So this case does address this in some fashion and the office ruled that significant edits can be proof of authorship. Mrs. K does provide examples of ai-generated work that is edited and they do review it.

> However the presumption will be that AI 'assisted' art is not entitled to copyright either.

I would draw the exact opposite conclusion from the USCO correspondence. Note this:

> We conclude that Ms. Kashtanova is the author of the Work’s text as well as the selection, coordination, and arrangement of the Work’s written and visual elements. That authorship is protected by copyright.

They’ve specifically said that everything about but the generated images themselves is copyrighted. Assuming that this decision holds up to further scrutiny (which, who knows), an assistive tool is one that combines non-copyrightable generated content with copyrightable human generated elements. With those kinds of tools, the fact that individual elements of the final work are not copyrightable would generally be academic.

Edit: phonetic typo

Professional photoshoppers devastated

[deleted]

would you prefer CartoonBrew? https://www.cartoonbrew.com/law/midjourney-ai-images-us-copyright-office-226437.html

Anything that takes two years to grasp and apply the fundamentals can't be called easy...

Photos are a great example.

Somebody takes a photograph of a skyline, why should they be able to copyright that? All they did was press a button, the skyline itself was created by others.

If the answer is because of the compositional choices involved, then that's no different from a user giving specific prompts to an AI. Which is exactly what the comic book author was doing when creating their work.

Photography should not be copyrightable under the same standards held to AI in this case.

> don't understand art

Understanding art isn't a prerequisite for creating art.

Most images generated with AI do not look interesting. People generate a fantasy girl, mario as a dwarf, some space car, funny sometimes, but it gets boring easily.

It is actually not so easy to generate something interesting with it. The most imaginary images are created by people who were already artistic, and they use their knowledge with this new tool. Mostly changing elements afterwards or combining images.

For photography it is the same, 99,999% of images are nothing more than snapshots. And it is so easy, just one click. But it takes an artistic eye to make something more of it.

From the court ruling cited on this specific case:

> In cases where non-human authorship is claimed, appellate courts have found that copyright does not protect the alleged creations. For example, the Ninth Circuit held that a book containing words “‘authored’ by non-human spiritual beings” can only gain copyright protection if there is “human selection and arrangement of the revelations.” Urantia Found. v. Kristen Maaherra, 114 F.3d 955, 957–59 (9th Cir. 1997). The Urantia court held that “some element of human creativity must have occurred in order for the Book to be copyrightable” because “it is not creations of divine beings that the copyright laws were intended to protect.”

>> A computer absolutely can not create original work.

> Why not?

> Or rather, if a computer can't, what is the reason that a human could instead?

It's a question of the word "original". Water makes beautiful patterns in the sand below it, wind creates intricate patterns on the water. But we don't usually use the phrase "original work" to talk about things like that. Its meaning is related to the concept of invention, something that takes a will, a desire, imagination, intentional work, skill, and a process that involves being conscious of the aesthetics of what's being produced. I think that some animals are capable of it too, to some extent. But things produced by inanimate forces just don't fit into the category by that name. It doesn't mean they're not beautiful, and they have been the inspiration for countless artworks. But they're not called original artworks in themselves. There are different words for that.

On the other hand, people use tools and media to make art, and an artist using a computer can certainly create original work, if it involves the elements mentioned above. Also, processes of chance have been extremely important in the art of the past century. Much of the "output" of John Cage's work for example, is based on randomness. And I don't think the US Copyright Office is a particularly good judge of that. They might refuse to register a copyright on the music created, when musicians played notes that were produced by fish in a tank with a musical staff painted on it. Nevertheless, that piece is considered a very important and original work in the history of avant-garde art and music.

One of the best examples is artist Harold Cohen's AARON, a software project started in 1972, that produces physical paintings, spanning over four decades. The artist himself doesn't claim that the sofware is "creative", though the paintings have been displayed in many important galleries, and the overall work is considered very significant and influential in the history of art and AI. In 1994, Cohen asked: "If what AARON is making is not art, what is it exactly, and in what ways, other than its origin, does it differ from the 'real thing?' If it is not thinking, what exactly is it doing?"[1]

It comes down to the nature of the work. Someone who writes "an astronaut riding a horse"... it's so low-effort that it's difficult to call it original art, even though it's become somewhat iconic. But I don't think at all that its impossible to use AI image generators in a process that does produce original, creative art works, or at least, in a way that the deep and thoughtful investigation of the questions, as in Cohen's work, is clearly the original work of an artist.

Because a human must take action for it to occur. A human must direct the AI to do a task so the human behind the instructions is the true creator.

Humans don't need to be told what to do to be creative, we can choose to do it of our own free will.

How did it start then?

[deleted]

This is a fact which nobody can argue. Everything is a remix. There is never truly original art and never will be.

So... what the ai does?

Because it learns what a concept looks like and that's how it will generate an image from pure static. It doesn't have images saved inside the model it has knowledge of what something looks like and how to make that from static. Essentially it knows how to draw a thing but doesn't have images of the thing saved in its data.

https://www.fastcompany.com/90649913/the-unusual-creative-process-of-the-artist-behind-the-little-mermaid-and-beauty-and-the-beast

Aphantasia prevents the generation of mental images based on knowledge of what things look like, but it does not prevent that knowledge serving as the basis for an image made with pencil and paper. Keane can draw a picture of Ariel because he knows what humans (and fish) look like, and that information—plus the skills acquired through study and practice—steers his hand accordingly.

This is the best explanation i can think of for this.

No, because plagiarism is when you copy something verbatim, without creating your own authentic interpretation and expression. All art has elements of borrowing, but it's inventiveness, imagination, and some originality, that makes it art and not plagiarism.

The question is whether a machine is capable of inventiveness, imagination, originality, thinking, feeling, etc., or not, since those things have generally been acknowledged throughout history as being necessary elements of art. Wind and rain may carve patterns that are as beautiful as the most beautiful painting, but we don't call it art. Some people believe, or want to believe, that computers are capable of those things, and so we should call the patterns they produce, original, creative art. Others think that those things are not actually necessary, and we should call it art anyway. Personally, I think it's neither art nor plagiarism, but something else, that we don't have words for yet, and we're not sure how to deal with. It's a necessary discussion to work it out, but trying to fit dramatically new things into old categories is usually less successful than creating new categories.

here's a different one with a less click-baity title

https://www.cartoonbrew.com/law/midjourney-ai-images-us-copyright-office-226437.html

You can already highlight the part of the image that generated a signature or whatever and ask it to put something else there on SD. Midjourney I think you have to redo the whole piece.

I would very much prefer the floating heads