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Should Studios Follow These New AI Copyright Guidelines?

Photo from This Is Engineering via Pexels

Should Studios Follow These New AI Copyright Guidelines?

By Movieguide® Contributor

In 2023, the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers proposed that writers’ compensation and rights would not be weakened if a script was written with AI.

The Writers Guild of America didn’t like the sound of the offer, aware that it held some talking points regarding AI, according to The Hollywood Reporter. Namely, AI-produced scripts aren’t copyrightable. To have a copyright, a human has to rewrite an AI script.

Presently, under the U.S. Copyright Office’s guidelines, refined last Wednesday, protection is issued when a human “selects and arranges” AI-generated content in a creative way. Simply giving an AI system a command isn’t enough to establish creativity, says Shira Perlmutter, Register of Copyrights and Director of the U.S. Copyright Office.

“The use of AI tools to assist rather than stand in for human creativity does not affect the availability of copyright protection for the output,” the copyright report stated.

“Where that creativity is expressed through the use of AI systems, it continues to enjoy protection,” Perlmutter said.

The question that the copyright office will now ask when presented with AI scripts is, was it used to “assist rather than stand in for human creativity?” For protection, any AI use must be specified. That includes AI in production and postproduction, rotoscoping, color correcting, detail sharpening, deblurring and removing objects or features. This use of AI creates more doubt when it comes to projects’ copyright protection potential.

READ MORE: COPYRIGHT OFFICE WEIGHS IN ON AI USE IN CREATIVE WORKS

The Motion Picture Association says that movies created with AI shouldn’t have portions rejected for copyright. In other words, the whole movie should be eligible for copyright. To the MPA, copyright only for specific scenes isn’t reasonable. So the MPA is arguing against following the copyright guidelines, as they carry “significant, negative real-world consequences.”

Some studios are forbidding AI in writers’ rooms and even have their writers sign and attest that they didn’t use AI in their scripts.

“Contracts say you need to ask permission of studios and a lot of studios’ policies is that it’s simply not allowed,” said showrunner and writer Mark Goffman.

It’s unclear whether the Copyright Office will remain stringent or move in another direction. Courts could complicate matters if they rule that the training of AI systems on copyrighted works constitutes infringement.

In its report Wednesday, the Copyright Office maintained that creativity must be specified in our current times.

“In theory, AI systems could someday allow users to exert so much control over how their expression is reflected in an output that the system’s contribution would become rote or mechanical,” the report states. “The evidence as to the operation of today’s AI systems indicates that this is not currently the case.”

READ MORE: HOW AI-GENERATED ART COPYRIGHT RULING COULD IMPACT HOLLYWOOD


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