Warner Bros. Takes Legal Action Against Midjourney
Warner Bros. has filed a lawsuit against the artificial intelligence company Midjourney, claiming copyright infringement. The startup allows millions of subscribers to generate AI-created images and videos featuring copyrighted characters like Superman and Bugs Bunny.
This marks the third major Hollywood studio to sue Midjourney in a Los Angeles federal court, following a joint lawsuit filed by Disney and Universal back in June.
Based in San Francisco, Midjourney has not yet responded to requests for comments regarding the lawsuit.
The complaint asserts that Midjourney uses “illegal copies” of Warner Bros.’ properties for training its AI systems, highlighting iconic characters such as Batman, Wonder Woman, and Scooby-Doo. It alleges that the platform encourages users to create and download images and videos of these characters in various “imaginative scenes.”
According to the lawsuit, even basic prompts in AI tools can generate high-quality images of well-known DC characters, including Superman and Batman.
Warner Bros. argues that “Midjourney believes it operates outside the law,” stating that stopping intellectual property theft should be straightforward—similar to enforcing guidelines on violence and nudity.
The lawsuit raises concerns about consumer confusion regarding the legality of Midjourney’s practices, suggesting that subscribers might mistakenly think they have obtained permission from Warner Bros. for the replicas of characters and the numerous infringing images and videos produced by Midjourney’s services.
Warner Bros. claims it is entitled to damages of up to $150,000 for each instance of infringement.
Midjourney has previously denied any allegations of copyright infringement in related lawsuits from Disney and Universal. It argues that AI tools learn visual concepts by responding to language and require training on billions of publicly available images.
In its defense, Midjourney stated that training generative AI models to comprehend concepts by extracting statistics from copyrighted materials can be considered transformative fair use, a claim supported by recent court rulings in different cases.
Additionally, Midjourney noted that it expects its users to adhere to its terms of service, which prohibit intellectual property infringement.
In a 2022 interview with the Associated Press, Midjourney CEO David Holz described the service as akin to a search engine, drawing from a wide array of images available online. He raised questions about how copyright laws might need to adapt to technological advancements in creativity. “Can a person look at someone else’s photo, learn from it, and create similar pictures?” Holz asked, suggesting that just like humans learn and create, AI learning should be seen in a similar light, especially when the generated images are indeed different.
