Who owns an image or text created with AI? Copyright explained

Who owns an image or text created with AI? Copyright explained

The article establishes that, in both the United States and Spain, copyright protection requires a human author, thereby excluding machines from being recognized as rights holders. The firm conclusion is that content generated entirely by artificial intelligence lacks legal protection and falls into the public domain, whereas protection is retained only when the user contributes creativity through the meaningful selection, modification, or composition of the generated elements. It is emphasized that a simple prompt is insufficient to claim authorship; it is necessary to demonstrate creative control over the final output. The Thaler case reinforced this position by denying registration when exclusive ownership was claimed for a machine, underscoring that the law protects human intervention rather than the tool itself. This implies that publishing material generated without subsequent editing leaves the work vulnerable to use by third parties, as no legal exclusivity can be asserted. This distinction is crucial for the open-data community, as it clearly defines which digital assets can be freely shared without legal risks. By recognizing that automatic generation does not create intellectual property rights, it facilitates the integration of such content into open repositories and datasets used for model training. This promotes transparency and ethical use, ensuring that material lacking explicit human contribution is treated as a common resource, thereby avoiding ownership conflicts within the open-knowledge ecosystem.

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