The following contains references to sexual abuse and suicidal ideation.
Several months after launching a lawsuit against Midjourney, Disney has announced a three-year deal with Sam Altman‘s company OpenAI, allowing users of the video generator Sora access to over 200 Disney characters in early 2026. You can read the full press release here, but for now, here are the main points, courtesy of Disney:
- As part of this three-year licensing agreement, Sora will be able to generate short, user-prompted social videos that can be viewed and shared by fans, drawing on more than 200 Disney, Marvel, Pixar and Star Wars characters.
- Agreement will make a selection of these fan-inspired Sora short form videos available to stream on Disney+.
- Disney and OpenAI affirm a shared commitment to responsible use of AI that protects the safety of users and the rights of creators.
- Alongside the licensing agreement, Disney will become a major customer of OpenAI, using its APIs to build new products, tools, and experiences, including for Disney+, and deploying ChatGPT for its employees.
- As part of the agreement, Disney will make a $1 billion equity investment in OpenAI, and receive warrants to purchase additional equity.
The announcement adds, “The agreement does not include any talent likenesses or voices,” which are protected by the SAG-AFTRA agreement reached in 2023.
“Disney will become a major customer of OpenAI, using its APIs to build new products, tools, and experiences, including for Disney+, and deploying ChatGPT for its employees,” the announcement says, which suggests the move is likely to impact below-the-line workers, who generally lack those contractual protections against AI.
The deal comes at an especially ironic time, with Disney’s biggest release of the year, James Cameron‘s Avatar: Fire and Ash, set to feature a disclaimer boasting none of the film was made using generative AI. Disney-owned Marvel Comics’ editor-in-chief C.B. Cebulski also announced at this year’s New York Comic Con that “We will not be using [the technology], and we don’t condone it.”
The news comes shortly after Altman’s appearance on The Jimmy Kimmel Show this week, where he claimed he could not imagine raising his children without his text and image generator ChatGPT.
The AI industry is the most-capitalized field in America right now, but it’s also mired in lawsuits. Not only are various AI aggregators being sued for large-scale copyright infringement, but their chat and support apps face criticism as well. OpenAI is also facing a number of lawsuits alleging ChatGPT played a role in encouraging several suicides. Altman himself is being sued by his sister Ann Altman, who claims the CEO sexually abused her from 1997 to 2006, when she was a child and he was in his teens.
