Generative artificial intelligence has burst into the art world like a bull in a china shop. Artists have declared open war on a technology that, since its emergence, clearly and directly threatens their livelihood. Even so, there are those who do not see the situation as so severe and argue that generative AI is just another technique.
This might be the case for Jason Allen. Some time ago, this artist went viral on social media for winning an art contest at a state fair with “Theatre D’opera Spatial,” a piece generated with Midjourney. Now, Allen is in the midst of a battle with the United States Copyright Office because, according to them, the work is not eligible for registration.
The agency dismissed its proposal last fall, arguing that almost the entire piece had been generated by artificial intelligence. In this case, for the work to be registered, it needed to have a “more human” authorship.
In response to this decision, the creator has appealed and requested a judicial review. As reported by ArsTechnica, Allen argues in his defense that “the negative media attention surrounding the work may have influenced the perception and judgment of the Copyright Office examiner.”
For Allen, the examiner in charge of reviewing his work was impartial and took into account situations such as the audience’s reaction. In this case, the conclusion reached by the examiner was that Allen had “no control over how the artificial intelligence tool analyzed, interpreted, or responded to these prompts.”
The artist believes that this could pose a major problem as technology advances and becomes capable of creating more believable things. “[The examiners] may even not be able to distinguish a work of art that has used AI tools to assist in the creation from one that does not use any computer tools,” expressed Allen. However, the artist still holds hope that a jury can review his case and thus, overturn the denial from the Copyright Office.
