Disney and Universal Sue Midjourney for Copyright Infringement | Hacker News Reader

Disney and Universal Sue Midjourney for Copyright Infringement

nytimes.com

43 pointsBGyss23 comments

Whilst I have a lot of sympathy for creatives, seeing (or hearing) other people's work has been a source of new work since forever. In many ways AI is doing the same but way more efficiently. What it is not doing is adding something new. The existing rules don't acknowledge that part of "being inspired by ...".

I disagree with it (generative AI) being incapable of adding new works. I have seen machine generated prompts rendered by image models create decidedly, in my opinion, new art works. A significant fraction of them I even liked.

Whether it's capable/incapable of doing it is much less important in a legal sense than whether it does/doesn't. When it comes to the specific images in the article, the AI clearly didn't add anything new. The average person wouldn't be able to tell whether those images were AI generated or official images from the rights' holders. If any of us tried to build a business around selling images like these, we would quickly receive a cease and desist before an eventual lawsuit if we continued.

Stability AI and Midjourney are the easy targets for these giant companies to go after.

Shouldn't they sue whoever uses it to make Disney IP?

Contributory infringement is also a thing:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contributory_copyright_infri...

They'd have to prove that Midjourney "knowingly" contributed.

They will start with this interview, which the CEO of Midjourney admitted that they trained on copyrighted content without the artists permission. [0]

[0] https://www.forbes.com/sites/robsalkowitz/2022/09/16/midjour...

The article is behind a paywall, but here’s an archived version for those who want to read it: https://archive.is/ekIQm

This is not at all surprising to me.

Just this week I asked for a picture of a cartoon Car. It produced an image so similar to Pixar Cars that I was surprised. I was hoping for something a bit more creative. I asked the AI a few follow-up questions about the first use of the windshield for eyes. That might not be a copyrightable thing but Pixar Cars have a certain look to them and these tools seem to produce a very similar look.

I didn't read the article due to the paywall.

When you simply ask for "a picture of a cartoon car" and nothing else, these models will give you a bland and generic depiction of a cartoon car, something like the lowest common denominator among cartoon car images according to their training data. Pixar's Cars is a popular depiction of cartoon cars.

If you want something more sophisticated and creative then you have to be the source of creativity, you have to describe details of the cartoon car, the setting, and the style, whatever you can think of to describe the thing that you actually want. "Picture of a car" doesn't cut it. If you can't describe it in words, then you make a scribble instead (I don't actually know if Midjourney supports this, I only use ComfyUI + local models and tools).

Most people don't know how to use these tools properly and they don't care, all they want and all they know is a "Make image" button. More sophisticated users (dare I say "artists"?) use it like a renderer for their ideas, sometimes literally integrated into Blender or other creative software.

How about "Cartoon car, not Pixar" for instance.

I think it's important for AI to learn from sources; just to know what not to do as well.

And I suppose it's legal to explore a visual space for your own personal use as well.

Actually publishing copyright infringing materials is a different story. Not sure you should blame the tool though.

Fair use. Let's not live in a pay-per-thought society.

Oh don’t worry, once BCIs get developed you’ll live in a pay per thought society, and if you think negatively of it, boy will you ever pay. It’s science fiction today but I doubt it will remain so for our lifetimes.

If we let them own our thoughts they will -- control over AI inputs is part of that dystopian trajectory IMO. And if it arrives in our lifetime I will flee The Convergence and hide with Priest Entity Nada and Polo in the Space Anomaly :nerdface

lol I don't think that the ability to spit out recognizable images of copyrighted characters really counts as fair use

AI inputs are not outputs. Copyright exists at the output. You can't sue someone for reading every book in the library unless they try to sell one of them as their own.

If I buy a pencil and draw a copyrighted character, is that copyright infringement? No. If I sell that drawing? Yes.

Midjourney and other AI companies are not selling you the drawing, they're selling you the pencil. What you do with that pencil and the drawings you create with that pencil is on you and you alone.

Because suing made the VCR, Napster, and DVRs disappear... Now Disney & Universal take on Midjourney to stop democratized AI art.

Suing made Grooveshark disappear. I still miss Grooveshark's UI.

Notably they didn’t sue OpenAI or Google or another entity with a huge war chest.

Get the ruling. Then license out to the big money.

Midjourney? Now that's a name I've not heard in.... /s

Surprised it took Disney & Universal this long. Suppose they issued cease & desists awhile ago, so this is actually a gradually escalating campaign.

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