論人工智慧輔助之音樂創作與其著作權取得之爭議

Artificial Intelligence-Assisted Creation of a Musical Work and Issues Related to Copyright Ownership

本文意在分析人工智慧輔助音樂創作及其著作權取得之議題，並以「樂點Letron」APP 為討論基礎；該APP 為由國內公司所開發、且經商業化之AI 輔助音樂創作軟體。待分析者為AI 著作與使用者著作，前者指AI 程式所產生的音樂著作，後者指由該APP 輔助所創作之音樂著作。相關議題包括原創性、著作人身份、與著作財產權之歸屬等。本文指出AI 著作較難具有原創性，但使用者著作之原創性問題應不大。此外，本文認為使用者著作可視為共同著作，而共同著作人包括：（1）該APP 之使用者；（2）AI 程式設計者或訓練者、或其雇主。最後，針對著作財產權歸屬問題，本文建議修法以創建「以電腦程式產生之音樂著作」、及界定該音樂著作之「著作財產權人」為「所使用之電腦程式著作」之著作財產權人或合法使用人。

This article analyzes issues of copyright ownership concerning artificial intelligence-assisted creation of a popular musical work based on a case of Letron APP, a mobile-device application. Letron App is a commercial software or computer program developed by a Taiwanese company which uses AI to assist music creation. Letron APP has been commercialized and available at Apple Store and Android-based stores. In terms of Letron APP, there are two kinds of AI-related works for the analysis. The first is musical work generated by an AI program that was written and modified to learn and create musical melodies and lyrics. The second AI-related work is what an APP user makes through Letron APP’s assistance. The relevant copyright issues include originality, authorship, and ownership of such an AI-related work. This article argues that an AI-generated work may lack originality while a user-generated work may meet the requirement of minimal originality. AI creates music melodies by simply treating those melodies as digital data without inputting any personal characteristics into its creation. On the other hand, to acquire copyright protection, a person has to show its unique personal characteristics in his/her creation, such that his/her work can have originality. Additionally, this article argues that a user-generated work is a co-work of which the co-authors include the APP user and the AI programmer or program trainer. The employer of the AI programmer or program trainer may be a co-author under the work-for-hire doctrine. Lastly, regarding the ownership issue, this article proposes a reform to the Copyright Act. The proposed amendment needs to provide a definition of “computer program-generated musical work.” The amendment also has to include an ownership clause that allocates the ownership of that musical work to the copyright owner or that authorized user of the AI software or computer program.