Warner Bros. Discovery Is Suing Midjourney For Copyright Infringement

Warner Bros. Discovery has filed a lawsuit against celebrated AI image generator Midjourney, accusing it of stealing and exploiting its intelligence properties. The title revolves astir nan AI tool's expertise to make images and videos of Warner Bros.' celebrated fictional characters, including Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Scooby Doo, Bugs Bunny and his friends from Looney Tunes. "Midjourney thinks it is supra nan law," nan institution wrote successful its lawsuit. It said that nan image generator sells a commercialized subscription work powered by AI exertion that was illegally trained utilizing its copyrighted works.

The institution based on that Midjourney has nan exertion to forestall users from generating images of nan characters it owns. It apparently refused to make videos based connected Warner Bros.' properties erstwhile it first launched its video model. But wrong nan past mates of weeks, it allegedly removed those protections and told its users that they would brushwood "fewer blocked jobs." The expertise to make Warner Bros.' characters are a clear tie for its subscription work that costs $10 to $120 a month, nan media conglomerate said. "It is difficult to ideate copyright infringement that is immoderate much willful than what Midjourney is doing here," nan plaintiff added. "Midjourney has prioritized and sought to sphere nan hundreds of millions of dollars it earns annually from its work by doubling down connected its theft of copyrighted works."

In nan complaint, nan institution gave respective examples of Midjourney-generated images and video stills adjacent to images and screencaps of its movies and shows. The image above, for instance, shows Midjourney's output from nan punctual "Batman, screencap from The Dark Knight." adjacent to existent promotional materials from nan Christian Bale-led movie. Further, generic prompts for illustration "classic comic book superhero battle" could lead to output pinch WB characters moreover if they're not specifically mentioned.

Midjourney is already facing a copyright infringement lawsuit revenge by Disney and Universal Studios backmost successful June. They accused nan AI work of "help[ing] itself to countless" copyrighted useful to train its models and for infringing connected their copyright by allowing users to make images of characters from Star Wars, Shrek, The Simpsons and Despicable Me, among different properties.

Warner Bros. Discovery is now asking nan tribunal for statutory damages of "up to $150,000 per infringed activity by kindness of Midjourney’s willful infringement." We've reached retired to Midjourney and will update this station erstwhile we perceive back.