Why a New Court Ruling Against AI Is a Victory for Human Artists

Score one for humans in the battle over who owns art created using artificial intelligence (AI).

A court has ruled that an artwork generated solely by AI without human involvement is not eligible for copyright protection. It's part of a growing controversy over the use of AI in creative works.

"The most tangible advantage of this ruling is that it offers the chance for peace of mind for those in artistic communities that have fought against generative AI from the beginning," Solomon Blair, head of creative product development at the collaborative art platform Magma told Lifewire in an email interview. "Although many artists have shared opinions that the issues against AI are solely connected to its unethical training practices, another component arguably discussed far less is the simple truth that humans put a much higher value on artwork that takes time, patience, skill, passion, and most importantly human involvement."

The AI Art Debate

A judge confirmed in the ruling that copyrights can only be granted to works created by human authors. The decision upholds the copyright office's denial of an application submitted by computer scientist Stephen Thaler.

The artwork at the center of the lawsuit is titled "A Recent Entrance to Paradise." The art was generated in 2012 by DABUS, an AI system created by Thaler, and his attempts to register the piece with the copyright office, listing DABUS as the autonomous author, were repeatedly denied on the grounds that it lacked the necessary human authorship for a copyright claim.

"This ruling offers the chance for all users to see a world where AI cannot be taken advantage of to simply produce more artwork for monetization or cutting costs in the artistic workforce," Blair said. 

Morally, all art should be subject to copyright protection, Anthony Panebianco, a partner at Boston law firm Davis Malm D'Agostine, noted in an email.

"Legally, the question is: 'When does that work become protectable art?'" he added. "For AI-created work, the current threshold test will be the de minimis human input necessary to be afforded possible copyright protection."

Art created with the help of AI can be beautiful, moving, and impactful, Panebianco noted. However, he said presently, under current copyright law, AI-created work needs more protection.

"Copyright laws were established to protect the creativity and artistry of individuals," he added. "For AI-created work, there needs to be some human element in the creation of the work to give an individual the protection that the laws provide."

Creative or Created?

The recent legal ruling over AI copyright underscores an ongoing debate over whether computer-generated art can be considered equal to human creativity. 

"The mystery of AI is appealing, but essentially current systems are nothing more than complex aggregators of human-authored words and images," Heath Hanlin, a professor at the Syracuse University College of Visual and Performing Arts, told Lifewire in an email interview. "These complex aggregations are intriguing sites for arguments about authorship, but current systems are more akin to copy and paste than anything approaching human authorship."

Generative AI programs like Midjourney can create nearly any images users can imagine. But is such software creating the art, or is it the person prompting the software?

"Currently, the answer is very much no," Hanlin said. "Without human input, the AI says nothing, and AI images and words are aggregates, not an original thought or an indication of original thought. The litigant here is capitalizing on the novelty of the medium to gain attention, a practice as old as any of the arts themselves."

 AI provides a powerful set of tools for the augmentation and creation of new content, Tony Rodriguez, the chief technology officer of Digimarc, a product digitization company, said in an email.

"This can be a boon for artists, labels, and streaming services, but only if the rights of the artists—or original content creators—are protected," he added. "It has been proven that there is a market for new and derivative works generated by AI models trained using previously released tracks. Taking this approach, however, without involving the original artists, presents both financial and reputational risks for those artists."