Portrait of the Artist as AI

Creativity has always been a superpower inherent and unique to humans. It’s how we’ve told stories, shaped our cultures and built civilizations. But today that belief is being challenged.

Technology has evolved from a brush or a hammer that helps us make art to a supercomputer that can make its own art. This brings us to the edge of something both exciting and terrifying as artificial intelligence (AI), particularly generative AI, has emerged as a creative force of its own.

Now, I won’t bore you with the nitty-gritty of what AI is, how it works, what it creates, what it has not created—or at least not just yet. Many of you readers know all of that by now. For decades, AI has been making headlines, taking space in many research journals. Countless science fiction books and movies have explored different worlds with AI—some paint a utopia where AI is a friend, others a dystopia where AI becomes the arch enemy who takes over the world.

Like the papers, books and movies we’ve consumed, our ongoing 2nd Philippine International Copyright Summit (PICS), which is free to all artists and curious minds, offers us a moment to slow down from the fast pace of technological advancements and ask the more profound questions.

With the theme, “Unlocking the Future: Tech Trends and Challenges in Copyright,” the 2nd PICS is an opportunity to meet like-minded people and unlike-minded people to brainstorm meaningfully for solutions. It is a place to learn and unlearn. It is a safe space for artists to share their experiences and be heard as we share the vision of creating new frontiers for the Philippine creative economy.

At the heart of these conversations is intellectual property (IP). Copyright, in particular, has been our shield—protecting artists from having their work exploited without permission. But as AI reshapes the way art is made, we need to ask if our current IP laws are enough. Should AI-generated works be copyrighted? Should the developers of AI be given credit when its algorithm leads to creative outputs? What will the creative frontier look like? And how will we protect artists in the digital future?

To these questions, IPOPHL attempts for answers as we intend to soon release guidance on this for artists.

This guidance is a result of years of listening to them.

We know many artists today are largely concerned about strengthening their ownership of their works at a time IP infringement is digital and widespread, making this 2nd PICS timely as October is National Anti-Piracy Month. But as in history, where the clamor for copyright protection was loudest, the progress in creativity and technologies is strongest in pushing boundaries.

As we navigate future landscapes of the copyright system, technologies and AI, we have to acknowledge that the modern tools of today will be more deeply involved in the creative process in the years to come. And we need to come up with solutions to live in harmony with technology and AI.

At the end of the day, technologies may move the world, but it is us humans who can give it meaning. It is us who can shape the direction of the technological race to create tools that strengthen our creative superpowers, and not necessarily replace us entirely.