Disney and Nbuniversal they declare war open toGenerative artificial intelligence. The two film production houses, among the most influential in the world, have filed a legal cause against Midjourneyaccusing it of systematic and massive copyright violation. According to the complaint filed in a California court, the AI platform would have allowed the creation of high definition images of iconic characters, such as Darth Vader And the Marvel heroes, without any authorization.
The heart of the problem? The possibility for users to generate detailed images of intellectual property protected with simple textual commands. Midjourney’s technology explain the lawyers of the production houses, but does it on an industrial scale, favoring the Creative piracy under technological coverage.
AI does not distinguish between inspiration and plagiarism
According to the official documentation, Midjourney allows anyone to type prompts such as “Darth Vader who fights in the forest under the snow”, and the system returns in a few seconds of professional quality images. But those images explain Disney and Nbuniversal, they are based on works covered by copyrightcreated in decades of work and with huge economic investments, as he said Horacio GutierrezChief Legal Officer of Disney:
Our intellectual property is the result of decades of investments, creativity and innovation. We believe in the positive potential of AI, but piracy remains piracy, even if automated.
The complaint defines Midjourney “the copyright parasite par excellence”, a platform that profit from the work of others without offering any compensation, violating the laws at the base of the creative and productive system.
A legal cause that could redefine the limits of generative artificial intelligence
The cause has a historical scope: It is the first time that two cinema giants bring a company to the generative in court. And it’s no coincidence. The artificial intelligence sector has long been in the sights of publishers, artists and authors. Several companies – including Openai and Google – have been accused of training their linguistic and visual models on protected content without consent or compensation.
In January 2024, the expert of Ai Gary Marcus And the Hollywood artist Reid Southen they had launched the alarm on the pages of IEEE Spectrum. In that article, they denounced as tools such as Midjourney and 3 Super Mario to Iron Man.
Now, Disney and Universal try to restore the boundaries of creativity, not only to protect their interests, but also to defend the dignity and work of thousands of artists. “We want to protect those who entertain us and inspire us every day,” he said Kim Harrisvice -president and legal of Nbuniversal.
The process could last years, but its consequences will go well beyond the boundaries of Hollywood. It will be a test to understand to what extent artificial intelligence can go without breaking fundamental rights.
