> the premise of all this is basically that there’s originality based on ideas, right?

That’s part of it. But it depends. I’m not sure exactly which premise we’re talking about, since digital painting and writing apps are fairly different activities. It also depends on whether we’re making legal distinctions or just judging originality for the sake of narrative or discussion. Either way, I personally think that original ideas are only part of the equation, and that original execution matters for the purposes of art as well as for the purposes of software, and this goes if we’re talking about copyrights as well.

I’ve done digital painting, and written apps for others, as well as written tools and libraries made for digital artists. As a digital artist, I’ve had people wonder out loud in front of me whether I had any skill as an artists since “the computer did all the work”. As an app developer I give the person commissioning the work and giving the specifications the credit for the design, even though I might have to make many unspecified micro-decisions. Likewise, I take credit for the design of apps I write for myself. As a contractor, the client is the “artist” for the purposes of this conversation. I’m responsible for execution of their vision, and I can hand some of that off to AI in which case I’m giving away or sharing some credit for the execution. As the author of tools or libraries for artists, my credit stops with the tools or libraries, and artists that use those tools get all credit for both the ideas and the execution of their works.

Anyway, I mostly agree with you in the sense that apps I write are only as original as the original pieces I put in them. There is room for creativity (depending on the flexibility of the client/employer), maybe for novel modes of UX, maybe for thoughtful design and beautiful interfaces (both code and graphics). It’s also possible to make good apps without adding a lot of originality too, and there’s nothing wrong with that - it can be more efficient and better for the client/employer to not push your own ideas. That’s more engineering & business than art/authorship/originality, but still a valid lens for evaluating your identity and responsibilities.