Recently, Disney sent a cease-and-desist letter to Google accusing them of copyright infringement on a “massive scale” for use of their works in AI programs. According to Deadline, Google has now removed those videos.
Google Stopd Using Disney IPs in AI
Dozens of videos featuring Mickey Mouse, Deadpool, Moana and more have been removed from YouTube. A Google rep said the following in a statement about the removal:
We have a longstanding and mutually beneficial relationship with Disney, and will continue to engage with them. More generally, we use public data from the open web to build our AI and have built additional innovative copyright controls like Google-extended and Content ID for YouTube, which give sites and copyright holders control over their content
Disney & OpenAI
The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI recently reached a three-year licensing agreement allowing users to generate videos with Disney-owned characters in Sora. The videos will also come to Disney+. As part of the deal, Disney will make a $1 billion equity investment in OpenAI and receive warrants to purchase additional equity. Just after this partnership was announced was when Disney sent the cease-and-desist letter to Google.
Disney demanded Google “immediately cease further copying, publicly displaying, publicly performing, distributing, and creating derivative works of Disney’s copyrighted characters” in “outputs of Google’s AI Services, including through YouTube’s mobile app, YouTube Shorts and YouTube.”
They also said Google must “immediately implement effective technological measures within Google’s AI Services and, as necessary, Google’s suite of products and services in which Google’s AI Services are integrated, to ensure that no future outputs infringe Disney works.”
Based on this news, it appears that Google is fully cooperative with the demands.
How do you feel about Disney going after Google for AI, but willingly handing their IPs to OpenAI? Let us know in the comments and on social media.
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