Tracking the Explosive World of Generative AI

U.S. Copyright Office Draws the Line on AI-Generated Creations

While “some” AI-assisted works could be copyrighted, the office notes that current generative AI art technologies function more like hiring a “commissioned artist” and do not have copyright protection.

The U.S. Copyright Office's latest guidance fortells trouble for generative AI artworks. Illustration: Artisana

🧠 Stay Ahead of the Curve

The U.S. Copyright Office has issued a crucial update on its stance towards generative AI-created works and whether they have copyright protection
In its new guidance, the Office says that typical generative AI art is unlikely to have copyright protection as the “generated material is not the product of human authorship”
As generative AI art continues to grow in prevalence, this guidance is the first of many consequential rulings in a new legal frontier

By Michael Zhang

March 15, 2023

Is AI-generated art protected by copyright? As the adoption of technologies such as Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, and OpenAI's DALL-E accelerates, this issue has found its way to the U.S. Copyright Office.

In newly-released guidance, the U.S. Copyright Office clarifies its stance on the matter: "When an AI technology determines the expressive elements of its output, the generated material is not the product of human authorship," and as a result, lacks copyright protection.

The Office explains that technologies like Midjourney, Stable Diffusion, and OpenAI's DALL-E are systems where "users do not exercise ultimate creative control over how the systems interpret prompts and generate material." In this context, prompts function more like "instructions to a commissioned artist," with the AI determining how those instructions manifest in the final output.

Consequently, art pieces will only receive copyright protection for "human-authored components," such as the layout and words in a comic book. The Office emphasizes that these protected elements can be distinct from AI-generated images, which are not covered by copyright.

Regarding the human inputs involved in prompt engineering, the Office concludes that "while some prompts may be sufficiently creative to warrant copyright protection, that does not mean that material generated from a copyrightable prompt is itself copyrightable."

This guidance follows a February decision where the Copyright Office ruled that Midjourney-generated images in the comic book "Zarya of the Dawn" were ineligible for protection, even though the text and layout were unique and qualified for copyright protection.

While the U.S. Copyright Office's recent guidance is somewhat narrow, it offers valuable clarity on the fast-evolving landscape of AI-generated art and its copyright implications. However, the practical application of this principle as the boundaries between human creativity and machine authorship continue to blur remains to be seen.