A few weeks ago, Openai achieved one of the greatest company promotions in recent memory. Whereas the initial launch of ChatGPT, back in 2022, was “one of the crazy viral moments i'd ever seen,” CEO Sam Altman wrote on social media, the response to a new upgrade was, in his words, “biblical”: 1 million users supposedly signed up to use the chatbot in just one hour, Altman reported, thanks to a new, more permitted image-generating capability that could imitate the styles of various art and design Studios. Artman called it "a new high water mark for us to allow creative freedom."
Almost immediately, images began to flood the internet. The most popular style for a long time is the style of Studio Ghibli, a Japanese animation studio co-founded by Hayao Miyazaki and widely loved by movies. Thousands and Thousands of Seek and Princess Mononoke. Ghibli's style is applied to family portraits, historical events including 9/11 and anything else that others want. Altman even changed his X Avatar to what appears to be a meta name and made a joke about the sudden popularity of this style that surpassed his previous (and supposedly more important work).
The Ghibli AI phenomenon is often portrayed as organic, driven by inspiration from Chatgpt users. On X, the person who thought the launch trend pointed out that Openai was "very lucky" and that "Ghibli's active interest was the first virus use of the model, not some horrible deepfake nonsense". But Ultraman doesn't seem to think it's luck. He replied, “Believe it or not, we thought a lot in the initial examples we showed when introducing new technology.” In addition to profile pictures that appeared on each of his posts, he also reposted many meta-text images himself, adding images less than 24 hours after the Gibley-style visuals became popular. Openai President Greg Brockman also looped and celebrated the images.
This is different from other image sharing trends involving memes or GIFs. This technology allows ChatGpt users to control the visual language that artists honed through their careers, potentially devalued the styles of those artists and undermined their ability to charge for work. Existing laws do not explicitly address generated AI, but there is a reasonable argument that Openai is wrong and may be liable for millions of dollars in damages - now some of these arguments are being tested in the case of Midjourney, an AI company that opposes another image-generating AI.
It is worth noting that Openai and Studio Ghibli can imagine a promotional agreement that is similar to tech companies and many media publishers (including) Atlantic. However, this seems unlikely based on Miyazaki's explicit preference for hand-painted works of at least some types of computer-generated images. Neither company answered my question about whether a deal had been reached, and neither Miyazaki nor Studio Ghibli had made public comments on the situation. Personal artworks are copyrighted, but visual stylefor example Studio Ghibli, not. The legal logic here is that other artists should be allowed to develop styles through influence and reinterpretation. Van Gogh led Picasso and the way Spenser went to Shakespeare. But without adding any real value creation, a group of people who apply Ghibli style like Instagram filters is not a collective effort to drive our visual culture. These images are also a direct result of a private company promoting technology products, partly through social media of its executives, with the ability to make images in a specific style. In response to a wider request for comment, an Openai spokesperson told me: “We continue to prevent generations in the style of an individual living artist, but we do allow for a wider studio style.”
Still, this has a flavour of endorsing agreements, such as Nike’s Pepsi with LeBron James and Beyoncé: Use chatgpt; to make studio Ghibli art! These recognitions usually cost millions of dollars. Consider what happened in 1985, when Ford Motor Company wanted to promote one of the cars through an advertising campaign featuring popular singers. Ford's advertising agency Young & Rubicam asked Bette Midler to record her hit song "Do you want to dance?" but she refused. They approached one of Midler's backup singers without hesitation and asked her to perform the song in Midler's style. She accepted it and imitated Midler as much as possible. Advertisement broadcast. Midler sued.
In court, the judge described the core issue as “a grant for the attributes of his own identity” and cited precedents in previous cases. Young & Rubicam chose Midler not because they just wanted any good singer, but because they wanted to connect their brand with the feelings evoked by Midler’s special, recognizable sound. "When the unique voice of professional singers is well known and deliberately imitated to sell products, the seller already possesses it is not theirs," the court wrote. Young & Rubicam violated Midler's "right to publicity" with law. Midler received a $400,000 verdict (equivalent to about $1 million today).
Last year, Openai might have appeared in a similar lawsuit, when it used sounds that many people think sounded similar to those of Scarlett Johansson to promote its voice-assisted products. Like Midler, Johnson was asked to attend and refused. Experts believe she has a viable public case for Openai. Johansson's attorney sent a letter to Openai, but did not file a formal legal complaint. (Openai denied that the voice was built on Johansson's model, but removed it and apologized to the actors.)
The average person who sees torrent images in Studio Ghibli style with subtitles praise Chatgpt may reasonably infer that Miyazaki himself endorsed or related to Openai, as he is the most famous artist in the studio and has a more directing film than any other film. The fact that people tend to say that aesthetic Ghibli does not change styles Miyazaki ShinEven in his early works, such as the 1979 film Lupin III: Cagliostro CastleThis was created six years before Ghibli was founded. Of course many people know Thousands and Thousands of Seek As Miyazaki Hayao, I have never heard of Studio Ghibli.
In addition to the disclosure rights complaint, another legal option could be a complaint about false recognition or transaction infringement made by other artists recently against AI companies. False recognition is intended to prevent consumers from being confused by whether an individual or company recognizes a product or service. Trade Women’s Law protects unique visual cues that indicate the source of a product and distinguish it from other products. Classic Coca-Cola bottle shapes are protected by trade dresses. Apple also gained protection from traders on the role of general rectangular and circular on iPhones, a design that is much the same as Ghibli's style (and therefore less likely to protect).
In August, the judge agreed that claims against Midjourney’s false endorsement and trade modification were sufficient for litigation and found that, as the plaintiff claimed, the components used by Midjourney and similar AI tools used as the “trade skirt database”, used by the component.
Regardless of the decision of the court or any action taken by Studio Ghibli, the potential drawbacks are obvious. As Greg Rutkowski, an artist involved in the case against Midjourney, observed, the AI-generated images titled by his name and soon overwhelms his actual art online, making “confused by those who discovered my work.” As Adobe's former general counsel, Dana Rao is edge Last year, “people will lose some economic livelihoods due to style grants.” Rao suggests that current laws may not be able to handle the task of generating AI: “We may need to do new protections here.” That’s not only because artists need to make a living, but because we need visual aesthetics to develop. Artists such as Hayao Miyazaki push culture forward by placing careers attentively to the world and hone the styles that resonate. The generated AI can only mimic the styles of the past, thus minimizing the incentives for humans to create new styles. Even if Ghibli and Openai reached an agreement, Chatgpt allows users to imitate any number of different studio styles: DreamWorks Animation, Pixar, Madhouse, Sunrise, etc. As one designer recently released: “For decades, no one has been able to make aesthetics again, and there is no market for those who try it.”
Looking back at this AI boom in the years from now, Openai may not be as good as the provocative role for its technology. With its clever products, the company quickly encourages new use cases for image and text generation, testing what society accepts legally, ethically and socially. Many publishers have recently filed complaints that their brands have been attached to articles invented or modified by chatbots (another misleading endorsement). One of these publishers is Atlanticvarious AI companies are being sued for trademark dilution and trademark infringement. Meanwhile, Altman is still posting under his smile, avatar as of today.