The major players in the American film industry have forced Bytedance, the owner of Tik Tok, to review its operations. The Chinese technology giant is expected to increase its security on its AI-driven video generation service, Seedance 2.0, after being served cease-and-desist notices by Disney and Paramount/Skydance.
Hollywood Strikes Back
The Seedance 2.0 allows its users to create high-production-value videos with textual prompts at out of the regular spending fraction. The technology was criticized by Motion Picture Association of America (the trade association of industry representatives including Netflix, Sony, and Universal Pictures, and on the other side, Warner iconic Discovery and Disney) within days as allowing copyright infringements on a large scale.
In a single day, the Chinese AI service Seedance 2.0 has engaged in unauthorized use of U.S. copyrighted works on a massive scale.
Said MPA chairman and CEO Charles Rivkin in the statement.
By launching a service that operates without meaningful safeguards against infringement, ByteDance is disregarding well-established copyright law that protects the rights of creators and underpins millions of American jobs.
Disney also claimed that the system builds a collection of pirated characters using copyrighted characters which makes them ordinary public domain images.
That is echoed by the Screen Actors Guild -American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) which went on as saying that the unlicensed use of voices and likenesses was unacceptable and would have negative effects on the livelihoods of the members.
ByteDance Responds
A representative of ByteDance told CNBC on February 16, that it does not disrespect intellectual property rights and that the concerns were considered.
A company spokesperson said in a statement shared with CNBC.
ByteDance respects intellectual property rights and we have heard the concerns regarding Seedance 2.0.
the spokesperson added.
We are taking steps to strengthen current safeguards as we work to prevent the unauthorized use of intellectual property and likeness by users.
Although Seedance currently resides only in China, the platform will be rolled out across international borders in later the same month. However, the observers within the industry do not believe in quick remediation; SAG-AFTRA called the system the representation of a rubber-stamped infringement enabled by poor practice to curate training data.
Bigger Picture and Outlook
The new recalibrations of ByteDance, even though they helped to calm the situation in the industry in the short run, still leave the threat of litigation and regulatory intervention, which will likely come true around the middle of 2026.
As a reaction to this, Hollywood can seek further licensing deals, as Disney did with OpenAI recently, whereas AI companies will aim to come up with morally-sound models. The final conclusion will also depend on whether technological progress or the lengthy intellectual-property disputes will win the day.