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OpenAI is vowing to provide rights owners with increased oversight over the creation of characters after its recently released tool, Sora 2, produced a flood of clips featuring copyrighted figures.

Sora 2’s Launch and Initial Concerns

The AI video generator, powered by AI, was rolled out recently on an invite-only arrangement. The application enables individuals to create brief clips based on a written description. Initial assessments of the machine-created video feed showed copyrighted figures from popular shows including animated series, adult cartoons, creature-collecting franchises and Rick and Morty.

Prior to launch of Sora 2, the company reportedly told artist representatives and studios that if they did not want their protected content replicated by the AI tool, they would have to opt out.

“Our team will collaborate with copyright owners to prevent character generation upon request and address removal inquiries.”

OpenAI stated that content owners can report copyright infringement using a dedicated reporting tool, but individual artists or studios cannot have a universal exclusion.

Leadership’s Reaction and Future Plans

Recently, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said in a blog post that the company had been gathering input from users, rights holders and stakeholders, and would implement changes accordingly.

Altman noted that copyright owners would be provided more detailed management over character generation, similar to how users can opt-in to share their own image in the app, but with “additional controls”.

“Many copyright owners have expressed enthusiasm for this innovative form of ‘interactive fan fiction’ and believe it will generate significant value, yet they desire the power to define usage terms for their characters, including complete prohibition.”

Handling Exceptions and Revenue Models

Altman said that OpenAI would “let rightsholders decide how to proceed” and that there would be some unusual instances of content that bypass the platform’s guardrails that ought not to.

Altman continued that the organization would also need to generate revenue from content creation, and already the system was observing people generating much more content than anticipated per user. This could mean payment to copyright owners who allow their characters to be created.

“We will need to experiment with different approaches to finalize the revenue structure, but implementation is imminent,” Altman said. “Our hope is that the new kind of engagement is even more valuable than the revenue share, but of course we want both to be valuable.”

Altman finished by noting that there would be a rapid pace of change, comparable to the initial stages of ChatGPT, and there would be “some good decisions and some missteps”.