In a landmark judgement, a US court in Washington DC Friday ruled that a work of art created by artificial intelligence without any human input cannot be copyrighted under United States law.
US District Judge Beryl Howell said that only works with human authors can receive copyrights, affirming the US Copyright Office’s rejection of an application filed by computer scientist Stephen Thaler on behalf of his Device for the Autonomous Bootstrapping of Unified Sentience (DABUS) system.
The decision follows losses for Thaler on bids for US patents for inventions created by DABUS, according to him.
The computer scientist has also filed for DABUS-generated patents in other countries including, the United Kingdom, Australia, South Africa, and Saudi Arabia with limited success.
On Monday, Thaler’s attorney Ryan Abbott said that he and his client strongly disagree with the decision and will appeal.
The Copyright Office did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Monday.
Novel intellectual property issues have been raised with the fast-growing field of generative AI.
A copyright claim by an artist was declined by the Copyright Office for copyrights on images generated through the AI system Midjourney. The artist had argued that the system was part of their creative process.
Multiple stakeholders have also filed lawsuits over the use of copyrighted works to train generative AI without permission.
Judge Howell wrote in his judgement: “We are approaching new frontiers in copyright as artists put AI in their toolbox,” which will raise “challenging questions” for copyright law.
“This case, however, is not nearly so complex,” Howell said.
Thaler applied in 2018 for a copyright covering “A Recent Entrance to Paradise,” a piece of visual art that he said was created by his AI system without any human input.
The office rejected the application last year and said creative works must have human authors to be copyrightable.
Thaler challenged the decision in federal court, arguing that human authorship is not a concrete legal requirement and that allowing AI copyrights would be in line with copyright’s purpose as outlined in the US Constitution to “promote the progress of science and useful arts.”
Howell agreed with the Copyright Office and said human authorship is a “bedrock requirement of copyright” based on “centuries of settled understanding.”