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Only humans can be ‘authors’ say Canadian music publishers in test case on copyright status of AI-generated works | by Chris Cooke | Jul 24, 2026 | Complete Music Update

The debate over the copyright status of AI-generated works continues, and in Canada there’s a key court battle as part of that debate centered on an AI-generated artwork. The precedent set in that case could impact on music copyright too, so Canada’s music publishers have formally intervened.

Music Publishers Canada has formally intervened in a legal battle in the Canadian courts that asks whether AI-generated works are protected by copyright, and also whether an AI tool can be classified as an ‘author’ of any one work, possibly alongside any human creators who utilised the AI tool.

The case involves an artwork called ‘Suryast’, which was created by Ankit Sahni using an AI tool called RAGHAV. However, despite it centering on the copyright in a visual work, MPC notes that the outcome of this case “is likely to have a significant impact on how Canadian law determines whether a musical work created with the assistance of generative AI tools is eligible for copyright protection”.

Which is why the music publishers represented by MPC have an active interest in whether or not the Federal Court Of Canada decides that ‘Suryast’ is protected by copyright and, if it is, whether or not AI tool RAGHAV should be considered a co-author.

As far as MPC is concerned, “only a human can be an author for copyright purposes”, and “while there may be circumstances where copyright protection is afforded to a work created by a human with the help of AI tools, the AI tool itself should not be recognised as a legal ‘author’”.

The copyright status of AI-generated works is an ongoing debate. In most countries, it seems likely that entirely AI-generated works do not enjoy copyright protection, although there are some differences around the world. UK copyright does provide protection for what the Copyright Act calls ‘computer generated works’, though that could be removed as part of the government’s ongoing review of AI and copyright law.

However, while AI-generated works are not protected by copyright in most countries, AI-assisted works - where a human creator uses AI tools - probably are. But the big debate is how much human creativity there needs to be for copyright protection to kick in.

Ankit Sahni’s ‘Suryast’ has become an interesting test case in both the US and Canada. Sahni took a photo of a sunset and then prompted the RAGHAV AI to rework that image in the style of Vincent Van Gogh’s painting ‘The Starry Night’. He then sought to register a copyright in the outputted image, which he called ‘Suryast’, in various countries, including the US and Canada.

The US Copyright Office declined to register a copyright in ‘Suryast’. It concluded that only humans can be authors for copyright purposes and therefore AI-generated works do not enjoy copyright protection. And while AI-assisted works can be protected by copyright, the prompts provided by Sahni to RAGHAV were not sufficient to constitute human creativity.

That was in line with the decision made by the US Copyright Office in relation to another AI-generated artwork, ‘A Recent Entrance To Paradise’. US courts backed the Copyright Office’s decision on that work and, earlier this year, the US Supreme Court declined to intervene in the case.

Which means the rule in the US is pretty much fixed that AI-generated works do not enjoy copyright protection and, while AI-assisted works do, simple text prompting by the human using an AI tool is not enough for copyright protection to kick in.

However, up in Canada, the Canadian Intellectual Property Office did initially register a copyright in ‘Suryast’ back in 2021, listing both Sahni and RAGHAV as co-authors. But that registration was then challenged in the courts by the Canadian Internet Policy And Public Interest Clinic.

It made two key arguments. First ‘Suryast’ does not meet the originality requirements in Canadian copyright law in order to enjoy copyright protection. And even if it does, an AI tool cannot be listed as an author for copyright purposes. That legal challenge is still working its way through the courts and the ruling in the case should prove influential regarding the copyright status of AI works in Canada.

Hence the MPC seeking permission to intervene, which was granted last month. In its submission, MPC cites both global copyright treaties and the approach taken in various other countries, including the US, insisting that “Canada’s approach to assessing whether copyright protects works created with AI tools should be consistent with the approaches that are being adopted in other jurisdictions around the world”.

When it comes to deciding whether an AI-assisted work enjoys copyright protection, MPC says that “a principled yet flexible approach is needed”.

Canadian copyright law “already assesses copyright protection by focusing on the extent of the human author’s contributions of skill and judgment to the creation of the work”, it then adds.

And “that should be no different in the AI context: courts should take a case-by-case, contextual look at how a creator used AI to support their creative efforts instead of adopting a categorical, ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach”.

SOURCE:
https://completemusicupdate.com/only-humans-can-be-authors-say-canadian-music-publishers-in-test-case-on-copyright-status-of-ai-generated-works/