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Comment by afavour | Hacker News Reader

Because they didn't get any money from the daycare and they will get money from OpenAI when you make your Sora video. That's all there is to it.

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I have a feeling that the long-term economics of this don't really work. OpenAI is burning money and Altman has already gone out in public saying how Sora-generated content is being made in large volumes for little audience.

>People are generating much more than we expected per user, and a lot of videos are being generated for very small audiences.

If OpenAI is going to pay Disney money for Winnie the Pooh smoking crack, I get the feeling that the money is going to come not from Sora profits but from companies that invested in OpenAI. Companies like Disney. Not that Sora is going to generate any profit if I can generate a video for free and I then post it on Discord instead.

Yes, that's what makes Disney investing in OpenAI as part of this so confusing to me. Sign a licensing deal that means OpenAI pays you every time someone uses your character? Absolutely. Who cares if they're burning cash, as long as you get your payday it's all good. But investing in the company means their cash burning is your problem too. I don't know why you'd do it.

The only explanation is if they think they can juice their stock by 2 billion and then whoever is on the ship jumps before the crash.

Sounds like Iger has his finger on the eject button. How much stock has he announced to be cashing out over 2026?

It’s not that.

It’s ego and desperation for one last hurrah. Disney has a history of being a corporate governance nightmare - which Iger ironically contributed toward fixing. He’s undoing all that now.

>People are generating much more than we expected per user, and a lot of videos are being generated for very small audiences.

That was the issue even the biggest Ai fans pointed out from day one. People aren't gonna post their videos on Sora. They are gonna make it on Sora and post on TikTok. A watermark won't change that reality (and I don't think ClosedAI is worried about brand recognition and taking a hit for that).

Likenthr rest of the scene, it's so utterly tone deaf.

It's not just that: generative AI tools make it so easy to make content that you run into discoverability problems. The pool of available content becomes huge but without a way to market or otherwise differentiate yourself, no one will likely stumble across it.

We already see this dynamic with the "vanity press" pay-to-play record labels / distributors like DistroKid: the vast majority of their catalog has never been played or was only played to test the initial upload. Huge numbers of tracks have a tiny number of views, with many literally never played. "Democratizing" content creation predictably does this, and it's frankly bizarre it wasn't anticipated.

> I have a feeling that the long-term economics of this don't really work. OpenAI is burning money and Altman has already gone out in public saying how Sora-generated content is being made in large volumes for little audience.

Let me introduce you to ponze scheme. He is feeding the hype, that's all that matters right now. More and more cash... The only real winner will be Nvidia when the bubble explode.

The brand rot will be disgusting here. I thought "family" companies like Nintendo and Disney hit so hard, against their best interests, because they didn't want the next pregnant Elsa or Nazi Mario to cause a storm on their carefully tailored brands.

Seems like Nintendo still has that long term thinking. Disney was just waiting for the right price.

I mean, Disney can do basically whatever it wants and nothing will change. If my gay, Muslim friends are still willing to patronize the parks, despite their very real disagreement with how Disney conducts its business, then what hope is there for the exhausted, overworked mom whose child won't stop wailing about watching Frozen? This will absolutely tarnish the brand, and yet people will still consume Disney slop.

> If my gay, Muslim friends are still willing to patronize the parks, despite their very real disagreement with how Disney conducts its business

What is this referring to?

Disney has a long history of donating large dollars to ultra-conservative legislators and presidential hopefuls (they also donate to liberal candidates as well). As for the Muslim portion, it’s most likely due to Disney donating $2 million to Israeli Non-profits and condemning terrorism while making no statements or donations to the Palestinian people’s or groups that attempt to provide to the Palestinian people Israel was bombing in the closing months of 2023. The BDS movement has and keeps Disney on their list of boycott targets to this day.

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