来源：《新科学家》
原文见刊日期：2022年10月15日
本文适合2024考生
Concerns over copyright have driven photography agencies to remove images created by artificial intelligence models from their databases. The worries come because AIs hoover up vast amounts of human-generated, copyrighted art to train themselves and use this database to generate images related to almost any text prompt. This has led to debate over who owns the copyright of an image generated by an AI.
出于对版权的担忧，图库网站将人工智能模型生成的图像从数据库中删除。之所以会出现这种担忧，是因为人工智能收集了大量由人类创作的、有版权的艺术作品来进行自我训练，并使用这个训练集生成与几乎所有文本提示相关的图像。这引发了关于谁拥有人工智能生成的图像版权的争论。
Stock photography agencies like Getty Images have announced that they will remove images created by AI models. A Getty spokesperson said that “there are open questions and real concerns with respect to the copyright of outputs from these models”.
盖蒂图片社等图库网站已经宣布，他们将删除人工智能模型创作的图片。盖蒂的一位发言人表示：“这些模型的输出版权存在一些未决问题和真正的担忧。”
Although the creators of some AI models have said that copyright of output will belong to the user who enters the prompt into the AI, smaller photo agencies are feeling the pressure to follow the example of the large companies. Dittmar Frohmann at stock agency Photocase says his company is likely to take the same approach.
尽管一些人工智能模型的开发者表示，输出的版权将属于向人工智能输入提示的用户，但较小的图库网站感到了效仿大公司的压力。图库网站Photocase的迪特马尔•弗罗曼表示，他的公司可能会采取同样的做法。
“Simply removing AI-generated images entirely from a platform is not a real solution to any of the challenges,” says Ryan Abbott at the University of Surrey, UK. He says that while in theory you can legally copyright images generated by an AI in the UK, and the same should be possible in the US, it hasn’t been tested in the UK and the US Copyright Office has a “policy of not allowing copyright on AI-generated art”.
英国萨里大学的瑞安•阿博特表示：“简单地从平台上完全删除人工智能生成的图像并不是任何挑战的真正解决方案。”他表示，虽然理论上你可以在英国合法地获得人工智能生成的图像的版权，在美国也应该如此，但在英国还没有对此进行过测试，而美国版权局有一项“不允许对人工智能产生的艺术进行版权保护的政策”。
Neil Brown at law firm Decoded.legal says the UK’s Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 protects all “computer-generated” works in the country, which would probably cover AI-generated work, but there are complications. Not only could the output image be covered by copyright, but the input prompt also could, if sufficiently detailed.
律师事务所Decoded.legal的尼尔·布朗表示，英国1988年的《版权、设计和专利法》保护所有“计算机生成”的作品，这可能会涵盖人工智能生成的作品，但其中存在一些复杂的问题。不仅输出图像可以受版权保护，如果输入的提示足够详细，也可以受版权保护。
Online marketplaces are already springing up that allow people to buy and sell detailed text prompts, and anyone able to prove that their text prompt is being used by someone else could have a copyright claim.
网络市场已经如雨后春笋般涌现，允许人们购买和出售详细的文本提示，任何能够证明自己的文本提示正在被其他人使用的人都可以提出版权索赔。
The makers of the AIs may have terms and conditions that further muddy the waters, says Brown. “The work that you create, in my view, could be protected by copyright. But that isn’t settled. So you could be in for some expensive litigation.”
布朗说，人工智能的开发商可能会制定一些限制性规定，使水变得更浑。“在我看来，你创作的作品可以受到版权的保护。但这并没有解决。所以你可能会面临一些昂贵的诉讼。”
Frohmann says Photocase is likely to seek explicit permission from the people submitting images to the agency before allowing AI companies to use its archive for training their AIs, because these artists may object to their work being used to develop an AI that could potentially replace them. References to AI training is already being inserted into the release forms for larger companies like Getty.
弗罗曼表示，Photocase可能会在允许人工智能公司使用其存档来训练他们的人工智能之前，寻求向其提交图像的人的明确许可，因为这些艺术家可能会反对他们的作品被用于开发可能取代他们的人工智能。对于像盖蒂这样的大公司，AI训练的参考已经被插入到图片发布表单中。
Despite his stance, Frohmann says he sees AI as a tool akin to editing software and that copyright should belong to the person prompting the AI. He also currently sees no threat to anyone’s livelihoods from AI art.
尽管弗罗曼的立场不同，但他认为人工智能是一种类似于编辑软件的工具，版权应该属于提示人工智能的人。他目前也不认为人工智能艺术会对任何人的生计构成威胁。
“The images, if you look at them, they look good – but totally boring and predictable, and soulless,” says Frohmann.
弗罗曼说：“如果你仔细看这些图片，你会发现它们看起来很好——但完全是无聊的、可预测的、没有灵魂的。”