Reforming Copyright Law for AI-Generated Content: Copyright Protection, Authorship and Ownership

Abstract

With the emergence of disputes over the copyright of AI-generated content (AIGC), academia has extensively discussed relevant issues, including copyright protectability and ownership. However, the copyright law community has not reached an international consensus. Adopting a doctrinal methodology, this paper investigates these issues and proposes reforms, arguing that copyright law should clarify the de facto authorship of AI and determine the originality of AIGC based on minimum creativity at the expression level. It also recommends attributing copyright of AIGC to the AI owner via statutory provision, allowing contractual allocation between parties. The proposed framework would resolve significant academic controversies on fundamental issues surrounding AIGC copyright and provide a reference model for future research.