The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled on March 18th, 2025 that works generated by AI, without human involvement, are not eligible for copyright protection under U.S. law.
Computer scientist Stephen Thaler argued that his ‘Creativity Machine’ created the painting on its own, and tried to copyright it. The US Copyright Office rejected it, and their decision was affirmed by a lower federal court.
Now, a federal appeals court has affirmed that decision, ruling that art created by artificial intelligence cannot be copyrighted, saying that at least initial human authorship is required for a copyright. The decision is based on the Copyright Act of 1976, which the court said was based on human authorship. Many provisions of the act are based on the idea of human authorship, like copyright lasting for 70 years beyond the author’s death.
This affirms how copyright applies to AI-generated works. Under current law, content produced entirely by AI immediately enters the public domain, allowing unrestricted commercial use. Works can be copyrighted if they are authored by a human that provides ‘meaningful input’, and AI is just used as a tool.
The decision has interesting implications for musicians:
- AI-generated audio is public domain, meaning that it can be sampled and used to create original works.
- Music that’s created by a musician can be copyrighted, even if they use AI-powered tools for things like effects, mixing and mastering.
- If you use AI-powered tools to create music, without providing ‘meaningful input’ and control over the results, you can’t copyright it. What level of creative control is needed to meet this bar is still a gray area.
The ruling affirms US Copyright Office guidance from 2023 on AI-generated works.
What do you think about the use of AI tools in music-making? Share your thoughts in the comments!
and he still doesn’t have working fingers, and whoa! that fretboard is insane. and i thought keyboards were the AI ‘turing test’. yeah sure, you *deserve* a copyright for that crap.
“AI-generated audio is public domain, meaning that it can be sampled and used to create original works.”
I’ve come across “AI music” that was made using AI-generated MIDI files and commercial sample banks, which wouldn’t be protected here for sampling (the composition probably falls into the public domain, but not the samples). Something to bear in mind.
A_Synth_Fan_in_BC – that’s exactly the sort of complication that creates the ‘gray areas’ that will likely have to be worked through in court.
In your case, the AI was generating MIDI, which would be public domain, not the audio. If the MIDI was used to play a copyrighted sample, it would not make the sample public domain.
Which brings up a relevant point – that Terminator image can’t be copyrighted by the AI or the person who generated it, but because it uses the Terminator as played by Schwarzenegger it presumably violates the copyright of whoever holds the rights to the character and Arnold’s rights to his own likeness.
So, depending on the prompt, an AI could be used to create a work which violates copyright without the prompt explicitly requesting that it draw on the copyrighted materials if it has been trained on a dataset that contains copyrighted materials – which as far as we know, they have all been. At that point, surely the creator of the AI who used that dataset for training would be liable?
Excellent point. There’s a lot of complications to consider and work through.
Lawyers are going to have a heyday with this, until precedents are established.
Does this also apply to music? We’re seeing so much slop being uploaded to all the digital platforms
Yes, until someone wins a case asserting otherwise. However, while you could in theory just rip off the AI slop and re-upload it wherever, platforms would probably still honor copyright claims because they’re in hte business of taking the least legally risky option and there is zero legal penalty for upholding a bullshit copyright claim.
If you want to imagine what Heaven is like, start with No Lawyers.
The law hasn’t any relation to human needs;
it’s a racket carried on by a syndicate of parasites.
~ from Henry Miller’s “The Rosy Crucifixion, Sexus, Volume Two”
Actually, if you want to imagine what Heaven is like, start with No humans that need lawyers. It s not lawyers fault.
start with no need for money.
Is your surname Lennon?!
I joke of course , but actually somewhat agree with you.
You mean start with no religion
So your priest has ever told you not to use AI ?
Everytime I see AI generate something with a human playing a musical instrument, it looks like something from a feverish nightmare
We need to get this applied to anything created by AI, not just art.