alt Hacker NewsI think you should interpret it like this:
You cannot copyright the alphabet, but you can copyright the way letters are put together.
Now, with AI the abstraction level goes from individual letters to functions, classes, and maybe even entire files.
You can't copyright those (when written using AI), but you __can__ copyright the way they are put together.
> You can't copyright those anymore (when written using AI), but you __can__ copyright the way they are put together.
Sort of, but not really. Copyright usually applies to a specific work. You can copyright Harry Potter. But you can't copyright the general class of "Wizard boy goes to wizard school". Copyrights generally can't be applied to classes of works. Only one specific work. (Direct copies - eg made with a photocopier - are still considered the same work.)
Patterns (of all sorts) usually fall under patent law, not copyright law. Patents have some additional requirements - notably including that a patent must be novel and non-obvious. I broadly think software patents are a bad idea. Software is usually obvious. Patents stifle innovation.
Is an AI "copy" a copy like a photocopier would make? Or is it a novel work? It seems more like the latter to me. An AI copy of a program (via a spec) won't be a copy of the original code. It'll be programmed differently. Thats why "clean room reimplementations" are a thing - because doing that process means you can't just copy the code itself. But what do I know, I'm not a lawyer or a judge. I think we'll have to wait for this stuff to shake out before anyone really knows what the rules will end up being.
Weird variants of a lot of this stuff have been tested in court. Eg the Google v Oracle case from a few years ago.