The US Copyright Office Review Board has denied another AI-generated art for copyright protection, as revealed in its latest decision on an artwork that was applied by its artist which brought it up for review. The said AI art is best known to be the controversial one which was flaunted to be the winner of last year's Colorado State Fair fine arts competition under a fitting category.
In this case, the ownership of the person who prompted the AI to create the art is being questioned, and while AI art can be copyrighted, humans must relinquish their claims on it.
US Copyright Office Denies AI-Generated Art via Midjourney
A report by Reuters shared the recent decision of the US Copyright Office Review Board about its decision to turn down a famed but controversial artwork from Jason M. Allen for copyright protection.
The US Copyright Office denied the application from Allen, with the artwork known as the "Theatre D'opera Spatial" that was made via the Midjourney AI.
"The Board finds that the Work contains more than a de minimis amount of content generated by artificial intelligence ("AI"), and this content must therefore be disclaimed in an application for registration. Because Mr. Allen is unwilling to disclaim the AI-generated material, the Work cannot be registered as submitted," said the Office.
State Fair Winning AI Art: No Copyright Protection
The Colorado State Fair's fine arts competition had a Digital Arts/Digitally Manipulated Art category where Allen entered his futuristic theater depiction and won the first prize. It became a massive controversy online, with many denouncing the art and Allen, and some praising his work.
US denied the art copyright protection as Allen did not want to "disclaim" the artwork, while the Copyright Office's precedent clearly states that it could only be accepted if the AI gets all the credit, as it was mostly made from it.
AI Art, Content Copyrighting, and its Issues
Anything is almost possible now thanks to the emergence of AI, and it has proven that it can match or surpass humans in creating content or outputs easily, considering that humans use a masterfully crafted prompt. The question of AI-generated art possibly rivaling that of human works was previously answered, and yes, these powerful machines can.
However, it is important to note that many artists are now gunning for artificial intelligence programs that create art, especially as they claim that these machines allegedly copy their works. It has also been a massive controversy that AI companies have trained their systems via the internet, and while it was able to freely access them, some do not have licenses or permissions to do so.
There has been a massive debate about whether AI-generated art and other forms of output could be eligible for copyrighting, and while the US is not entirely closed on this discussion, it has massive precedents or conditions to meet. Allen's state fair-winning artwork may have been an impeccable creation via Midjourney, the US cannot copyright it if the person who prompted it claims they are the artist.
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