AI firms are feeling the legal pressure as American studios fight to protect their copyrighted franchises and characters from being used in video-generating services. 

Disney, NBCUniversal and Warner Bros. Discovery have set aside their differences as rivals to launch a joint lawsuit against Chinese AI developer MiniMax. Their complaint, which was filed in the US District Court for the Central District of California yesterday, claims that MiniMax’s Hailuo AI software was built using unauthorized copyrighted materials from each studio, and that it treats their characters and IPs as if they were owned by MiniMax. 

The studios are asking the court to order MiniMax to stop these infringements, install new copyright protections on the Hailuo AI service, and provide the plaintiffs with any profits or financial gains made from using their characters in AI-generated works. Examples listed in the documents include users allegedly being able to generate high-quality images and videos of Wonder Woman, Joker, Lightning McQueen, Groot, Darth Vader and the Minions from simple prompts, all featuring Hailuo-branded watermarks.

MiniMax is also accused of blatantly using these characters to advertise its business, which the studios claim have helped Hailuo AI garner more than five million subscribers across its free and paid services. The AI firm was founded in 2021 and is now valued at US$4 billion after filing for an IPO in Hong Kong in July and receiving funding from Tencent and Alibaba. 

This new lawsuit comes just three months after NBCU and Disney filed a similar case against LA-based Midjourney AI (which WBD joined earlier this month) that basically makes the same complaints. Midjourney has pushed back against this lawsuit with a 43-page response, claiming that the responsibility falls on the studios to use the firm’s takedown procedure for any specific images they believe are infringing copyrights from the billions of images the AI draws from. The AI developer is asking for the case to be dismissed. 

We want to hear from the industry. As more studios begin experimenting with AI, are these lawsuits the beginning of a new and more regulated era of AI use? Or is there no stopping AI giants from generating unauthorized reproductions of copyrighted IPs?

Feature image is of the Star Wars: Unlimited trading card game by Ravensburger.