In November 2025, the Robbins Collection Research Center cosponsored the conference “IP and Human Creativity in the AI Age: A Global Conversation” in partnership with Berkeley Law’s Asia IP and Competition Law Center and Korea Law Center. The symposium shares its title with the UC Berkeley Law course launched in 2023, reflecting the university’s sustained academic focus on these issues. Held at the UC Berkeley Faculty Club, the event gathered a leading group of scholars, judges, and practitioners to investigate how the rapid ascent of generative artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping the landscape of intellectual property (IP).
Presented by the Asia IP & Competition Law Center, the proceedings began with an opening keynote by Robert Merges, cofounder and co-faculty director of the Berkeley Center for Law and Technology. Presenters hailed from across the globe—representing the United States, South Korea, China (including the mainland and Hong Kong), Japan, Singapore, Germany, and the United Kingdom—and included distinguished voices such as Daryl Lim of Penn State Dickinson Law and the Honorable Kwangnam Kim of the Seoul High Court, among others.
Bringing a “human-creativity-centered” lens to the conversation, participants explored how AI challenges established doctrines, specifically regarding the legal status of inventors, authorship, and the “fair use” defense in copyright infringement. The discussion also weighed the legal standing of works created in tandem with AI, questioning their eligibility for protection and how regulatory frameworks can ensure that technology empowers, rather than replaces, human creators.
The significance of the conference extends beyond the immediate academic community. For the Robbins Collection Research Center, the event highlighted the convergence of common-law and civil-law traditions in addressing seismic technological changes. On a global scale, the dialogue marked a critical moment for international IP law. As generative AI crosses jurisdictional boundaries, the conference emphasized the necessity of a harmonized, transpacific approach to regulation. Through these high-level exchanges, the Robbins Center and its partners are helping to shape a global legal framework that upholds intellectual property as a meaningful safeguard for human invention amid this century’s transformative shifts.