Year: 2021
Type: paratext
Abstract: This thesis explores the subsistence of copyright protection for artistic works made with artificial intelligence (AI). The original human contributions that go into formation of these works are outlined and assessment made on whether they have the potential to meet the criteria of eligibility for copyright protection. Moreover, the suitability of the current system to protect these works is evaluated through the lens of international copyright law.\n\nAgreements on which the international copyright legal framework is based on such as the Berne Convention, are fundamentally founded on the assumption of a human author and the requirement of originality. While the concept of artificial creativity is intriguing, eligibility for copyright protection requires the work to contain a sufficient amount of human originality. Terms AI-generated and AI-assisted have surfaced to delineate the extent of original human contributions but so far lacking clear definitions should be used with care as the legal terminology has not fully been established. Furthermore, as a result of the relatively novel nature of the subject matter, limited legislative efforts and case law exist on how copyright doctrines relate to works created with AI. Nevertheless, technologies such as photography can be identified to share similarities to how originality is expressed by means of making arrangements, processing and selection, and can therefore be used as a comparison in legal analysis. The involvement of AI in the creative process should not by itself preclude the availability of copyright protection any less than that of other technological devices.\n\nAlbeit creating works with AI may contain various forms of human originality implying eligibility for protection, modern AI applications equally have the capacity to produce works that appear indistinguishable from ones made by human authors where the exercised human originality is sufficiently non-existent, vague or convoluted that protection by traditional copyright doctrines appears unfitting. While the required threshold of human originality is generally regarded as a reasonably low one, these works arguably necessitate a closer inspection of the requirement.\n\nThe legal treatment and potential impact to the creative market of low-cost AI-generated works that can be produced in large quantities and effectively look and function like traditional human authorial ones is yet to be fully determined. As the implications of these works include economic and social ones, the treatment of such works should not be left guided by judicial decisions alone. While the default position would be to leave them in the public domain, solutions such as the work made for hire doctrine in the US or a related right in the EU could serve to clarify the balance between protection and access for these works.
Source: Aaltodoc (Aalto University)
Author: Isohanni, Perttu
Language: English
Subfield: Artificial Intelligence
Field: Computer Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W6980763796