No, according to Beryl Howell, Chief Judge of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia: https://www.theverge.com/2023/8/19/23838458/ai-generated-art-no-copyright-district-court

Can’t say I entirely agree. I’ve seen plenty of low effort AI, but I’ve also seen AI that clearly had work put into it, probably a custom LoRA or checkpoint, extensive inpainting and touchups, etc, where they were using AI as a tool to create something new.

What are your thoughts? Does art generated by AI deserve copyright protection?

  • SmolSlime@burggit.moeEnglish
    2·
    1 year ago

    In her decision, Judge Howell wrote that copyright has never been granted to work that was “absent any guiding human hand,” adding that “human authorship is a bedrock requirement of copyright.”

    It seems like AI art is un-copyright-able if it’s fully generated by AI.

    She wrote that this would create “challenging questions regarding how much human input is necessary” to copyright AI-created art, noting that AI models are often trained on pre-existing work.

    There are so many ways to create AI art. Does small edits in photo editor count? How about inpainting? What about drawing a rough composition to be used as a guide? AI currently evolves very fast, it’s gonna take a while to enforce it.

    What are your thoughts? Does art generated by AI deserve copyright protection?

    I’m not sure honestly. Copyright in the current state is abused thoroughly by big corporations to stifle creativity and minimize competition. Just look at how Monster Energy tried to copyright “monster” word and sued everyone who used that word. Maybe if it’s not beaten to death, I’d be more inclined towards “yes”. After all, copyright was made to help creators profit their work.