L'intelligenza artificiale e la definizione di "opera dell'ingegno", Aida. Annali italiani del diritto d'autore, della cultura e dello spettacolo (2018)

The essay tackles the issue of the impact of creative works produced by AI systems on the legal category of “oeuvres de l’esprit”. An overview of current applications of AI in the artistic/literary fields shows that (human) authors carry out their creative activity mostly in drafting algorithms, or in setting up the technical and / or expressive devices that will subsequently allow other individuals to show off their own creativity. This calls for further reflections on access of algorithms to copyright protection, as well as on the legal recognition of a specific category of “AI works”, including those forms of art / literature in which the work is the outcome of an ongoing interaction between the AI system and its users. In those cases, the “oeuvre de l’esprit” does not assume a final and complete form, but it is subject to constant, and often non – predictable (and, therefore, not pre-defined) changes.