No surprise: New OpenAI app is already causing drama

OpenAI’s new short-form video app, Sora, hasn’t even been out for a week. But already, the artificial intelligence company has revamped its policies and rankled some users after running into an issue that anyone could have seen coming: copyright.

Sora is a TikTok-style app, featuring a feed of AI videos and the tools to easily create more. It uses OpenAI’s latest video generation model, which can spin up realistic-looking clips from text prompts. From the start, those clips included various copyright characters, because OpenAI had decided to require copyright holders to individually opt out of having their work appear on the app, rather than opt in, the Wall Street Journal reported. But that unusual arrangement didn’t last after Sora leaped to the top of Apple’s App Store charts. On Friday, CEO Sam Altman announced a reverse.

In a blog post, Altman wrote that since people are now using the Sora app, the San Francisco company no longer has to “theorize” about what users and “rightsholders” want. Contrary to the reported original opt-out plan, he said OpenAI would “give rightsholders more granular control over generation of characters.” Sora users can agree to having their faces used in others’ videos; Altman wrote that characters’ copyright holders would now get a similar “opt-in model.”

Altman also noted that some rightsholders want to “specify how their characters can be used (including not at all)” but that lots are “very excited for this new kind of ‘interactive fan fiction.’” He provided no specific examples but wrote, “We are struck by how deep the connection between users and Japanese content is!”

The change — a deference to copyright law that generally protects companies like Nintendo and Nickelodeon from seeing renditions of their characters in bizarre scenarios — appears to have already gone into effect. On X and in Sora’s reviews on Apple’s App Store, a wave of users complained about getting “content violation” notices when they attempted to generate clips with prompts like “Spongebob goes to Paris.” (The app is, as of Monday, still invite-only for full access, though anyone using iOS 18 or later can at least download it.)

The six most recent reviews visible on one loading of the App Store, as of Monday afternoon, were each from Saturday, and each complained about the app blocking their requests. “Every time I try to make a daredevil or Something from Marvel, this keeps giving me multiple content violations,” one said. Another reviewer wrote: “Literally everything is a violation. How are we supposed to test the app [if] we can’t generate anything?”

A one-star Saturday review on the App Store, titled “New content restrictions ruined it,” read: “Don’t bother. You can’t generate anything fun anymore.” A few reviews earlier, someone wrote, “Reverse third party limitations. This prevents the entire purpose of the platform.” The app’s aggregate rating, at around 1,400 reviews, was 3.1 out of five stars — with more five-star reviews than one-star reviews, and far fewer reviews in between.

OpenAI didn’t immediately respond to SFGATE’s request for comment on Monday, but researcher Gabriel Petersson, who works on Sora, hinted on X that the company’s clampdown on copyright issues had gone too far. He wrote: “we are working hard on fixing unnecessary content violations on sora 2!! bear with us, we are a small team!” And Sora head Bill Peebles, responding on X to a question about getting fictional characters onto the app, wrote that it’s “on the roadmap” and that he’d share more information soon.

The startup has long faced lawsuits from copyright holders looking to prevent ChatGPT from regurgitating their words. Sora, with its speedy tools for creating video, marks a whole new terrain. Still, it’s no surprise that the creators of iconic, culturally load-bearing characters weren’t going to immediately roll over and let OpenAI peddle their valuable intellectual property.

Work at a Bay Area tech company and want to talk? Contact tech reporter Stephen Council securely at stephen.council@sfgate.com or on Signal at 628-204-5452.