Reid Southen is a successful concept artist who has worked for many of the biggest studios (Marvel, 20th Century Fox, Warner Bros, Paramount etc) on a lot of huge films (Matrix Resurrections, The Hunger Games, Transformers, and Alien, among others).
I thought this was already a settled argument, though. It is not reproducing exact copies of copyrighted work, it is creating simulacra based on data that it has trained on. Obviously it trained on copyrighted material, as all large AI models had, and the newest version has gotten better at being able to create output resembling its training material if the user specifically requests a concept that fits the description (and likely has it regenerate 20+ times until it gives you the “infringing” work you’re looking for).
If Midjourney is breaking copyright, then so is every artist who has ever sketched a scene from a movie.
I thought this was already a settled argument, though. It is not reproducing exact copies of copyrighted work, it is creating simulacra based on data that it has trained on. Obviously it trained on copyrighted material, as all large AI models had, and the newest version has gotten better at being able to create output resembling its training material if the user specifically requests a concept that fits the description (and likely has it regenerate 20+ times until it gives you the “infringing” work you’re looking for).
If Midjourney is breaking copyright, then so is every artist who has ever sketched a scene from a movie.