David Holz—Disney, Universal, Warner Bros. sued Midjourney for copyright infringement, alleging willful generation of protected characters
In 2025, multiple major studios filed copyright infringement lawsuits against Midjourney. Disney, NBC Universal, and DreamWorks sued June 2025 alleging 'mass infringement.' Warner Bros. sued September 2025 claiming Midjourney 'willfully creates both still images and video' of Superman, Batman, Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Tom and Jerry. Studios alleged Midjourney 'will readily generate images of copyrighted characters by name'—users need only prompt 'Yoda' not 'short, elderly, green humanoid alien.' Complaint states 'Midjourney has no internal protocols intended to prevent such use of the platform.' Artist class action from January 2023 also ongoing. Midjourney defense asserts fair use, comparing AI training to how humans learn art.
Scoring Impact
| Topic | Direction | Relevance | Contribution |
|---|---|---|---|
| Corporate Governance | -against | secondary | -0.50 |
| Intellectual Property Ethics | -against | primary | -1.00 |
| Overall incident score = | -0.885 | ||
Score = avg(topic contributions) × significance (critical ×2) × confidence (0.59)
Evidence (1 signal)
Disney, Universal, Warner Bros. filed major copyright lawsuits against Midjourney alleging willful infringement
Disney, NBC Universal, and DreamWorks sued Midjourney June 11, 2025 for 'mass infringement of intellectual properties.' Warner Bros. sued September 2025 alleging Midjourney 'willfully creates both still images and video' of Superman, Batman, Bugs Bunny, other characters. Complaint states Midjourney 'will readily generate images of copyrighted characters by name' and 'has no internal protocols intended to prevent such use.' Artist class action from January 2023 also ongoing.