Studios "Can't Have It Both Ways" As Midjourney Issues First Response In Landmark Lawsuit Filed by Disney and NBC Universal
Midjourney also points to "dozens" of subscribers that are registered using Disney and Universal email addresses.
Midjourney, the generative AI company, has formally responded to the lawsuit brought forth by Disney and NBC Universal in June, arguing that the studios have no power to prevent AI training.
What’s Happening:
- Midjourney has issued their first response to a lawsuit that was brought by Disney and NBC Universal, arguing that studios have no power to prevent AI training on its works.
- You may recall the headline-making lawsuit, filed back in June, that saw the two massive media companies team up to take the first legal action against a generative AI company, accusing them of copyright infringement while training their language models.
- Midjourney’s lawyers argued that “copyright law does not confer absolute control over the use of copyrighted works…the limited monopoly granted by copyright must give way to fair use, which safeguards countervailing public interests in the free flow of ideas and information."
- The company also argued that the studios are trying to “have it both ways," citing not only the popularity of the tool among visual effects companies and vendors that work with Disney and Universal, but that “many dozens" of subscribers to Midjourney’s services have emails stemming from Disney and Universal - suggesting that employees of the studio are using the tech.
- Their response filing states that “Plaintiffs cannot have it both ways, seeking to profit - through their use of Midjourney and other generative AI tools - from industry standard AI training practices on the one hand, while on the other hand accusing Midjourney of wrongdoing for the same."
- The lawsuit filed in June focuses largely on the outputs of the service, arguing that users are creating images incredibly similar to the copyrighted works of the studio, differing itself from other suits that focus on the AI training alone as a means of the infringement.
- Responding to that, Midjourney points out that its users are required to adhere to their terms of service, which forbid infringing on intellectual property rights, with their lawyers arguing that generating images similar to their copyrighted works is not enough to show infringement, saying “there are any number of legitimate, noninfringing grounds to create images incorporating characters from popular culture like those claimed by Plaintiffs, including non-commercial fan art, experimentation and ideation, and social commentary and criticism. Plaintiffs seek to stifle them all."
The Lawsuit and Some Thoughts:
- When the lawsuit was first filed back in June, it was quite the milestone considering two media giants - The Walt Disney Company and NBC Universal teamed up to sue the generative AI company.
- The complaint was filed in a U.S. District Court in California, accusing Midjourney of both direct and secondary copyright infringement by using the studios’ IP to train their language models and displaying AI-generated images of their copyrighted characters.
- Midjourney being the target of the lawsuit, there are so many different apps and editors out there now that feature generative AI tools, like templates where one can “cartoonify" their selfies and photographs to look like Pixar, Disney, Ghibli, Dreamworks, Illumination…basically any studio’s house style.
- The most interesting thing is the citing of the numerous employees with Disney and Universal emails that subscribed to Midjourney. Were they using it for research? To play with? For actual production?
- This is a landmark case in the industry, and we’ll definitely be paying attention to how it plays out.
Laughing Place recommends MouseFanTravel.com for all your Disney travel planning
Fill out the form below for a free, no obligation quote from MouseFanTravel.com