A rule against copyrighting AI art will be unworkable.
I’ve generally been against giving AI works copyright, but this article presented what I felt were compelling arguments for why I might be wrong. What do you think?
In the movie industry, everyone usually signs a work for hire contract that specifies who will have the rights to the completed film.
However, in a recent case the director (Alex Merkin) did not sign a contract and then tried to claim copyright afterwards. The court said that directors have no inherent copyright over film:
We answer that question in the negative on the facts of the present case, finding that the Copyright Actʹs terms, structure, and history support the conclusion that Merkinʹs contributions to the film do not themselves constitute a ʺwork of authorshipʺ amenable to copyright protection. … As a general rule, the author is the party who actually creates the work, that is, the person who translates an idea into a fixed, tangible expression entitled to copyright protection. … But a directorʹs contribution to an integrated ʺwork of authorshipʺ such as a film is not itself a ʺwork of authorshipʺ subject to its own copyright protection.
As a general rule, the author is the party who actually creates the work, that is, the person who translates an idea into a fixed, tangible expression entitled to copyright protection
Yes that’s a thing directors do. They do the translation between script and image, anything cinematography in a movie is due to them.
Taking the judges’ reasoning to an extreme you’d expect them to rule that if I dictate a book to someone who then writes it down I do not own copyright because I did not give the work its tangible expression.
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If you reach a certain threshold you’d be co-creator. AIs can’t hold copyright, so in the analogous case you’d be sole copyright holder.
Take the movie industry and try to argue, as a camera operator, that the director has no rights at all to the video you shoot. I’m waiting.
In the movie industry, everyone usually signs a work for hire contract that specifies who will have the rights to the completed film.
However, in a recent case the director (Alex Merkin) did not sign a contract and then tried to claim copyright afterwards. The court said that directors have no inherent copyright over film:
Yes that’s a thing directors do. They do the translation between script and image, anything cinematography in a movie is due to them.
Taking the judges’ reasoning to an extreme you’d expect them to rule that if I dictate a book to someone who then writes it down I do not own copyright because I did not give the work its tangible expression.
Whose lawyers was he up against? Disney?