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Section 69b of the German Copyright Law "Deutsches Urheberrecht" states that:

Where a computer program is created by an employee in the execution of his duties or following the instructions of his employer, the employer alone shall be entitled to exercise all economic rights in the computer program, unless otherwise agreed.

However, what happens if the computer program is created by a third party? Do the economics rights, and copyrights, belong to the third party that created the computer program or the entity that uses the program to create, in this case, a musical composition?

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  • What do you actually mean? You use Microsoft Word for creating a book? Or you use the latest AI software, which can be fed with all the works of an author, analyses the style and everything else, and prints a book that looks as if it could be a lost work of that author?
    – gnasher729
    Commented Jul 8, 2021 at 23:29
  • @gnasher729 I mean that I use an AI, created by someone else, and have it write a new book (either with certain parameters or with the a broad requirement like genre).
    – Ski Mask
    Commented Jul 9, 2021 at 11:45

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You are confusing economic rights in a computer program with economic rights in a work created using the program. The latter belong to the user of the program, though the rights in works made for hire typically belong to the employer rather than the employee.

Suppose for the sake of argument that J. K. Rowling used Microsoft Word to draft her Harry Potter series of books. Would Microsoft have any economic rights in those books? No, it would not. Similarly:

what happens if the computer program is created by a third party? Do the economics rights, and copyrights, belong to the third party that created the computer program or the entity that uses the program to create, in this case, a musical composition?

If I understand correctly, there is a computer program here that was created by a third party ("T"), used by someone ("S") to create a musical composition in tbe course of employment with some employer ("E").

In this case, the economic rights in the program belong to T, and the economic rights in the composition belong to E.

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