One of the more high-profile ways that people are using artificial intelligence these days is to create unofficial versions of existing and copyrighted characters and events. One of the big current ones is seeing comedic vlogs of Star Wars' Stormtroopers, but in the past there have been other uses of the software tackling Marvel characters, and so much more. It looks like Disney and Universal at least are tired of their owned IP being used in such a way.
The Hollywood Reporter notes that a lawsuit has been filed against AI company Midjourney under the grounds that it's a "bottomless pit of plagiarism". The companies that are combining to launch this legal suit include Disney Enterprises, Marvel, Lucasfilm, 20th Century, Universal City Studios Productions, and DreamWorks Animation.
This moment actually marks Hollywood's first move against AI and the tech giants leading its development, as the aim is to stop them from simply consuming immense amounts of data to kick out "slop" versions of their IP, which is then consumed by countless folk around the world.
The complaint elaborates: "If a Midjourney subscriber submits a simple text prompt requesting an image of the character Darth Vader in a particular setting or doing a particular action, Midjourney obliges by generating and displaying a high quality, downloadable image featuring Disney's copyrighted Darth Vader character."
The lawsuit even offers visual evidence of Midjourney's use of copyrighted characters, with the complaint featuring a look at Yoda and Shrek and AI-generated versions of the characters.
The complaint even directly references and states that Midjourney has taken data and information from copyrighted IP, cleaned and converted it, and then used it for its own training purposes, before then also displaying said content on the key Explore pages of its website.
"Midjourney's publication and curation of infringing images on the Explore page show that Midjourney knows that its platform regularly reproduces Plaintiffs' Copyrighted Works, and that the Explore page is intended to advertise Midjourney's ability to infringe the Copyrighted Works."
Disney has summed up its intent to take on Midjourney with a leading executive stating simply that "piracy is piracy".