comment: >
  
  In this situation ai is "an artist" because, like a human, it interprets the request, makes "creative" choices and learns. You as a commissioner can only see the art, accept it or not and tell the ai if you want something different. Think of artists and their sponsors in the old times, it worked exactly like that. 
  If you're looking for "a tool" in this equation, the tool is everything that allows ai to make the image. Yes, it does mean that the images in its database are tools (something which us artists call "references" altough you could rightfully argue ai's use of them is often particularly malicious). 
  I understand it is hard to call ai an artist because it is obviously not sentient, it doesn't know artistic expression. Yet calling the commissioner an artist is even more absurd. An artist is someone who "does things" and not someone who "asks for things to happen". From my personal perspective of an artist, I have more in common with the ai despite its lack of sentience than with the commissioner and all of his humanity. 
  Now, the lines get blurry, depending on your involvement with the ai's structure. A person who types in a request like "draw me a sheep" in an already existing ai is the furthest from an artist there is. But somebody who writes the code, personally assembles ai's "references" (even better, what is they draw them themselves?)? Now that's something to think about.
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  These are some good resources and I will look into them now. In terms of the mickey mouse thing, if the output has elements of something that is protected, then that is infringing and Disney can sue. I am talking about cases where the output does not have direct elements of copying >
  
  ...but that's the argument isn't it? The data the AI was trained on consisted of copyrighted elements. So is it more akin to an artist taking copyrighted images and putting together a collage for their own copyright, or is it entirely new?
  It's certainly nuanced. I think ultimately judges will rule that anything made via an AI that had copyrighted data in its training will result in the output not being eligible for copyright. >
  
  Intuitively I would argue that is entirely new as opposed to a collage. That is an interesting position in your last sentence. So it would be public domain then? Couple questions in that scenario: 
  
  
  How would they prove whether there was copyrighted data in the training? Some people might not know what a model that comes to them has been trained on in the past. 
  
  
  What would you say to the argument about influence? If I listen to George Carlin's stand up 5000 times and then create a stand up set of my own which is clearly influenced by his work but draws no direct copying, should I be able to copyright my set? >
  
  
  It diesn't matter that there is copyrighted data in the training set. It's covered by fair use. >
  
  As far as I heard, the "fair use" ruling was based on authors suing search engines for displaying copyrighted material (book previews/excerpts). It was ruled fair use because it didn't actually harm the sales, nor was it any real competition. AI art is direct competition at the expense of the artists, so it's substantially different.
  Currently it might fall into the fair use category, but that's more of a technical accident, and there are already lawsuits undergoing trying to change it. >
  
  The judge also ruled that it was transformative. >
  
  Yeah, I think there's no contest that the final result is transformative, and arguing that angle was a mistake (also calling it collage). But there's another angle about the right to include images in the training data in the first place. Copyrights can be very specific about what use cases are allowed, so it might be possible to have a clause that forbids inclusion in AI training sets, but allows use for human learning. >
  
  Don't you think a better analogy would be a commission?
  If I want a portrait painted of my partner for her birthday I can reach out to an artist and commission them. I give them a prompt "please paint a canvas of this woman, interpret her as a renaissance queen" I supply a reference photograph and the painter does their painting.
  I pay them for their work and they ship me the product.
  I own the painting.
  The painter stills owns the copyright to that painting.
  Even though I prompted the painter my involvement ended there.
  It's possible even to credit the photographer that supplied the reference image in the first place, but they wouldn't own copyright to the painting unless it was too artistically similar to the photo. Because it was reinterpreted into renaissance that's a slim chance. >
  
  I always assumed it was the commissioner who owned the copyright, like if I have a idea for a character in my head but suck at drawing so I just gave a description for someone to draw for me, wouldn’t I own the copyright to the character I made up?
  Or using your analogy if I commissioned a portrait of my partner, I wouldn’t want the painter making copies of her portrait to sell on the open market. >
  
  
  The condition of them using the reference image was to produce a single work, they would be in breach of contract if they violated this.
  
  I’m confused, if I control whether or not the work can be replicated, I essentially own it’s copyright (the right to copy) no?
  I always wanted a family portrait on canvass if I could one day afford to have one made, but never did I even consider that I had to stipulate in a contract that the painter could only make the one artwork, so anyone who didn’t have it in a contract could find the artist selling copies of their family portrait on the public market?
  That’s scary, I kind of not want to commission any art now, whether it’s my personal ideas or the people I care about, potentially losing control of my ideas and privacy because I’m not adept in copyright law, seems too high a price. >
  
  
  I’m confused, if I control whether or not the work can be replicated, I essentially own it’s copyright (the right to copy) no?
  
  If you have a contract which states please produce one painting from this reference and they produce two (or more, or even one and a half) they have violated the contracted.
  But the painter still owns the copyright, so if your painting rips and you send it to a different painter and ask them to make a fresh copy they would be in breach of the first painters copyright. You send it to the original to remake.
  There is always a contract when you commission something, and most artists aren't out there selling portraits of other people's families. Your fear is unfounded. >
  
  That's not correct. A new painting is a new painting. The new artist implicitly owns that new copyright. 
  The copyright can also transfer if the artist signs it away. >
  
  
  A new painting is a new painting.
  
  Go paint Mickey Mouse and see how that works out for you.
  
  The copyright can also transfer if the artist signs it away.
  
  That's a contract. >
  
  Trademark law is different
  A contract is able to transfer property, including intellectual property >
  
  That's correct, but as your article points out, for less than a year left. 
  Trademark law would still apply. That's why I brought it up. 
  More in context with the original commissioned painting, the painting is a licensed production of the original photograph, where the copyright begins. Just like mickey, all new creations of mickey still belong to Disney. The new painting would extend from that original copyright, and the first painting wouldn't have domain over it. This would be the default situation according to copyright law, and contracts could be drafted to transfer ownership of any intellectual properties if that was desired by any of the parties. >
  
  
  The only choice left is the user
  
  You forgot one option.
  Public domain.
  The idea that all of culture should be divied up and turned into sellable assets is a very recent one. A century ago, most cultural items were not owned, they were just there.
  Corporations have continuously and relentlessly expanded copyright to secure more profit, but we don't have to follow them. >
  
  In the EU employees own copyright and corporate ownership is restricted. >
  
  So a company with sufficient computing power could start generating and storing trillions of random images and they would own the copyright to all of them? >
  
  Two works that are independently created can both be legitimately copyrighted even if their content is very similar, at least in the USA - see this work for details.
  cc u/4vrf >
  
  Awesome resource thank you! >
  
  You're welcome :).
  This article is IMHO the best introduction to AI copyright issues. For a deeper dive, see the many links in this post of mine. >
  
  
  The point of copyright is to incentivize creative expression
  
  Sure, it's fun what people can get those AI algorihms to churn out. And there is some creativity involved, and a certain skill. I can dig the entutiasm as long as AI is new and sort of fringe, kind of like the internet was once, before it took over our entire culture.
  But what if we end up with sweatshops with thousands of underpaid workers churning out illustrations at insane deadlines? 
  Compared to the time before the web, hand drawn artwork has been in a massive decline. I think it would be a bit sad with a world where what little there is left of this got taken over by algorihms.
  I think AI art should be in the Public Domain, to give traditional art at least some breathing room. I think this would be best for creative expression overall.
  This doesn't stop you from use AI art commercially, of course. You can still make a card game, for instance, with AI illustrations. But other people can use your illustrations too. >
  
  Would you say your view only applies to AI imagery?
  Let's say there was an AI number generator and I told it to give me a number between 1800 and 2764. That's my prompt, and the generator gives me 2422. Do I own that number, just because I prompted the machine to give it to me?
  What about Chat GPT, would I be able to say I was the author of something I didn't write? Would that really be an honest way of referring to it? I wouldn't be the author, I'd be the prompter. >
  
  Looking at the responses you seem to be very confused about your own metaphor. 
  The camera isn't the AI in this scenario, it is the site that hosts the AI. 
  AI is the artist that produces the image. Or simply put the person taking the photo. 
  You are just a commissioner. >
  
  What's your definition of a tool? 
  What's your definition of an artist? 
  For most people an AI will be a tool