Have you ever asked an artificial intelligence to write a song? People often use this method to explore new ideas or test the system while assessing how effectively machines can replicate human creative abilities. But once you obtain the result, a spontaneous question arises: who holds the rights? You, the AI, or no one? People now frequently ask this question because generative artificial intelligence tools which produce texts and images and music and videos from basic instructions have become integrated into our everyday existence. The legal framework which operates behind this straightforward system remains hard to understand completely.
Generative artificial intelligence functions through the analysis of large data sets which enables pattern recognition and relationship identification. The system uses these patterns to generate original content that appears to be new. The main problem exists in determining if these materials qualify as copyright-protected “works” and which person should receive authorship recognition. Traditional law defines an author as the individual who produces a work through a creative process which leaves their personal mark on the final product. People exercise free will when they form their own decisions and the legal system provides protection for these individual choices. The 1976 Copyright Act of the United States contains a definition for “works of authorship” which describes human-created works that result from inventive thinking. The Court of Justice of the European Union has established that a work receives protection when it contains the personal creative signature of its author. Both situations require human involvement as a fundamental element for creative work to function properly.
In Europe, the situation is more fluid. There is not yet a unified regulation, and protection often depends on the degree of human intervention. The study “Generative AI and Copyright – Training, Creation, Regulation,” produced by the European Parliament and the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO), highlights how the current legal framework is not entirely adequate for new technologies. The lack of clear rules creates uncertainty, especially when AI systems are trained on datasets containing protected works without authorization, as happens with many image and music generators.
A key example emerges from the comic “Zarya of the Dawn” which used Midjourney software for its illustrations. The United States Copyright Office provides protection exclusively to author-created texts but denies protection to images that artificial intelligence systems generate on their own. The case brought fresh discussion about the division between human-made and machine-produced materials.
The issue of data mining emerges as an essential point during the present time. Generative AIs receive their training through web-based materials which include protected works. The EUIPO study shows that researchers and innovators can use text and data mining under particular conditions yet unauthorized use of these techniques threatens creators’ rights. The issue extends past intellectual property because it also involves the need for clear training model documentation and source origin identification.
Authorities from various nations are currently working to modify their regulatory systems. The United States Copyright Office has introduced new registration standards for works containing AI-generated elements which require authors to identify human-made components separately from algorithm-produced content. The EUIPO together with the Commission plans to create transparency rules for generated content in Europe and the European Parliament evaluates collective licensing systems to control training data usage.
Every creative industry faces direct effects from these choices because AI systems generate music compositions within minutes and produce digital art that matches human-made quality and create written content at immediate speeds. Legal experts agree that artificial intelligence lacks legal subject status which prevents it from obtaining copyright protection. The human being remains at the center, but with a role that is changing: from direct creator to curator, selector, or interpreter of the work generated by the machine. The line between inspiration and substitution, however, remains thin. Beyond legal regulations the primary obstacle appears to stem from cultural factors. The purpose of copyright to safeguard personal creative works needs to address the current challenge of protecting new creative works which emerge from the combination of numerous pre-existing works. The question is no longer only who owns the result, but what it really means to “create” in an era in which machines also learn how to do so.