Claiming copyright on a fully AI-generated work
A machine cannot be an author. You cannot copyright a thing no human made, no matter how good the prompt was.
Not legal advice. Sally roasts behaviour and use-cases in general, never your specific situation, and nothing here replaces a real lawyer. The cases are real; what you do about them is between you and someone licensed to tell you.
Trying to register, or assuming you own, copyright in an image or text generated entirely by AI with no human authorship.
Thaler v. Perlmutter
No. 23-5233 (D.C. Cir. 2025); cert. denied 2026 · US (D.C. Circuit)
Stephen Thaler sought to register an AI-generated artwork naming his "Creativity Machine" as sole author.
The court affirmed denial because copyright requires a human author. The Supreme Court declined review, making it settled law.
A man spent years trying to register an AI-generated artwork naming the machine as the author. The courts said no, all the way up, because copyright requires a human author in the first instance. The Supreme Court declined to touch it, which makes it settled law: fully AI-generated work with no human authorship is not registrable.
This does not resolve human-AI collaboration, where a person genuinely shapes the result. But pure machine output sitting on its own has no copyright for anyone to own, including you.
“You wanted credit for art you did not make, from a tool that cannot hold the credit either. The result belongs to no one.”
- 01Understand that raw, fully AI-generated output is generally not protectable by anyone.
- 02If you want protection, contribute real human authorship and be able to point to it.
- 03Do not build a business on the assumption that you exclusively own pure model output. You probably do not.
Not legal advice. General commentary on a use-case, not your situation. Talk to a real lawyer before you act.