The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI Partner on Sora • Hacker News Board

Re: The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI Partner on Sora

#511

Post by shadowgovt » Fri, Dec 12, 2025, 5:57 PM UTC

dfedbeef wrote: post #483

shadowgovt wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the tool can generate output faster than human employees alone can (and they control the "legitimate" gate by which other people can use those characters in the tool). The consequence being that for everyone complaining that AI is disrupting artists right now: these will, in hindsight, be the halcyon years. Even if we assume the copyright arguments hold water in court and AIs trained on other people's copyrig…

Art isn't a volume business though.

Andy Warhol disagreed. But in general: it's not a bulk or commodity business like, say, toilet paper, but an artist that creates five thousand works a year can definitely out-sell an artist that creates five.

To the extent that art intersects capitalism, that matters (even if the second artist is charging thousands per work; when your price is too high, people can't buy, so the artist charging dozens or hundreds per work but making 5,000 a year can sell to all the people who can't afford five-works-a-year).

Re: The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI Partner on Sora

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Post by CamperBob2 » Fri, Dec 12, 2025, 6:32 PM UTC

smj-edison wrote: post #464

therealpygon wrote: post #395

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disney, is well aware of the writing on the wall that copyright is going to continue to become increasingly harder to enforce, as generative ai distances itself from brute mimicry, and because infringers can generate new versions faster that takedown notices can be filed. Their alternative is to either be steamrolled, or leverage their IP while it has worth in order to latch on to the AI market. Plus, they give a sol…

It'll be interesting to see whether OpenAI is able to enforce the guardrails that Disney would want...

They have to consider China. Right now Z-Image Turbo lets you render stills of any popular cartoon character you like, at frankly-disturbing levels of quality, doing almost anything you like. That's a relatively-tiny 6G-parameter model. If and when a WAN 2.2-level video model is released with a comparable lack of censorship, that will be the end of Disney's monopoly on pretty much any character IP.

Also, notice how Disney jumped all over Gemini's case before the ink was dry on the OpenAI partnership agreement. My guess is that Altman is just using Disney to attack his competitors, basically the 'two' part of a one-two punch that began by buying up a large portion of the world's RAM capacity for no valid business reason.

Re: The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI Partner on Sora

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Post by DarkNova6 » Fri, Dec 12, 2025, 8:35 PM UTC

YY478436874326 wrote: post #328

DarkNova6 wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disney has been a wannabe tech company for the longest of times. They started the streaming Wars with Disney+ and have had massive spend on AI already. There is virtually no creative or artistic talent left in the company.

Toy Story was essentially a tech demo for Pixar. And they worked alongside Apple to make the Squeak Smalltalk programming language.

Pixar was acquired by the current CEO of Disney. The same guy that purchased all the other large brands and saw them wither away. Heck, half of the Disney board comes from biotech companies.

Disney likes to use their past image of animation and artistry and the current way the company works couldn't stray father from it.

Re: The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI Partner on Sora

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Post by 71bw » Fri, Dec 12, 2025, 10:15 PM UTC

matsemann wrote: post #496

71bw wrote: post #480

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...have you ever thought about the way you're using the app, then? Because I, personally, get nothing else other than dumb memes and posts from people I follow.

No, stop with the stupid shaming. The point was that the algorithm pushes certain content on people, no matter what they actually want to see.

And I said that I do not have this issue and my current account is relatively fresh, having been made in May of this year.

Re: The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI Partner on Sora

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Post by lmm » Sat, Dec 13, 2025, 8:43 AM UTC

DrewADesign wrote: post #486

lmm wrote: post #462

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It’s not just to save the effort— stories are good because they surprise, challenge, and inspire us. Maybe, but that's the minority of demand. Most book sales are to people looking for something comfortable - think the near-infinite supply of practically interchangeable romance novels or detective stories.

Comfortable is different than known. How often do people use LLMs to generate fiction for them to read?

I hear a lot of people already roleplay with LLMs which is pretty much that.

Re: The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI Partner on Sora

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Post by ojr » Sat, Dec 13, 2025, 11:30 AM UTC

kevin_thibedeau wrote: post #349

ojr wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tiktok has AI moderation tools that you are highly underestimating.

The people making these are good at more subtle forms of hate with coded language and indirect references.

the people making AI moderation tools are also good, and in my opinion more skilled than the abusers

Re: The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI Partner on Sora

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Post by blobbers » Sat, Dec 13, 2025, 11:09 PM UTC

Zee2 wrote: post #432

blobbers wrote: post #416

I see a lot of "mickey mouse" but if this is Disney IP, then it includes Star Wars and Marvel, no? You can literally make your own Marvel movie now! Legally!

If you read the release, it explicitly does not include the likenesses of human actors. Only animated and illustrated characters are included. (Although, that does cover animated/illustrated versions of characters that are typically portrayed by human actors...) This is almost certainly due to the photographic/human likenesses of actors being under an entirely separate license and royalty contract than pure IP from D…

Interesting; what about say... ironman? Humanoid, has someone inside. Darth Vader, C3PO, or Chewbacca? Or say the Mandalorian?

Re: The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI Partner on Sora

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Post by DrewADesign » Sun, Dec 14, 2025, 12:39 AM UTC

lmm wrote: post #515

DrewADesign wrote: post #486

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Comfortable is different than known. How often do people use LLMs to generate fiction for them to read?

I hear a lot of people already roleplay with LLMs which is pretty much that.

No, it’s not the same as generating yourself a static piece of literature to read. It’s the difference between having an hours-long conversation and listening to an hours-long monologue. They are neither conceptually nor practically the same activity. It’s much closer to playing a video game.

Re: The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI Partner on Sora

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Post by evanjrowley » Mon, Dec 15, 2025, 10:19 PM UTC

npollock wrote: post #396

postalcoder wrote: post #12

buried the lede: > As part of the agreement, Disney will make a $1 billion equity investment in OpenAI, and receive warrants to purchase additional equity. I say this with no snark or disdain: Sam has mastered the art of the flywheel. Re licensed ai videos, if anyone wants to see the perspective the C-suites are being sold on, check out this episode of Belloni's The Town, in which they discuss the vision for AI + IP…

Disney said "Our IP is $1B for a 3yr license, or we sue" Altman said "We can pay with equity, but let's frame it as an investment" No cash exchanged

No cash because Disney's IP has no intrinsic value to begin with.

Re: The Walt Disney Company and OpenAI Partner on Sora

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Post by 578_Observer » Sun, Dec 21, 2025, 10:48 AM UTC

herbturbo wrote: post #488

578_Observer wrote: post #485

This deal establishes a clear dichotomy: Disney/OpenAI as the "Walled Garden" of premium IP vs. the "Open Bazaar" of mass distribution. Google is now backed into a corner. To keep YouTube relevant against this alliance, they can't rely on tech alone—they need comparable IP. I expect them to immediately start courting Sony Pictures or Universal to fill that gap. It’s essentially a battle between "Exclusivity" and "Sca…

This sounds like old TV exec logic. Disney IP is not “premium” any more thanks to relentless overuse in their garbage movies and shows. My teenage kids watch YT and TikTok (which gets highly relevant UGC daily) and couldn’t care less about Mickey Mouse or Kylo Ren.

Valid point. "Premium" might be the wrong word now due to the recent dilution of their IP (Marvel/Star Wars fatigue).

However, as AI-generated content floods platforms like YouTube, the value of "Human-Curated" narratives—even if currently diluted—might regain value as a counter-balance to infinite slop.