Still monkeying around

The Washington Post reported last week that, in the Monkey Selfie appeal, a "prominent anthropologist at the University of Notre Dame" has filed an amicus brief arguing that "[t]here is no dispute that Naruto created the images in question. Naruto is, therefore, the author."  That misses the point, I think.  That's a scientific conclusion.  The question in the case is a legal one:  does it make sense to consider animals to be authors in order to achieve the purposes of the Copyright Act?  On that question, Mike Masnick and Jordan Weissmann have the better of the argument.