Pryor Cashman Partner James Sammataro, co-chair of the Media + Entertainment Group, and Litigation Associate Nicholas Saady co-authored a column for Billboard about the potential copyright implications of songs generated by artificial intelligence (AI).
In "How Much Humanity Will AI-Generated Songs Need to Be Copyrightable?," James and Nick note that the quality and efficacy of AI is "evolving faster than the courts can evaluate how laws apply to it," and they discuss how the Copyright Act in the U.S. might intersect with AI:
The Copyright Act protects "works of authorship" – a concept derived from the U.S. Constitution's Copyright Clause, which empowers Congress to secure "exclusive rights" for "authors." Courts have held that authors must be human. Consequently, animals (including the famed monkey selfie) and natural forces (a naturally growing garden) cannot be authors of copyrighted works.
While current legal precedent suggests that AI also cannot "author" copyrighted works, the critical issue is what amount of human creative input or intervention suffices to make AI-generated musical works copyrightable (and by whom)?
U.S. courts have yet to answer this question decisively. The Copyright Office has drawn some basic boundary lines. AI-advocate Steven Thaler filed a copyright application for AI-generated artwork. The Board rejected his applications three times, finding that the artwork was not "created with contribution from a human author" and thus failed to meet the human authorship requirement. (Thaler has since sued.)
While this area of law changes alongside the technology, James and Nick say that "those creating AI-generated music are well-advised to stay cognizant of the legal risks and guide the artificial music making process with a genuine human touch."
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