Midjourney Seeks AI Transparency from Hollywood

In a significant development within its ongoing legal battle with three major Hollywood studios, AI startup Midjourney is actively striving to compel these entertainment giants to disclose their own internal use of artificial intelligence technologies.

The dispute originated last year when Disney and Universal initiated lawsuits against Midjourney, alleging copyright infringement. They asserted that the startup's image-generation models were capable of producing likenesses of iconic characters such as Bart Simpson and Darth Vader, intellectual property owned by the studios. Warner Bros. subsequently joined the legal action against Midjourney a few months later.

Midjourney's primary defense hinges on the argument that its practice of training AI models using images of copyrighted characters is permissible under the doctrine of fair use.

The current phase of the litigation centers on the scope of documentation the studios must provide during the discovery process. A previous judicial ruling stipulated that while the studios were indeed required to furnish information regarding their generative AI usage, this obligation was limited to instances where the AI produced "consumer-facing" videos and images.

In its most recent legal filing, Midjourney is seeking to overturn this restriction. The startup contends that the limitation "unfairly" allows the studios "to cherry-pick only those documents they believe support their market harm claims while depriving Midjourney of documents that would support its defenses."

Midjourney further asserts that the "documents [the studios] are withholding are precisely those that would reveal whether, behind closed doors, they are doing exactly what they are suing Midjourney for doing."

To illustrate its point, the startup posits that if the studios are developing image-generating AI models "for internal use in storyboarding or ideating content for film or TV, that evidence would equally demonstrate that it is an industry custom, even among the studios themselves, to download and train AI on unlicensed copyrighted content."

The filing also includes Midjourney's argument that the studios should be required to disclose all prompts they have used within Midjourney, along with the corresponding outputs, not merely those prompts that allegedly generated infringing images.

Representing the studios, lead attorney David Singer previously characterized Midjourney's pursuit of this documentation as a "fishing expedition."

Singer clarified the studios' position, stating they "do not seek to stop AI technology or even shut down Midjourney’s business." Instead, he emphasized that they "simply want Midjourney to stop copying their movies and TV shows and to stop distributing, publicly displaying, publicly performing, and creating derivative works that include copies of [their] famous characters without authorization."