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I think this ruling is wrong.

It's not hard to imagine a compiler using AI to optimize byte code, and so now the binary it creates is no longer copyrightable?

Compilers and transpilers, even though someone else may have wrote them, the courts have held the the copyright of the output binary is whoever wrote the source code.

In that sense AI is nothing more than a English language to image compiler.



Compiled byte code is a derivative work of the original source code. Copyright extends to derivative works.


But if I copyright the prompt to the input of the AI, does that not also become a derivative work?

I do believe in the US (I could be wrong) that copyright does exist without registering it with the US government.


Wouldn't AI generated art be derivative work done by Google (or whoever) when creating their Gemini models? So then Google owns all gemini created ai artwork?


1. Model weights may not be copyrightable.

2. Copyright protects copying. Expressive elements from the original creative work (source code) exist in the byte code, thus it remains under the original copyright.

3. For a derivative work to be considered a newly copyrightable work (as opposed to a copy subject to the original's copyright), it must contain new substantive human creative expression (whether the original creator also has a copyright claim as well depends on degree of transformation).


Typically you need the permission of a copyright owner to create derivatives of their work.


You think this ruling on photography is wrong because of a strained comparison to AI use in a compiler? Take a step back and rethink your approach. The copyright office here is dealing with fundamental principles, not worrying about what the impacts will be to the use of compilers.




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