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Yes, totally ethically bankrupt. But what bewilders me is that they yanked it as soon as they heard from their lawyers. I would have thought that if they made t

Yes, totally ethically bankrupt. But what bewilders me is that they yanked it as soon as they heard from their lawyers. I would have thought that if they made the decision to go ahead despite getting two "no"s, that they at least had a legal position they thought was defensible and worth defending. But it kind of looks like they released it knowing they couldn't defend it in court which must seem pretty bonkers to investors.

ethbr1 2y ago
> I would have thought that if they made the decision to go ahead despite getting two "no"s, that they at least had a legal position they thought was defensible and worth defending. They likely have a legal position which is defensible. They're much more worried that they don't have a PR position which is defensible. What's the point of winning the (legal) battle if you lose the war (of public opinion)? Given the rest of their product is built on apathy to copyright, they're actively being sued by creators, and the general public is sympathetic to GenAI taking human jobs... ... this isn't a great moment for OpenAI to initiate a long legal battle, against a female movie actress / celebrity, in which they're arguing how her likeness isn't actually controlled by her. Talk about optics! (And I'd expect they quietly care much more about their continued ability to push creative output through their copyright launderer, than get into a battle over likeness)
- justinclift 2y ago
  > They likely have a legal position which is defensible. Doesn't sound like they have that either.
  - bonton89 2y ago
    Copilot still tells me I've commit a content policy violation of I ask it to generate an image "in Tim Burton's style". Tim Burton has been openly critical of generative AI.
- XorNot 2y ago
  How is the PR position not defensible? One of the worst things you can generally do is admit fault, particularly if you have a complete defense. Buckle in, go to court, and double-down on the fact that the public's opinion of actors is pretty damn fickle at the best of times - particularly if what you released was in fact based on someone you signed a valid contract with who just sounds similar. Of course, this is all dependent on actually having a complete defense of course - you absolutely would not want to find Scarlett Johannsen voice samples in file folders associated with the Sky model if it went to court.
  - ethbr1 2y ago
    In what world does a majority of the public cheer for OpenAI "stealing"* an actress's voice? People who hate Hollywood? Most of that crowd hates tech even more. * Because it would take the first news cycle to be branded as that
    - XorNot 2y ago
      It is wild to me that on HackerNews of all places, you'd think people don't love an underdog story. Which is what this would be in the not-stupid version of events: they hired a voice actress for the rights to create the voice, she was paid, and then is basically told by the courts "actually you're unhireable because you sound too much like an already rich and famous person". The issue of course is that OpenAIs reactions so far don't seem to indicate that they're actually confident they can prove this or that this is the case. Coz if this is actually the case, they're going about handling this in the dumbest possible way.
      - ml-anon 2y ago
        It’s wild to me that there are people who think that OpenAI are the underdog. A 80Bn Microsoft vassal, what a plucky upstart. You realise that there are multiple employees including the CEO publicly drawing direct comparisons to the movie Her after having tried and failed twice to hire the actress who starred in the movie? There is no non idiotic reading of this.
foobarian 2y ago
> But it kind of looks like they released it knowing they couldn't defend it in court which must seem pretty bonkers to investors. That actually seems like there may be a few people involved and one of them is a cowboy PM who said fuck it, ship it to make the demo. And then damage control came in later. Possibly the PM didn't even know about the asks for permission?
- anytime5704 2y ago
  The whole company behaves like rogue cowboys. If a PM there didn’t say “fuck it ship it even without her permission” they’d probably be replaced with someone who would. I expect the cost of any potential legal action/settlement was happily accepted in order to put on an impressive announcement.
- kuboble 2y ago
  > a cowboy PM who said fuck it, ship it to make the demo. Given the timeline it sounds like the PM was told "just go ahead with it, I'll get the permission".
  - unraveller 2y ago
    Ken Segall has a similar Steve Jobs story, he emails Jobs that the Apple legal team have just thrown a spanner in the works days before Ken's agency is set to launch Apple's big ad campaign and what should he do? Jobs responds minutes later... "Fuck the lawyers."
emsign 2y ago
It looks really unprofessional at minimum if not a bit arrogant, which is actually more concerning as it hints at a deeper disrespect for artists and celebrities.

ethbr1 2y ago

> I would have thought that if they made the decision to go ahead despite getting two "no"s, that they at least had a legal position they thought was defensible and worth defending. They likely have a legal position which is defensible. They're much more worried that they don't have a PR position which is defensible. What's the point of winning the (legal) battle if you lose the war (of public opinion)? Given the rest of their product is built on apathy to copyright, they're actively being sued by creators, and the general public is sympathetic to GenAI taking human jobs... ... this isn't a great moment for OpenAI to initiate a long legal battle, against a female movie actress / celebrity, in which they're arguing how her likeness isn't actually controlled by her. Talk about optics! (And I'd expect they quietly care much more about their continued ability to push creative output through their copyright launderer, than get into a battle over likeness)

justinclift 2y ago
> They likely have a legal position which is defensible. Doesn't sound like they have that either.
- bonton89 2y ago
  Copilot still tells me I've commit a content policy violation of I ask it to generate an image "in Tim Burton's style". Tim Burton has been openly critical of generative AI.
XorNot 2y ago
How is the PR position not defensible? One of the worst things you can generally do is admit fault, particularly if you have a complete defense. Buckle in, go to court, and double-down on the fact that the public's opinion of actors is pretty damn fickle at the best of times - particularly if what you released was in fact based on someone you signed a valid contract with who just sounds similar. Of course, this is all dependent on actually having a complete defense of course - you absolutely would not want to find Scarlett Johannsen voice samples in file folders associated with the Sky model if it went to court.
- ethbr1 2y ago
  In what world does a majority of the public cheer for OpenAI "stealing"* an actress's voice? People who hate Hollywood? Most of that crowd hates tech even more. * Because it would take the first news cycle to be branded as that
  - XorNot 2y ago
    It is wild to me that on HackerNews of all places, you'd think people don't love an underdog story. Which is what this would be in the not-stupid version of events: they hired a voice actress for the rights to create the voice, she was paid, and then is basically told by the courts "actually you're unhireable because you sound too much like an already rich and famous person". The issue of course is that OpenAIs reactions so far don't seem to indicate that they're actually confident they can prove this or that this is the case. Coz if this is actually the case, they're going about handling this in the dumbest possible way.
    - ml-anon 2y ago
      It’s wild to me that there are people who think that OpenAI are the underdog. A 80Bn Microsoft vassal, what a plucky upstart. You realise that there are multiple employees including the CEO publicly drawing direct comparisons to the movie Her after having tried and failed twice to hire the actress who starred in the movie? There is no non idiotic reading of this.

foobarian 2y ago

> But it kind of looks like they released it knowing they couldn't defend it in court which must seem pretty bonkers to investors. That actually seems like there may be a few people involved and one of them is a cowboy PM who said fuck it, ship it to make the demo. And then damage control came in later. Possibly the PM didn't even know about the asks for permission?

anytime5704 2y ago
The whole company behaves like rogue cowboys. If a PM there didn’t say “fuck it ship it even without her permission” they’d probably be replaced with someone who would. I expect the cost of any potential legal action/settlement was happily accepted in order to put on an impressive announcement.
kuboble 2y ago
> a cowboy PM who said fuck it, ship it to make the demo. Given the timeline it sounds like the PM was told "just go ahead with it, I'll get the permission".
- unraveller 2y ago
  Ken Segall has a similar Steve Jobs story, he emails Jobs that the Apple legal team have just thrown a spanner in the works days before Ken's agency is set to launch Apple's big ad campaign and what should he do? Jobs responds minutes later... "Fuck the lawyers."

emsign 2y ago

It looks really unprofessional at minimum if not a bit arrogant, which is actually more concerning as it hints at a deeper disrespect for artists and celebrities.