The Disney-OpenAI tie-up has huge implications for intellectual property; Fast Company, December 11, 2025

CHRIS STOKEL-WALKER, Fast Company ; The Disney-OpenAI tie-up has huge implications for intellectual property

"Walt Disney and OpenAI make for very odd bedfellows: The former is one of the most-recognized brands among children under the age of 18. The near-$200 billion company’s value has been derived from more than a century of aggressive safeguarding of its intellectual property and keeping the magic alive among innocent children.

OpenAI, which celebrated its first decade of existence this week, is best known for upending creativity, the economy, and society with its flagship product, ChatGPT. And in the last two months, it has said it wants to get to a place where its adult users can use its tech to create erotica.

So what the hell should we make of a just-announced deal between the two that will allow ChatGPT and Sora users to create images and videos of more than 200 characters, from Mickey and Minnie Mouse to the Mandalorian, starting from early 2026?"

The Disney-OpenAI Deal Redefines the AI Copyright War; Wired, December 11, 2025

BRIAN BARRETT, Wired; The Disney-OpenAI Deal Redefines the AI Copyright War

 "“I think that AI companies and copyright holders are beginning to understand and become reconciled to the fact that neither side is going to score an absolute victory,” says Matthew Sag, a professor of law and artificial intelligence at Emory University. While many of these cases are still working their way through the courts, so far it seems like model inputs—the training data that these models learn from—are covered by fair use. But this deal is about outputs—what the model returns based on your prompt—where IP owners like Disney have a much stronger case

Coming to an output agreement resolves a host of messy, potentially unsolvable issues. Even if a company tells an AI model not to produce, say, Elsa at a Wendy’s drive-through, the model might know enough about Elsa to do so anyway—or a user might be able to prompt their way into making Elsa without asking for the character by name. It’s a tension that legal scholars call the “Snoopy problem,” but in this case you might as well call it the Disney problem.

“Faced with this increasingly clear reality, it makes sense for consumer-facing AI companies and entertainment giants like Disney to think about licensing arrangements,” says Sag."

Disney's deal with OpenAI is about controlling the future of copyright; engadget, December 11, 2025

Igor Bonifacic, engadget; Disney's deal with OpenAI is about controlling the future of copyright

"The agreement brings together two parties with very different public stances on copyright. Before OpenAI released Sora, the company reportedly notified studios and talent agencies they would need to opt out of having their work appear in the new app. The company later backtracked on this stance. Before that, OpenAI admitted, in a regulatory filing, it would be "impossible to train today's leading AI models without using copyrighted materials."

By contrast, Disney takes copyright law very seriously. In fact, you could argue no other company has done more to shape US copyright law than Disney. For example, there's the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, which is more derisively known as the Mickey Mouse Protection Act. The law effectively froze the advancement of the public domain in the United States, with Disney being the greatest beneficiary. It was only last year that the company's copyright for Steamboat Willie expired, 95 years after Walt Disney first created the iconic cartoon."

Disney says Google AI infringes copyright “on a massive scale”; Ars Technica, December 11, 2025

RYAN WHITWAM , Ars Technica; Disney says Google AI infringes copyright “on a massive scale”

"Disney has sent a cease and desist to Google, alleging the company’s AI tools are infringing Disney’s copyrights “on a massive scale.”

According to the letter, Google is violating the entertainment conglomerate’s intellectual property in multiple ways. The legal notice says Google has copied a “large corpus” of Disney’s works to train its gen AI models, which is believable, as Google’s image and video models will happily produce popular Disney characters—they couldn’t do that without feeding the models lots of Disney data.

The C&D also takes issue with Google for distributing “copies of its protected works” to consumers."

Disney Agrees to Bring Its Characters to OpenAI’s Sora Videos; The New York Times, December 11, 2025

 Brooks Barnes, The New York Times; Disney Agrees to Bring Its Characters to OpenAI’s Sora Videos

"In a watershed moment for Hollywood and generative artificial intelligence, Disney on Thursday announced an agreement to bring its characters to Sora, OpenAI’s short-form video platform. Videos made with Sora will be available to stream on Disney+ as part of the three-year deal...

“The rapid advancement of artificial intelligence marks an important moment for our industry, and through this collaboration with OpenAI we will thoughtfully and responsibly extend the reach of our storytelling,” Robert A. Iger, the chief executive of Disney, said in a statement.

Disney is the first major Hollywood company to cross this particular Rubicon."

‘South Park’ addresses AI-generated videos and copyright with Totoro, Trump and Bluey; The Los Angeles Times, November 13, 2025

Kaitlyn Huamani , Los Angeles Times; ‘South Park’ addresses AI-generated videos and copyright with Totoro, Trump and Bluey

"Droopy Dog, Rocky, Bullwinkle, Popeye and even the beloved preschool character Bluey are mentioned or make appearances in the episode. Representatives for Studio Ghibli also appear, offering a voice of reason in the madness, saying, “You cannot just do whatever you want with someone else’s IP.”"

Hollywood-AI battle deepens, as OpenAI and studios clash over copyrights and consent; Los Angeles Times, October 11, 2025

Wendy Lee and Samantha Masunaga, Los Angeles Times; Hollywood-AI battle deepens, as OpenAI and studios clash over copyrights and consent

• "OpenAI’s new Sora 2 tool allows users to put real people and characters into AI-generated videos, sparking immediate backlash from Hollywood studios and talent agencies.
• The dispute centers on who controls copyrighted images and likenesses, with Hollywood arguing OpenAI cannot use content without explicit permission or compensation.
• The clash between Silicon Valley’s “move fast and break things” ethos and Hollywood’s intellectual property protections could shape the future of AI in entertainment."

OpenAI’s Sora Is in Serious Trouble; Futurism, October 10, 2025

Victor Tangermann, Futurism ; OpenAI’s Sora Is in Serious Trouble

"The cat was already out of the bag, though, sparking what’s likely to be immense legal drama for OpenAI. On Monday, the Motion Picture Association, a US trade association that represents major film studios, released a scorching statementurging OpenAI to “take immediate and decisive action” to stop the app from infringing on copyrighted media.

Meanwhile, OpenAI appears to have come down hard on what kind of text prompts can be turned into AI slop on Sora, implementing sweeping new guardrails presumably meant to appease furious rightsholders and protect their intellectual property.

As a result, power users experienced major whiplash that’s tarnishing the launch’s image even among fans. It’s a lose-lose moment for OpenAI’s flashy new app — either aggravate rightsholders by allowing mass copyright infringement, or turn it into yet another mind-numbing screensaver-generating experience like Meta’s widely mocked Vibes.

“It’s official, Sora 2 is completely boring and useless with these copyright restrictions. Some videos should be considered fair use,” one Reddit user lamented.

Others accused OpenAI of abusing copyright to hype up its new app...

How OpenAI’s eyebrow-raising ask-for-forgiveness-later approach to copyright will play out in the long term remains to be seen. For one, the company may already be in hot water, as major Hollywood studios have already started suing over less."

You Can’t Use Copyrighted Characters in OpenAI’s Sora Anymore and People Are Freaking Out; Gizmodo, October 8, 2025

AJ DELLINGER, Gizmodo; You Can’t Use Copyrighted Characters in OpenAI’s Sora Anymore and People Are Freaking Out

 "OpenAI may be able to appease copyright holders by shifting its Sora policies, but it’s now pissed off its users. As 404 Media pointed out, social channels like Twitter and Reddit are now flooded with Sora users who are angry they can’t make 10-second clips featuring their favorite characters anymore. One user in the OpenAI subreddit said that being able to play with copyrighted material was “the only reason this app was so fun.” Another claimed, “Moral policing and leftist ideology are destroying America’s AI industry.” So, you know, it seems like they’re handling this well."

OpenAI wasn’t expecting Sora’s copyright drama; The Verge, October 8, 2025

Hayden Field , The Verge; OpenAI wasn’t expecting Sora’s copyright drama

"When OpenAI released its new AI-generated video app Sora last week, it launched with an opt-out policy for copyright holders — media companies would need to expressly indicate they didn’t want their AI-generated characters running rampant on the app. But after days of Nazi SpongeBob, criminal Pikachu, and Sora-philosophizing Rick and Morty, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman announced the company would reverse course and “let rightsholders decide how to proceed.”

In response to a question about why OpenAI changed its policy, Altman said that it came from speaking with stakeholders and suggested he hadn’t expected the outcry.

“I think the theory of what it was going to feel like to people, and then actually seeing the thing, people had different responses,” Altman said. “It felt more different to images than people expected.”

OpenAI hastily retreats from gung-ho copyright policy after embarrassing Sora video output like AI Sam Altman surrounded by Pokémon saying 'I hope Nintendo doesn't sue us'; PC Gamer, October 5, 2025

Stevie Bonifield, PC Gamer ; OpenAI hastily retreats from gung-ho copyright policy after embarrassing Sora video output like AI Sam Altman surrounded by Pokémon saying 'I hope Nintendo doesn't sue us'

"This video is just one of many examples, but you'll have a much harder time finding Sora-generated videos containing Marvel or Disney characters. As reported by Automaton, Sora appears to be refusing prompts containing references to American IP, but Japanese IP didn't seem to be getting the same treatment over the past week.

Japanese lawyer and House of Representatives member Akihisa Shiozaki called for action to protect creatives in a post on X (formerly Twitter), which has been translated by Automaton: "I’ve tried out [Sora 2] myself, but I felt that it poses a serious legal and political problem. We need to take immediate action if we want to protect leading Japanese creators and the domestic content industry, and help them further develop. (I wonder why Disney and Marvel characters can’t be displayed).""

Sam Altman says Sora will add ‘granular,’ opt-in copyright controls; TechCrunch, October 4, 2025

Anthony Ha , TechCrunch; Sam Altman says Sora will add ‘granular,’ opt-in copyright controls

"OpenAI may be reversing course on how it approaches copyright and intellectual property in its new video app Sora.

Prior to Sora’s launch this week, The Wall Street Journal reported that OpenAI had been telling Hollywood studios and agencies that they needed to explicitly opt out if they didn’t want their IP to be included in Sora-generated videos.

Despite being invite-only, the app quickly climbed to the top of the App Store charts. Sora’s most distinctive feature may be its “cameos,” where users can upload their biometric data to see their digital likeness featured in AI-generated videos.

At the same time, users also seem to delight in flouting copyright laws by creating videos with popular, studio-owned characters. In some cases, those characters might even criticize the company’s approach to copyright, for example in videos where Pikachu and SpongeBob interact with deepfakes of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.

In a blog post published Friday, Altman said the company is already planning two changes to Sora, first by giving copyright holders “more granular control over generation of characters, similar to the opt-in model for likeness but with additional controls.”"

OpenAI's new Sora video generator to require copyright holders to opt out, WSJ reports; Reuters, September 29, 2025

Reuters; OpenAI's new Sora video generator to require copyright holders to opt out, WSJ reports

"OpenAI is planning to release a new version of its Sora generator that creates videos featuring copyrighted material, unless rights holders opt out of having their work appear, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday, citing people familiar with the matter.

The artificial intelligence startup began notifying talent agencies and studios over the past week about the opt-out process and the product, which it plans to release in the coming days, the report said.

The new process would mean movie studios and other intellectual property owners would have to explicitly ask OpenAI not to include their copyrighted material in videos Sora creates, according to the report."

‘Wall-E With a Gun’: Midjourney Generates Videos of Disney Characters Amid Massive Copyright Lawsuit; Wired, June 20, 2025

Kate Knibbs, Reece Rogers , Wired; ‘Wall-E With a Gun’: Midjourney Generates Videos of Disney Characters Amid Massive Copyright Lawsuit

"MIDJOURNEY’S NEW AI-GENERATED video tool will produce animated clips featuring copyrighted characters from Disney and Universal, WIRED has found—including video of the beloved Pixar character Wall-E holding a gun."