#135 When Copyright Law Meets AI: A Litigator's Frontline View

Scott Sholder didn't plan on becoming one of the lawyers at the center of one of the most consequential legal battles of the AI era. The entertainment litigator and partner at Cowan, DeBaets, Abrahams & Sheppard LLP — a boutique firm with a long history in film, television, theater, music, visual arts, and publishing — found his copyright expertise suddenly in high demand the moment generative AI began reshaping the creative economy. Now co-counsel on class action suits against Anthropic and OpenAI, Scott is helping define where human authorship ends and machine output begins. In this episode of Lawyers Who Learn, host David Schnurman, CEO of Lawline, sits down with Scott to unpack the fast-moving legal landscape where copyright law and generative AI collide. Scott breaks down why raw AI output belongs to no one even if a prompt might earn copyright protection. He explains the crucial distinction between input and output claims, what thin copyright actually means, and why effort alone doesn't make AI-generated work protectable. In the midst of a litigation landscape  with over 100 lawsuits filed against AI companies and settlements pending, Scott offers a practitioner's view of a legal doctrine under genuine stress. But the conversation doesn't stop at doctrine. Scott shares how a journalism major who once dreamed of music transactional work ended up in litigation — and why staying visible in a competitive field has everything to do with being unapologetically yourself. His lifelong taekwondo practice and intentional approach to stress reveal a lawyer who builds discipline into every part of his life. For any legal professional navigating the collision of creativity and technology, this episode is required listening.