> That’s the causal link.

But copyright was based on substantial similarity, not causal links. That is the subtle change. Copyright is expanding more and more.

In my view, unless there is substantially similarity to the infringed work, copyright should not be invoked.

Even the substantial similarity concept is already an expanded concept from original "protected expression".

It makes no sense to attack gen-AI for infringement, if we wanted the originals we would get the originals, you can copy anything you like on the web. Generating bootleg Harry Potter is slow, expensive and unfaithful to the original. We use gen-AI for creating things different from the training data.

Substantial similarly is less stringent than causal links. With substantial similarity the worlds’s a landline of unpopular media.

Copyright isn’t supposed to apply if you happen to write a story that bares an uncanny similarity to a story you never read written in 1952 in a language you don’t know that sold 54 copies.