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I’m curious. If I’ve spent 8 hours getting the perfect prompt, fine tuning a few LORAs, mixing them, choosing between 8 different checkpointed stable diffusion

I’m curious. If I’ve spent 8 hours getting the perfect prompt, fine tuning a few LORAs, mixing them, choosing between 8 different checkpointed stable diffusion models, and have done a bunch of in painting, does this constitute a copyrightable work? Certainly a lot of artistic vision and effort to get to the finished “work”.

danuker 4y ago
I would assume the prompt itself is copyrightable. As far as inpainting or other manual modifications, I'm uncertain.
DiscourseFan 4y ago
You might be able to copy-write the method by which you generated something, but not the thing generated itself. Although even the former act might be too far, it's like saying that you fooled around with the parameters on a computer for 8 hours before it started working, and now you want to copy-write the operation of the computer: the computer is doing what it was intended to do, you just needed time to figure out how to use it. You could copy-write a training manual for how to ride a bike, but not bike riding itself.
- mlindner 4y ago
  Nitpick: Everyone does this, but it's "copyright" as in "the right to copy", rather than "copywrite"/"copy-write".
- bawolff 4y ago
  You cannot copyright the method of doing anything. You might be able to patent it, but that is a different thing. Copyright applies to the end result. Patents apply to methods and mechanisms.
  - DiscourseFan 4y ago
    No I understand, by "the method" I meant a written work about how the operation is performed--apologies if that was too vague in my OP--not the literal method itself, as in the example of copy-writing a manual for riding a bike.
mlindner 4y ago
Sounds like the prompt itself is quite copyrightable, the same as any code is copyrightable. Indeed in the contents is this: > While some prompts may be sufficiently creative to be protected by copyright, that does not mean that material generated from a copyrightable prompt is itself copyrightable.
bawolff 4y ago
In usa (but not uk), effort isn't relevent, just how "creative" the work is. For example, digitizing famous paintings is labour intensive but not considered copyrihtable.
Animats 4y ago
That is the "sweat of the brow" copyright argument, and it has been rejected in by US courts.
- greenyoda 4y ago
  Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweat_of_the_brow https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweat_of_the_brow Rejection by US courts: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweat_of_the_brow#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweat_of_the_brow#United_State...
- djent 4y ago
  The parent is complaining of amount of effort put into the work but should be justifying that each of those steps was a creative decision by a human which contributed to the end result.
  - corysama 4y ago
    With ControlNet and LatentCouple you are doing straight-up set direction. With Loras you are casting, costuming and directing the film/lens/lighting.
    - Animats 4y ago
      One could argue that setting up a printing press for high-quality art printing is creative. Deciding what inks to use for a 7-color press and how to separate the original image was a creative act. Or at least it used to be. Now it's automated.
snickerbockers 4y ago
the OP doesnt include any exceptions based on effort, so no.
dragonwriter 4y ago
> If I’ve spent 8 hours getting the perfect prompt, fine tuning a few LORAs, mixing them, choosing between 8 different checkpointed stable diffusion models, and have done a bunch of in painting, does this constitute a copyrightable work? The 8 hours doesn’t matter. By the USCO’s ruling, iterative prompt refinement probably wouldn’t, but that’s not super clear (partially, because the USCO’s description of what the model is doing justifying its determination is a fundamentally strained metaphor, so while its clear how it applies to the exact case it describes, its not clear how it generalizes.) If you are fine-tuning a model (LORA, Checkpoint, whatever), then your input isn’t just a prompt to the model (once or in an iterative process with review of the output), so, your pretty far outside of where the ruling provides clear guidance. > and have done a bunch of in painting, inpainting is probably the thing most (even though it again involves prompting, it involves specific selection of where within the image to apply that based on aesthetic concerns) similar to the traditional creative parts of visual art, and the strongest argument given the shape of the USCO description of its rule. But, I have a feeling that that a rule that appeals to tradition and vague analogy to lower tech visual techniques probably won’t be anywhere close to the final word on copyrightability in this space.
- hnbad 4y ago
  IANAL but I'd assume "inpainting" is legally considered equivalent to arranging. You're not pushing pixels in Photoshop, you're just running the AI again on a particular part of the output, thus combining that output with previous output. This seems equivalent to bricolage at best.
hnbad 4y ago
That sounds like your prompt is protected by copyright. I don't see why the output of a machine you feed your prompt into should be.
- anticensor 4y ago
  That argument runs afoul of the "rule of the shorter term" of the jurisdictions that start the copyright term from the publication instead of creation.
mindvirus 4y ago
Very interesting take! I wonder if a similar argument would apply to something like https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOD7HQOnKAE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOD7HQOnKAE - where the setup is a lot of work, but the actual execution is entirely up to nature/gravity.

danuker 4y ago

I would assume the prompt itself is copyrightable. As far as inpainting or other manual modifications, I'm uncertain.

DiscourseFan 4y ago

You might be able to copy-write the method by which you generated something, but not the thing generated itself. Although even the former act might be too far, it's like saying that you fooled around with the parameters on a computer for 8 hours before it started working, and now you want to copy-write the operation of the computer: the computer is doing what it was intended to do, you just needed time to figure out how to use it. You could copy-write a training manual for how to ride a bike, but not bike riding itself.

mlindner 4y ago
Nitpick: Everyone does this, but it's "copyright" as in "the right to copy", rather than "copywrite"/"copy-write".
bawolff 4y ago
You cannot copyright the method of doing anything. You might be able to patent it, but that is a different thing. Copyright applies to the end result. Patents apply to methods and mechanisms.
- DiscourseFan 4y ago
  No I understand, by "the method" I meant a written work about how the operation is performed--apologies if that was too vague in my OP--not the literal method itself, as in the example of copy-writing a manual for riding a bike.

mlindner 4y ago

Sounds like the prompt itself is quite copyrightable, the same as any code is copyrightable. Indeed in the contents is this: > While some prompts may be sufficiently creative to be protected by copyright, that does not mean that material generated from a copyrightable prompt is itself copyrightable.

bawolff 4y ago

In usa (but not uk), effort isn't relevent, just how "creative" the work is. For example, digitizing famous paintings is labour intensive but not considered copyrihtable.

Animats 4y ago

That is the "sweat of the brow" copyright argument, and it has been rejected in by US courts.

greenyoda 4y ago
Reference: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweat_of_the_brow https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweat_of_the_brow Rejection by US courts: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweat_of_the_brow#United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweat_of_the_brow#United_State...
djent 4y ago
The parent is complaining of amount of effort put into the work but should be justifying that each of those steps was a creative decision by a human which contributed to the end result.
- corysama 4y ago
  With ControlNet and LatentCouple you are doing straight-up set direction. With Loras you are casting, costuming and directing the film/lens/lighting.
  - Animats 4y ago
    One could argue that setting up a printing press for high-quality art printing is creative. Deciding what inks to use for a 7-color press and how to separate the original image was a creative act. Or at least it used to be. Now it's automated.

snickerbockers 4y ago

the OP doesnt include any exceptions based on effort, so no.

dragonwriter 4y ago

> If I’ve spent 8 hours getting the perfect prompt, fine tuning a few LORAs, mixing them, choosing between 8 different checkpointed stable diffusion models, and have done a bunch of in painting, does this constitute a copyrightable work? The 8 hours doesn’t matter. By the USCO’s ruling, iterative prompt refinement probably wouldn’t, but that’s not super clear (partially, because the USCO’s description of what the model is doing justifying its determination is a fundamentally strained metaphor, so while its clear how it applies to the exact case it describes, its not clear how it generalizes.) If you are fine-tuning a model (LORA, Checkpoint, whatever), then your input isn’t just a prompt to the model (once or in an iterative process with review of the output), so, your pretty far outside of where the ruling provides clear guidance. > and have done a bunch of in painting, inpainting is probably the thing most (even though it again involves prompting, it involves specific selection of where within the image to apply that based on aesthetic concerns) similar to the traditional creative parts of visual art, and the strongest argument given the shape of the USCO description of its rule. But, I have a feeling that that a rule that appeals to tradition and vague analogy to lower tech visual techniques probably won’t be anywhere close to the final word on copyrightability in this space.

hnbad 4y ago
IANAL but I'd assume "inpainting" is legally considered equivalent to arranging. You're not pushing pixels in Photoshop, you're just running the AI again on a particular part of the output, thus combining that output with previous output. This seems equivalent to bricolage at best.

hnbad 4y ago

That sounds like your prompt is protected by copyright. I don't see why the output of a machine you feed your prompt into should be.

anticensor 4y ago
That argument runs afoul of the "rule of the shorter term" of the jurisdictions that start the copyright term from the publication instead of creation.

mindvirus 4y ago

Very interesting take! I wonder if a similar argument would apply to something like https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOD7HQOnKAE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOD7HQOnKAE - where the setup is a lot of work, but the actual execution is entirely up to nature/gravity.