“For example, if I create a digital artwork and I use an AI tool to increase the resolution, I totally still own the artwork.”
There are tools that allow you to convert a stick figure drawing plus a prompt into whatever you want. I can draw a stick figure holding a circle and prompt it as a bunny holding an apple and I could get the desired output. Of course thats more than increasing resolution but where do we draw the line.
The line is probably drawn where it is drawn when using any other tool: For your contribution to be copyright-worthy it needs to be above the required threshold of originality. Copyright doesn’t distinguish between different tools you use, it just requires you to have put enough creativity into it for it to be a creative work.
AI in this respect is very close to photography.
Just pulling out your phone and snapping a picture of something does not clear the theshold, so you have no copyright over it, no matter how detailled the picture is.
If you set up the scene and put a lot of creative input into preparation and post-processing of the picture, you will clear that threshold and you will have copyright over it.
If this sounds arbitrary and hard to pinpoint whether that threshold (which is not clearly defined anywhere) is cleared, you are totally right. This is a big issue with the copyright system, but it’s also nothing that will be fixed by some people commenting on the internet.
So the question is “Did the human input into the AI tool clear the thresold or not?”
This question is the same, regardless of what tools are used, and it’s a common part of lawsuits concerning copyright. There is no blanket answer and it needs to be checked on a case-by-case basis. That’s how copyright law works.
“For example, if I create a digital artwork and I use an AI tool to increase the resolution, I totally still own the artwork.”
There are tools that allow you to convert a stick figure drawing plus a prompt into whatever you want. I can draw a stick figure holding a circle and prompt it as a bunny holding an apple and I could get the desired output. Of course thats more than increasing resolution but where do we draw the line.
we let the AI draw it for us
That’s what I said, yeah.
The line is probably drawn where it is drawn when using any other tool: For your contribution to be copyright-worthy it needs to be above the required threshold of originality. Copyright doesn’t distinguish between different tools you use, it just requires you to have put enough creativity into it for it to be a creative work.
AI in this respect is very close to photography.
Just pulling out your phone and snapping a picture of something does not clear the theshold, so you have no copyright over it, no matter how detailled the picture is.
If you set up the scene and put a lot of creative input into preparation and post-processing of the picture, you will clear that threshold and you will have copyright over it.
If this sounds arbitrary and hard to pinpoint whether that threshold (which is not clearly defined anywhere) is cleared, you are totally right. This is a big issue with the copyright system, but it’s also nothing that will be fixed by some people commenting on the internet.
So the question is “Did the human input into the AI tool clear the thresold or not?”
This question is the same, regardless of what tools are used, and it’s a common part of lawsuits concerning copyright. There is no blanket answer and it needs to be checked on a case-by-case basis. That’s how copyright law works.