Disney, Universal Sue Image Creator Midjourney for Copyright Infringement

Walt Disney and Comcast's Universal filed a copyright lawsuit against Midjourney on Wednesday, calling its popular AI-powered image generator a "bottomless pit of plagiarism" for its use of the studios' best-known characters.

The suit, filed in federal district court in Los Angeles, claims Midjourney pirated the libraries of the two Hollywood studios, making and distributing without permission "innumerable" copies of characters such as Darth Vader from "Star Wars," Elsa from "Frozen," and the Minions from "Despicable Me".

Spokespeople for Midjourney did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

Horacio Gutierrez, Disney's executive vice president and chief legal officer, said in a statement: "We are bullish on the promise of AI technology and optimistic about how it can be used responsibly as a tool to further human creativity, but piracy is piracy, and the fact that it's done by an AI company does not make it any less infringing."

NBCUniversal Executive Vice President and General Counsel Kim Harris said the company was suing to "protect the hard work of all the artists whose work entertains and inspires us and the significant investment we make in our content."

The film industry trade group Motion Picture Association expressed support for the lawsuit and called for AI companies to respect intellectual property rights.

"Strong copyright protection is the backbone of our industry," MPA chairman Charles Rivkin said in a statement. "A balanced approach to AI that both protects intellectual property and embraces responsible, human-centered innovation is critical for maintaining America's global leadership in creative industries."

The studios claim in the lawsuit that the San Francisco company rebuffed their request to stop infringing their copyrighted works or, at a minimum, take technological measures to halt the creation of these AI-generated characters.

Instead, the studios argue, Midjourney continued to release new versions of its AI image service that boast higher quality infringing images.

Midjourney recreates animated images from a typed request, or prompt.

In the suit filed by seven corporate entities at the studios that own or control copyrights for the various Disney and Universal Pictures film units, the studios offered examples of Midjourney animations that include Disney characters, such as Yoda wielding a lightsaber, Bart Simpson riding a skateboard, Marvel's Iron Man soaring above the clouds and Pixar's Buzz Lightyear taking flight.

The image generator also recreated such Universal characters as "How to Train Your Dragon's" dragon, Toothless, the green ogre "Shrek," and Po from "Kung Fu Panda." 

"By helping itself to plaintiffs' copyrighted works, and then distributing images (and soon videos) that blatantly incorporate and copy Disney's and Universal's famous characters -- without investing a penny in their creation -- Midjourney is the quintessential copyright free-rider and a bottomless pit of plagiarism," the suit alleges.

"Midjourney's infringement is calculated and willful," it said.

Big Scrape of the Internet

Disney and Universal asked the court for a preliminary injunction, to prevent Midjourney from copying their works, or offering its image- or video-generation service without protections against infringement. The studios also seek unspecified damages.

The suit alleges Midjourney used the studios' works to train its image service and generate reproductions of their copyrighted characters. The company, founded in 2021 by David Holz, monetizes the service through paid subscriptions and generated $300 million in revenue last year, the studios said.

This is not the first time Midjourney has been accused of misusing artists' work to train their AI systems.

A year ago, a California federal judge found that 10 artists behind a copyright infringement suit against Midjourney, Stability AI and other companies had plausibly argued these AI companies had copied and stored their work on company servers, and could be liable for using it without permission.

That ruling allowed the lawsuit over the unauthorized use of images to proceed. It is in the process of litigation.

The cases are part of a wave of lawsuits brought by copyright owners including authors, news outlets and record labels against tech companies over their use of copyrighted materials for AI training without permission. 

In a 2022 interview with Forbes, Midjourney CEO Holz said he built the company's database by performing "a big scrape of the Internet."

Asked whether he sought consent of the artists whose work was covered by copyright, he responded, "there isn't really a way to get a hundred million images and know where they're coming from."

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