Does AI artwork qualify for a U.S. copyright? And, why are most publishers still careful about using AI art?
There’s not a hotter “rights” question in publishing in 2025 than the complex issue of copyright protection when using AI image tools. This week, the U.S. Copyright Office issued a 52-page analysis of several related issues.
You can download the entire PDF below and read it for yourself. If you are regularly using such software—even for your own social media or your personal website—then you will find this overview intriguing.
If you’re only interested in the bottom-line conclusions, here are a few:
1.) Can an AI-assisted image qualify for a copyright? Yes—but the answer depends on how much the creator of that artwork interacted with the AI software in producing the final image. Simply writing a “prompt” that results in the AI creation of an image does not qualify for copyright. However, if a person collaborates with AI tools in a more organic way, then the final artwork may qualify for copyright protection. The report concludes that this is such a nuanced area of creative work that case-by-case decisions will be made—based on the applicant’s description of AI’s role in the creative process.
2.) The text of an AI image “prompt” does not qualify for a copyright at this point. There are a number of media professionals who are trying to build businesses—including selling books—based on the way they write highly detailed AI prompts. While they are free to market their professional expertise—the texts of their specific prompts do not qualify for copyright protection.
3.) We won’t see new copyright laws focusing on these issues anytime soon. The report concludes that existing copyright laws are sufficient to sort out these issues—at least for now.
Here’s the U.S. Copyright and Artificial Intelligence report
How do Front Edge Publishing and ReadTheSpirit magazine use AI art?
As of early 2025, the majority of established American publishers avoid using AI-generated images on book covers. Many legal claims still are pending from artists whose work was incorporated into AI tools without proper permission. Most publishers are concerned about these pending cases, especially claims that some AI tools continue to use specific, discernible elements that violate artists’ rights. However, this consensus among publishers is evolving. For example, a number of startup publishers have embraced AI art as a speedy, cost-cutting option for creating covers. Also, this new U.S. Copyright report is expanding awareness that the creative process—especially among professionals using some level of AI colaboration—can be far more complex and nuanced than many people may have realized.
At Front Edge Publishing, as of early 2025, we do not use AI-generated art in producing our book covers, which are designed by our award-winning Art Director Rick Nease. In effect, we stand with the majority of other well-established publishing houses in avoiding AI on covers at this point.
However, we do use AI-generated art in our weekly magazine www.ReadTheSpirit.com to create some of the colorful illustrations for our columns. We write prompts, generate artwork but then we creatively adapt those “outputs” before they appear in our magazine. That means, based on this new U.S. Copyright report, some of those illustrations in our weekly magazine could qualify for a copyright. We don’t assert copyrights on those images, though, because we publish everything in ReadTheSpirit magazine via Creative Commons in the hope that our readers will widely share and repost our columns, including the artwork.