Stability AI and Midjourney — two of the biggest names in the exploding field of AI-generated imagery — and portfolio website DeviantArt have become the target of a class-action lawsuit filed in California on behalf of artists.
As we have already mentioned, AI-generated images are a highly controversial fieldone where “Artists don’t write algorithms to follow a set of rules, but to “learn” a particular aesthetic by analyzing thousands of images. The algorithm then tries to generate new images while adhering to the learned aesthetics.”
The lawsuit was filed by three plaintiffs, all artists: Sarah Andersen (of Sarah’s scribbles), Kelly McKernan and Karl Ortizwho, on behalf of all affected artists, are demanding “compensation for damages caused by Stability AI, DeviantArt and Midjourney and an injunction to prevent future damages”.
She makes numerous and serious allegations:
The lawsuit alleges direct copyright infringement, surrogate copyright infringement related to counterfeiting, violations of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), violation of group members’ publicity rights, breach of contract related to the DeviantArt Terms of Service, and various violations of California unfair competition laws.
As attorney Matthew Butterick says in his post about the caseThe three companies are being targeted by “writers, artists, programmers and other creators” who are “concerned that AI systems are being trained on vast amounts of copyrighted work without consent, without acknowledgment, and without compensation.”
Stability AI (which do stability diffusion) and Midjourney are the companies behind the two most popular AI-generated art platforms, while DeviantArt — most commonly known as a portfolio and community art site — is included for his own work, to screw up massively.
For more technical details on the suit – or contact details if you’re an artist and want to get involved – see Butterick’s post here.
