Tom Graham, CEO of generative AI company Metaphysic, has reportedly become the first person to submit for copyright registration of his AI likeness with the U.S. Copyright Office. According to a press release issuesd by the company, “Graham, through this submission, demonstrates the increasingly fine line between reality and computer-generated media as he and Metaphysic seek to create a new bundle of intellectual property rights that must be available to any individual in the future.”
Metaphysics is known for popularizing a deepfake TikTok account spoofing Tom Cruise.
“Generative AI can create content that looks and feels real, and regular people’s avatars can be inserted into content by third parties without their consent. This is not right, and we should never lose control over our identity, privacy or biometric data,” said Thomas Graham, CEO of Metaphysic. “I hope that copyright registration of the photo-realistic AI-generated version of myself will increase my ability to take action against unauthorized AI impersonations of myself in the future. Today’s law supports that. We all need to work hard to ensure that future laws and regulations strengthen individual’s rights and protect vulnerable members of society.”
Producing the AI likeness required Graham to record a three-minute video of himself on a mobile phone to capture his likeness, voice, and biometric data. Once received, Metaphysic utilized its hyperreal AI tools to create an AI avatar of present-day Graham. Graham put a lot of effort into creating and curating the training dataset and working with the team at Metaphysic to hone in on the AI look he wanted. Beyond iterating on the look of his AI likeness, Graham and the team also took steps to composite and merge the AI model output into the underlying video to create an accurate representation of a hyperrealistic AI version of himself.
