaves smaller developers guessing about detail. Supporters counter that a shared template beats twenty-seven national readings of the same clause, and that early signatories help shape how supervisors read the text.

The transparency deadline lands eleven days before enforcement begins, a sequence that reads less like coincidence than design. Brussels wants the paperwork settled before the sanctions clock starts. Whether a voluntary code paired with a hard enforcement date produces cleaner disclosure or a rush of last-minute signatures will become clear within weeks, when the first requests for information reach the largest model builders.