Mickey Mouse is back! You knew it was only a matter of time before Disney began throwing its influence into the GenAI discussion. Next, an eye-opening but insightful perspective on GenAI developers from Audie Cornish and Karen Hao. Have the AI events in Silicon Valley and the AI world really become a quasi-religious movement? They explore that possibility.
Disney Enterprises (and a whole bunch of related companies) v. Midjourney Inc.
In 1998, Congress passed the Mickey Mouse Protection Act (ok, its official name was The Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act) after heavy lobbying from Disney aimed at preventing the earliest Mickey Mouse works from entering the public domain. It worked. Now Disney is back at it, this time to help derail GenAI.
On June 11, they filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court, Central District of California, with a complicated name, but I’ll refer to it as Disney v. Midjourney. It’s too early to draw many conclusions, as this is “document 1,” and it only presents Disney’s view. Its 110 pages will tell you how Disney is wonderful and why “Midjourney is the quintessential copyright free-rider and a bottomless pit of plagiarism.”
Anthony Lueng of Haldanes law firm in Hong Kong shares his perspective with The Empire Strikes Back. He argues that there is nothing groundbreaking in the lawsuit, but he believes it is perhaps “not a coincidence that Disney and Universal chose to target Midjourney, a significant but relatively small player in the AI industry, rather than deep-pocketed industry leaders.” Are they the least able to fight back? Lueng thinks so. His post is worth reading for a quick overview.
The Assignment with Audie Cornish
Ms. Cornish hosts a CNN podcast where she interviewed Karen Hao, an AI expert, investigative journalist, and author of the book Empire of AI. The episode titled “Is OpenAI Building an Empire or a Religion?” piqued my interest. (The link leads to a video, but you can access the transcript from there. They discuss many topics, but a few are especially noteworthy.)
At 2:39, Cornish and Hao discuss OpenAI as a hybrid company, and the model looks a lot like many ministry orgs in the West. They also talk about “hidden costs," a concept especially relevant in the Bible translation world. At 8:50, they start a discussion on what they believe “can only be described as quasi-religious movements that have been born.” The discussion is relevant and timely.
And again, thank you for the leads you provide. They are always appreciated.
Be Blessed!
Bruce Erickson