Just shy of 10 years ago, a crested macaque monkey in the jungles of Indonesia pressed the shutter button of a photographer’s camera, taking a selfie of himself smiling. The ensuing photo went on to be massively viral and sparked a unique debate: Who owns the picture if a human didn’t take it?

The Supreme Court answered this in the landmark case Naruto the Monkey v. Slater (2018). The case asked the question: if copyright laws serve to “promote the progress of science and useful arts” by granting “authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries”, as outlined in Article 1, Section 8, Clause 8 of the US Constitution, then how could a non-human (or in this case, a monkey) fulfill those requirements? The argument made on behalf of Naruto was that he had “constitutional standing” to the ownership of his own likeness; however, the counterargument responded that he may not have the ability to file for Copyright under the Copyright Act of 1976. Though it may not come as a surprise, the Supreme Court decided that “this monkey—and all animals, since they are not human—lacks statutory standing under the Copyright Act”.

What makes this significant is how this case shaped future copyright debates, namely, those concerning Artificial Intelligence and artificially generated images. As a result of the previous ruling that copyright can only be held and created by a human, Naruto v. Slater serves as precedent for a much more recent case. In 2024, computer scientist and copyright theorist Dr. Steven Thaler asked the US Copyright Office to register and protect his artwork, “A Recent Entrance to Paradise”. The only problem: Dr. Thaler’s own AI System called “the Creativity Machine” had generated the image entirely on its own, and Dr. Thaler listed it as the sole author in the official registration documents. The Office denied his application for copyright registration, and upon appeal, found itself in court with Thaler.

It was quickly ruled and upheld that “the Creativity Machine cannot be the recognized author of a copyrighted work because the Copyright Act of 1976 requires all eligible works to be authored in the first instance by a human being,” despite the appellant’s argument that “he is the work’s author by virtue of making and using the Creativity Machine”. Using the same logic used to deny Naruto his copyright, the courts denied the Creativity Machine’s (and therefore Thaler’s) copyright.

Although Thaler’s story ends there, it raises an interesting question. If the law allowed an AI model to hold copyright of the work it creates, who would hold the limited monopoly the copyright provides: the person who built the machine, or the machine itself?

As copyright legislation continues to grow and adapt to the rise of AI and other complicated technologies, it is important to remember the origins of these rights. The Constitution guarantees these protections to promote the progress of science and the useful arts. Therefore, it should be of the highest priority to speak with Congress in constructive and progressive dialogues that meet the demands these technologies create. For instance, one demand of AI technology is on our energy infrastructure and data storage. In turn, it is up to our government to support this growing demand and, more importantly, ensure the proper measures of guidance and regulation are in place for such development to be effective and safe.

We dive more into how U.S. governance frameworks are still evolving to keep pace with these rapidly advancing technologies on our Artificial Intelligence & Quantum page here.

There are many ways that legislators can attempt to reconcile these conflicting issues. They could choose to simply revisit the Copyright Act itself, given how much the digital world has changed in the past 50 years since the act was written, or simply abandon it in favor of a new system. Regardless, lawmakers must balance previous rulings and established judicial precedent with the rapidly changing landscape of technology development. It is fair to say that this problem will not be resolved overnight, and we can expect many more years of litigation before a clear legal picture is painted.