"Transformative" in copyright is a much stronger word than the word "transform" is in computer science. If your "transformation" could be used in many of the sa

"Transformative" in copyright is a much stronger word than the word "transform" is in computer science. If your "transformation" could be used in many of the same places as the original, it is most likely not transformative in the copyright sense. If you modify or add on to a work, most of the time what you're creating is called a derivative work, which is not protected from copyright claims. We don't really have established law on this particular case, but to me, what neural networks do seems much more similar to tracing or redrawing some artwork from memory than it does to, for example, a parody. But also, non-human actors cannot create copyrighted works, transformative or otherwise. For example, a photographer once gave his camera to a monkey and it took some pretty interesting pictures. He tried to get copyright for these photos, but the Copyright Office ruled that he wasn't the one who created them and the monkey is not a person, so the photos are not copyrightable at all. The law could be changed in these cases, but if we're treating the AI as a creative agent rather than a reservoir of other people's works that humans can request from it, then it seems to me like AI-created works should simply not be copyrightable.