Why is copyright protection required for works created by artificial intelligence?
Artificial intelligence today exists in all areas of life, that fact requires intellectual property law, including copyright law, to make appropriate adjustments to make the most of it. benefits that artificial intelligence brings to society.
Works created by Artificial Intelligence (AI)
Parambook publisher said that the novel, titled The World from Now On, was written in English by an artificial intelligence (AI) writer named Birampung. Birampung is co-developed by AI startup Dapumda and South Korean natural language processing company Namaesseu.
Writer Kim Tae-yeon, who is also a computer science expert, guided Birampung to write this novel through deep learning, after he outlined the theme, setting, and characters. The World from Now On will be the first full-length novel written by AI for Korean readers. Before that, the world’s first AI-written novel was published in Russia in 2008.
According to the publisher Parambook, so far, in Korea and Japan, there are only super short stories created by AI. The publisher even claims that The World from Now On will be the world’s first AI-written novel with a “truth that really moves readers”.
The combination of human intelligence and artificial intelligence in creative activities tends to be more and more widespread, leading to the distinction between human- and computer-generated artworks becoming increasingly blurred. . This also poses challenges in practice if copyright law still follows the traditional principle of protecting only the individual author’s intellectual creations.
Why is copyright protection necessary for works created by artificial intelligence?
Today, works created by artificial intelligence such as music, journalism, painting, design, software (computer programs), multimedia works such as computer games, etc. tend to be These are products of high commercial value in the cultural and entertainment industries, as well as being applied in many areas of life. Compared with ordinary works created by humans, works created by artificial intelligence often require large investment resources of businesses. If the work is not protected by copyright, it means that anyone can use and exploit it without having to ask for permission and pay a fee.
Businesses that invest in technology to create such works do not have the right to prohibit others from using them, nor to collect fees or material benefits from the exploitation of the works. This will not only cause them total economic losses, their efforts and investments are not properly compensated, but will certainly have a negative impact on the industry. Businesses will no longer invest, research effort and money when the results of their investment are not adequately rewarded. And so, the advantages of artificial intelligence in terms of saving time and costs for human resource investment in production and business activities are also not effectively utilized.
Not only negatively affect the interests of the subject who invests in the development of artificial intelligence and the development of the computer industry, the failure to protect the copyright for products created by artificial intelligence can have negative consequences. may affect the interests of society in promoting wealth, enriching cultural and spiritual life. In this case, the copyright law failed to fulfill its mission of harmonizing the interests of creative investors with those of exploiters, users and the interests of society. Today’s achievements in science and technology are bringing many opportunities in the way of creativity as well as the form of expression of works. Artists increasingly tend to take advantage of modern machines and means, including the use of artificial intelligence to support their composing activities.
Conditions for protection of works under copyright law
Traditionally, the subject matter of copyright is the product of mental creative activity (as opposed to the objects of the physical world, which are tangible objects). The Berne Convention is the oldest international copyright convention and has the largest number of member states. Article 2 provides an unlimited list of protected works, including original work in the fields of literature, art and science, regardless of form or mode of expression. On the basis of the Berne Convention, the copyright laws of most countries in the world only protect literary, artistic and scientific works that satisfy the condition that they are original spiritual creations. The Copyright Law of Japan, in section (i) Clause 1 Article 2 stipulates: “A work is a work in which thoughts or feelings are creatively expressed and in the literary domain. , science, art or music”.
Clause 2, Article 2 of the German Copyright Law provides for works protected by copyright as follows: “Works within the meaning of this code can only be personal creations”.
Clause 7 Article 4 of the current Vietnam Intellectual Property Law stipulates: “Creative works in the fields of literature, art and science may be expressed by any means or form” and in Clause 3 of Article 4. 14 stipulates that a protected work “must be directly created by the author with his or her own intellectual labor, and not copied from another person’s work..”
Although there are different ways of expressing it, the Berne Convention and the copyright laws of most countries around the world define the elements for a work to be protected by copyright, which are:
(i) Expressed in a certain form
Creative results, if they are just ideas in the author’s mind, have not been expressed outside the physical world in a certain form, are not considered a copyright-protected work. On the author’s side, if the work exists only in the mind of the author and cannot be recognized by others, it does not pose a problem of protection. On the other hand, creative products in the fields of literature, art and science only have meaning when they are accessible to the public. Therefore, the first requirement for a work to be protected is that it must be expressed through a certain form so that others can recognize and identify the work.
(ii) The work must be the result of mental creative activities
This requirement requires that the work must be the result of the process of thinking, exploring, creating, and reflecting the thoughts and feelings of the creator. In other words, a work must be a creative result containing a certain spiritual content.
(iii) Original identity (or personal imprint of the author)
International law as well as the copyright laws of most countries in the world only protect works that meet the conditions of original human spirit creation. Originality requires that work created by the author himself be distinguishable from the works of others. In the laws of some countries, this requirement is raised that the work must have its own characteristics or personal imprint, reflected in the content or form of the work. The personal impression can be about the author’s thinking or expression style.
How to protect copyright for works created by artificial intelligence
Regarding the subject of copyright protection, works created by artificial intelligence need to meet the minimum requirements for creativity. Under paragraph 1 of Article 10 of the TRIPs Agreement, a computer program is protected as a linguistic work as defined by the Berne Convention, for a minimum term of 50 years. Although protected by copyright law, computer programs do not possess the same aesthetic or artistic properties as other works. It is simply a product of information technology created to solve a certain problem, so it is difficult to prove that a computer program represents a spiritual content or personal imprint of the author.
The basic difference between a computer program and a traditional work is that the level of creativity is low, only the minimum condition is “creative work results” – the most important criterion for the work to be protected. households, while the requirements of “spiritual creation” or “personal imprint” are no longer important. A data collection is also a work protected by copyright when it is formed from the collection and selection of works, information and other data to become a unified whole.
Regarding the subject of copyright protection, in the current context of the fourth industrial revolution, with the widespread participation of “intelligent autonomous robots”, has been raising the question of whether robots are recognized as such. a subject of legal relations or not? In Europe, there have been recommendations to create a separate legal status for robots, such as granting the status of “electronic kernel” to the most intelligent autonomous robots.
In 2017, Saudi Arabia became the first country in the world to grant citizenship to a humanoid robot with artificial intelligence. It can be seen that, if the fourth industrial revolution leads to important legal reforms, including the granting of “human electronic” legal status to intelligent robots, then the law is inevitable. Copyright besides empowering people – “natural people”, it is also necessary to consider attribution of copyright to artificial intelligence when creating works.
Thus, regarding the protection of copyright for works created by artificial intelligence, lawmakers around the world can consider the recognition and protection of copyright for those who contribute to it. play an important and decisive role in how computer-generated works are, including: People who collect and select input data sources to train computers and computer programmers.
Source: Why is copyright protection required for Works created by Artificial Intelligence? (Law & Copyright)