USCO doesn't make the law nor do they decide what the law says, they just register Copyrights. However, registration is not necessary for a work to be protected under Copyright law.

Congress makes the law then the Court interprets it, which hasn't happened yet.

If choosing the position / angle of a camera and its settings is enough to gain Copyright over the images it generates then prompting a model to generate an image is enough too. I don't see how anyone can come to any other conclusion.

The creativity bar for Copyright is not high. An alphabetically ordered list of customers does not meet it. Pointing a camera at someone and pushing the button does.

Congress has made the laws and USCO interprets them and makes rules based on its interpretation. Those are the implementation of those laws.

Directing is not copyrightable. The person who takes the picture owns the copyright (fixation rule) unless some other contract says otherwise. Treating the prompt writer as a director reduces their claim to ownership.

(Edit to to clarify interpretation of parent)