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OpenAI is vowing to offer rights owners with “more granular control” regarding the creation of characters after its recently released application, Sora 2, produced a flood of clips featuring protected figures.

Sora 2’s Release and Initial Issues

The AI video generator, powered by artificial intelligence, was rolled out recently on an invite-only basis. This tool enables users to create brief clips from a text prompt. Initial assessments of the machine-created video feed showed copyrighted figures from well-loved shows including animated series, South Park, Pokémon and Rick and Morty.

Prior to the release of Sora 2, the company allegedly 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 rights holders can flag unauthorized use via a dedicated reporting tool, but individual artists or studios cannot have a blanket opt-out.

CEO’s Response and Future Strategies

Recently, OpenAI CEO the chief executive said in a blog post that the company had been “taking feedback” from users, copyright owners and other groups, and would implement changes as a result.

He mentioned that copyright owners would be provided more detailed management over the creation of characters, similar to how people can opt-in to use their own image in the app, but with extra safeguards.

“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.”

Addressing Exceptions and Revenue Plans

Altman said that OpenAI would allow copyright owners to determine their approach and that there would be some “edge cases of generations” that bypass the platform’s guardrails that should not.

Altman continued that the organization would also need to generate revenue from content creation, and currently the platform was seeing people generating much more content than anticipated per user. He suggested payment to rights holders who grant permission their figures to be generated.

“We will need to experiment with different approaches to finalize the revenue structure, but implementation is imminent,” he commented. “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 high rate of evolution, similar to the initial stages of ChatGPT, and there would be “some good decisions and some missteps”.