Disney Partners with OpenAI to Let Sora Create AI Videos

The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI signed a three-year deal on Thursday to integrate the company’s well-known characters into the Sora artificial intelligence video generator.

Additionally, Disney will invest $1 billion in OpenAI, the owner of ChatGPT. It declared that it would become a “major customer” of OpenAI, utilising its capabilities to create new experiences and products, such as for Disney+’s streaming service.

Disney and OpenAI said in a statement, “Under the agreement, Disney and OpenAI demonstrate a shared commitment to the appropriate use of AI that protects user security and the rights of creators.”

The terms of the agreement were not disclosed. During a joint appearance on CNBC on Thursday morning, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Disney CEO Bob Iger both declined to provide any information.

Disney’s Investment and Commitment to Responsible AI

OpenAI, on the other hand, stated that it has pledged to “implement responsible measures further to address trust and safety, including age-appropriate policies,” but it did not elaborate on what that would mean.

A national debate and multiple cases centre on how AI chatbots interact with people under 18.

Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Lilo, Stitch, Ariel, Belle, Beast, Cinderella, Baymax, Simba, and Mufasa are among the characters included in the agreement, according to Disney, along with characters from “Encanto,” “Frozen,” “Inside Out,” “Moana,” “Monsters Inc.,” “Toy Story,” “Up,” and “Zootopia.”

Iger characterised the agreement as “kind of a way” for Disney to enter the AI space.

Read: Taiwan Bans Chinese App RedNote for One Year

Disney’s Strategic Move into the AI Industry

Disney is renowned for protecting its vast portfolio of intellectual property, which includes everything from contemporary superhero and fantasy brands to animated cartoons from the 1920s, which makes the arrangement noteworthy.

“We hear so much from users about the way they love Disney,” Altman stated, adding that he anticipates “very well” reactions from Sora users to the Disney characters’ inclusion.

However, Altman stated that the companies had not yet set a debut date. “We’ll try to make it in there as soon as we can.”

“Early 2026” was listed as a possible launch date in the company’s announcement.

Opportunities and Implications for Disney Fans and Media Industry

“Combining OpenAI’s ground-breaking technology with Disney’s iconic stories and characters puts imagination and creativity directly into the hands of Disney fans in ways we’ve never seen before, providing them with richer and more personal ways to connect with the Disney characters and tales they love,” Iger said in a statement.

Disney’s stock ended Thursday up 2.4%.

Media businesses are struggling to protect the value of their intellectual property while avoiding being overtaken by a technology many consider game-changing, which currently has limited legal protections.

Instead of playing whack-a-mole with every AI business, as Disney has done with other media in the past, Disney would be establishing a legitimate channel through which a generative AI system could deploy its characters via OpenAI.

Copyright Concerns and Disney’s Ongoing Disputes

For years, the studio has vigorously pursued legal action to prevent unlawful usage of its iconic characters, trademarks, and musical compositions. Disney has also pushed Congress for U.S. copyright extensions, such as a 1998 federal bill that some have dubbed the “Mickey Mouse Protection Act.”

Disney looks to be attempting to block Google, a primary rival, while also opening the door for OpenAI to use its characters under copyright.

The Disney accused Google of “infringing Disney’s copyrights on a massive scale” in a cease-and-desist letter sent on Wednesday.

“Disney has been expressing its concerns with Google for months, but Google has done nothing in response,” the attorney for Disney stated. “Google’s mass violation of Disney’s copyrighted works must stop.”

Industry Reactions and Union Concerns

Disney stated that it is looking for a “swift response” from Google.

Iger intimated that Disney was negotiating a transaction with an AI company during the company’s November 13 earnings call, but he did not mention any specific companies.

“We’ve been in some interesting discussions with some of the AI companies,” Iger remarked. “I think of some of them as very beneficial conversations.”

Iger stated that Disney was in those discussions “seeking to not only safeguard the value of our IP and of our intellectual engines, but also to seek opportunities for us to use our innovations to create more engagement with consumers.”

In Hollywood, where writers and producers are already uneasy about the potential of generative AI, the deal caused a new wave of anxiety.

Hollywood Guilds Respond to the Disney-OpenAI Agreement

Hollywood screenwriters are represented by the Writers Guild of America, a labour union that denounced the agreement, claiming that it “appears to sanction” the technological platform’s “theft of our work and surrenders the value of what we create to a tech company that has constructed its business on our backs.”

Disney executives will meet with the guild, according to the guild, to “probe the terms of this deal, including the degree to which user-generated videos use the work of WGA members.”

May marks the expiration of the guild’s labour agreement with the major studios in Hollywood. Concerns about the emergence of generative AI in the film and television industries contributed to the difficulty of the 2023 round of discussions.

Hollywood’s top actors’ union said in a separate statement that it will closely monitor the deal’s implementation.

“SAG-AFTRA is going to closely track the deal and its implementation to ensure that it complies with our contracts and with the relevant laws protecting image, voice, and likeness,” the union for film performers stated in part.

In a statement on Thursday, the Executive Board of the Animation Guild also expressed its views, stating that “the announcement brings up significant issues regarding its effect on Guild members and consumers worldwide.”