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US appeals court rules AI generated art cannot be copyrighted

reuters.com

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Re: US appeals court rules AI generated art cannot be copyrighted

#211

Post by dragonwriter »

visarga wrote: post #131
kopecs wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a matter of law? Sure it does. Thaler said the image at issue was "autonomously created by a computer algorithm running on a machine". He's been trying to walk that back for the last couple of years though. See Thaler v. Perlmutter , 1:22-cv01564-BAH (ECF #24), D.D.C. (Aug. 18, 2023).

How about selection? If I select the good image from 1000 others? Curation is also a contribution to art.

The argument about whether human selection would make the human the author of the work is irrelevant, because the human in this case isn't claiming authorship, by selection or otherwise.

Re: US appeals court rules AI generated art cannot be copyrighted

#212

Post by bb88 »

NitpickLawyer wrote: post #133
tantalor wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not difficult to understand. Replace the monkey with a 2nd human, and it's obvious that "the guy" does not earn the copyright, it goes to the person who took the photo. If there was no person, then there is no copyright. The AI thing is no different. If I ask my human friend, "please paint a picture using your vast knowledge and experience", then my friend gets the copyright. Replace friend with AI; there is no…

> there is no person to assign the copyright, so there is no copyright. Wait, so if I have a script that generates some source-code autonomously (based on whatever trigger I setup say in a ci/cd pipeline) then that code is not copyrightable? What about macros? This seems silly to me.

I think this ruling is wrong.

It's not hard to imagine a compiler using AI to optimize byte code, and so now the binary it creates is no longer copyrightable?

Compilers and transpilers, even though someone else may have wrote them, the courts have held the the copyright of the output binary is whoever wrote the source code.

In that sense AI is nothing more than a English language to image compiler.

Re: US appeals court rules AI generated art cannot be copyrighted

#213

Post by dragonwriter »

intrasight wrote: post #23

What, if any, practical implications does this have? Why would a real person or company want to specify a non real person as an author?

> What, if any, practical implications does this have?

Very little.

> Why would a real person or company want to specify a non real person as an author?

Other than to needlessly complicate the claim that the work is subject to copyright? No reason at all.

Re: US appeals court rules AI generated art cannot be copyrighted

#214

Post by aydyn »

radlad wrote: post #70
aydyn wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Couldn't the same argument be made for photography? You aren't making the image, the camera is doing all the work.

Try taking photographs like the ones you see in Nat Geo, or museum exhibits, and you'll quickly realize the camera is most definitely NOT doing all the work.

Right. The same can be said for AI art. If you think you can exactly reproduce stylistically of some of the more popular AI work, you would be mistaken.

Re: US appeals court rules AI generated art cannot be copyrighted

#215

Post by dragonwriter »

cvoss wrote: post #37
intrasight wrote: post #23

What, if any, practical implications does this have? Why would a real person or company want to specify a non real person as an author?

The practical implication is you can't copyright something that your AI generated. As the article notes, copyright applications are also being rejected in cases where a human asserts authorship over an AI generated work.

> The practical implication is you can't copyright something that your AI generated.

No, its not.

This is not a case of the human trying to claim copyright as the author of a work made using AI tools.

> As the article notes, copyright applications are also being rejected in cases where a human asserts authorship over an AI generated work.

That is true (although at least one has been accepted by the copyright office, IIRC), but it is not an outcome of this case (even in the sense that this ruling might support it) because this case does not concern human claims of authorship at all. It concerns undisputed solely-AI creation.

Re: US appeals court rules AI generated art cannot be copyrighted

#216

Post by aithrowawaycomm »

gdubs wrote: post #203
tantalor wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not difficult to understand. Replace the monkey with a 2nd human, and it's obvious that "the guy" does not earn the copyright, it goes to the person who took the photo. If there was no person, then there is no copyright. The AI thing is no different. If I ask my human friend, "please paint a picture using your vast knowledge and experience", then my friend gets the copyright. Replace friend with AI; there is no…

My initial response to this was to think of all the artists who don't actually create their own work. Lots of contemporary artists have assistants that do the actual painting, sculpting, installation, etc. Even way back a lot of masters were credited for work that was done by apprentices. But, then on the other hand I suppose that in the eyes of the law, a monkey can't legally sign a contract agreeing to pass ownersh…

The real issue is that the monkey (or Stable Diffusion) cannot be sued in civil court for copyright infringement, so they can't be granted copyrights in the first place: it makes no sense to have one-way streets of legal responsibility.

Note that a human-made curation of AI or animal art is protected by copyright (e.g. you can copyright an AI art coffee table book). The original case involved an AI-generated graphic novel: the author could claim copyright for the whole book but not the individual panels.

Re: US appeals court rules AI generated art cannot be copyrighted

#217

Post by cellis »

jachee wrote: post #157
visarga wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So.. does the conductor of an orchestra get royalty rights? He's just prompting the "actual" musicians.

She’s directing the orchestra. It’s semantically different than prompting. It’s not like the conductor just says “okay, play Canon in D” and calls it quits. She actively participates in the performance and creation of the end work. And different conductors can absolutely yield different versions of the exact same arrangement. They’re as much a performer as any of the instrumentalists. So yes, they get royalties like…

How is that any different than a prompt engineer other than the degree to which "...actively participates in the performance and creation"?

Re: US appeals court rules AI generated art cannot be copyrighted

#218

Post by dragonwriter »

squidsoup wrote: post #144

I understand the intent of this ruling, but it seems that real artists like Refik Adanol who trains his own models and produces work that I would consider to be uniquely his, are getting the short end of the stick here.

They aren't getting any end of the stick here, because this suit does not address the boundary of claims of copyrightability of works with claimed human authorship using AI assistance.

Re: US appeals court rules AI generated art cannot be copyrighted

#219

Post by SilasX »

lesuorac wrote: post #207
SilasX wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It always felt to me like the photographer was trying to have it both ways there: "Whoa! Isn't this sooo trippy! A monkey showing self-awareness to take a picture of itself!" Courts: "Okay, the monkey took it, so no copyright for you." "No, you don't get it! I put in a ton of work to stage that to the point that the monkey just had to be in the right place at the right time. Hell, a worm could have triggered it!"

I'm not sure where you arrived at that conclusion. The photographer has been claiming the entire time it's his copyright while other people (namely PETA) have been arguing the monkey should have it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monkey_selfie_copyright_disput...

You missed that the selling point of the picture is the supposed self awareness and intent involved in the monkey taking a selfie?

Yes, of course the author has always wanted the copyright. But the whole reason the picture has value contradicts the basis for that copyright claim. You can’t simultaneously say that you did all the work, and that it’s so cool to see a genuine, self-directed monkey selfie.

Re: US appeals court rules AI generated art cannot be copyrighted

#220

Post by kopecs »

ahtihn wrote: post #159
kopecs wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What I can guarantee, is that the prompt itself would be copyright-able. That's non-obvious to me. Even if the prompt is extremely long and precise, if it is somehow purely functional, it seems possible for it to not be (although in practice, I agree that most prompts could be).

Code is purely functional and is copyrightable so why would a prompt not be? A prompt has essentially the same purpose as code, especially when it's long and precise.

Code is not purely functional. If it is, it is not copyrightable (at least in the US; probably true elsewhere but I am less sure) [0]. I would not expect most prompts to be purely functional.

[0]: https://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ61.pdf

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