The Three Big Unanswered Questions About Sora

The Three Big Unanswered Questions About Sora

Estimated reading time: 7 minutes

• Sora, OpenAI’s new AI video app, presents both immense creative potential and substantial challenges regarding its long-term sustainability, economic viability, and legal standing.
• The platform’s future success depends on OpenAI’s ability to implement effective monetization strategies, navigate complex copyright issues, and refine its content algorithms.
• Generating AI video is extremely energy and cost-intensive, raising concerns about OpenAI’s financial burden and the environmental impact of scaling Sora globally.
• Sora is a legal minefield, with potential lawsuits stemming from the unauthorized use of copyrighted/trademarked content and the creation of deepfakes of real individuals, despite implemented safeguards.
• Users, creators, and copyright holders must cultivate digital literacy, proactively monitor content, and understand evolving legal rights to responsibly engage with AI-generated media.

• Can Sora’s Unfiltered Reality Sustain Itself?
• The Staggering Cost of Infinite Imagination: Can OpenAI Afford Sora?
• Navigating the Legal Minefield: How Many Lawsuits Are On the Horizon for Sora?
• Actionable Steps for Navigating the Sora Era
• Share Your Thoughts
• Frequently Asked Questions

The landscape of digital content is in constant flux, but every so often, a new innovation emerges that doesn’t just nudge the boundaries but obliterates them entirely. We’re currently witnessing such a moment with the advent of advanced AI video generation. While the technology promises unprecedented creative freedom, it also ushers in a new era of complex questions.

Last week OpenAI released Sora, a TikTok-style app that presents an endless feed of exclusively AI-generated videos, each up to 10 seconds long. The app allows you to create a “cameo” of yourself—a hyperrealistic avatar that mimics your appearance and voice—and insert other peoples’ cameos into your own videos (depending on what permissions they set).

A former OpenAI researcher who left to build an AI-for-science startup referred to Sora as an “infinite AI tiktok slop machine.”

That hasn’t stopped it from soaring to the top spot on Apple’s US App Store. After I downloaded the app, I quickly learned what types of videos are, at least currently, performing well: bodycam-style footage of police pulling over pets or various trademarked characters, including SpongeBob and Scooby Doo; deepfake memes of Martin Luther King Jr. talking about Xbox; and endless variations of Jesus Christ navigating our modern world.

Just as quickly, I had a bunch of questions about what’s coming next for Sora. Here’s what I’ve learned so far.

Can Sora’s Unfiltered Reality Sustain Itself?

Can it last? OpenAI is betting that a sizable number of people will want to spend time on an app in which you can suspend your concerns about whether what you’re looking at is fake and indulge in a stream of raw AI. One reviewer put it this way:

“It’s comforting because you know that everything you’re scrolling through isn’t real, where other platforms you sometimes have to guess if it’s real or fake. Here, there is no guessing, it’s all AI, all the time.”

This may sound like hell to some. But judging by Sora’s popularity, lots of people want it. So what’s drawing these people in? There are two explanations. One is that Sora is a flash-in-the-pan gimmick, with people lining up to gawk at what cutting-edge AI can create now (in my experience, this is interesting for about five minutes). The second, which OpenAI is betting on, is that we’re witnessing a genuine shift in what type of content can draw eyeballs, and that users will stay with Sora because it allows a level of fantastical creativity not possible in any other app.

The allure of a world without limitations, where imagination directly translates into visual media, is undeniably powerful. Sora offers an escape into pure, unbridled fantasy, distinguishing itself from platforms where users constantly scrutinize authenticity. This unique value proposition could be its enduring strength, fostering a new genre of digital interaction.

However, long-term retention hinges on several critical strategic decisions. There are a few decisions down the pike that may shape how many people stick around: how OpenAI decides to implement ads, what limits it sets for copyrighted content (see below), and what algorithms it cooks up to decide who sees what. The careful calibration of these elements will determine whether Sora evolves into a sustainable creative hub or fades as a technological marvel.

The Staggering Cost of Infinite Imagination: Can OpenAI Afford Sora?

Can OpenAI afford it? OpenAI is not profitable, but that’s not particularly strange given how Silicon Valley operates. What is peculiar, though, is that the company is investing in a platform for generating video, which is the most energy-intensive (and therefore expensive) form of AI we have. The energy it takes dwarfs the amount required to create images or answer text questions via ChatGPT.

This isn’t news to OpenAI, which has joined a half-trillion-dollar project to build data centers and new power plants. But Sora—which currently allows you to generate AI videos, for free, without limits—raises the stakes: How much will it cost the company?

The sheer computational demand of generating even a 10-second high-quality video is astronomical. Scaling this to millions of users, each creating multiple videos daily, represents an unprecedented economic and environmental burden. Running Sora free-of-charge, while great for initial adoption, is an unsustainable model in the long run.

OpenAI is making moves toward monetizing things (you can now buy products directly through ChatGPT, for example). On October 3, its CEO, Sam Altman, wrote in a blog post that “we are going to have to somehow make money for video generation,” but he didn’t get into specifics. One can imagine personalized ads and more in-app purchases. The challenge lies in introducing revenue streams without alienating a user base accustomed to limitless free access, a delicate balance crucial for its survival.

Still, it’s concerning to imagine the mountain of emissions might result if Sora becomes popular. Altman has accurately described the emissions burden of one query to ChatGPT as impossibly small. What he has not quantified is what that figure is for a 10-second video generated by Sora. It’s only a matter of time until AI and climate researchers start demanding it. The environmental footprint of pervasive AI video generation is a looming ethical and practical concern that cannot be ignored.

Navigating the Legal Minefield: How Many Lawsuits Are On the Horizon for Sora?

How many lawsuits are coming? Sora is awash in copyrighted and trademarked characters. It allows you to easily deepfake deceased celebrities. Its videos use copyrighted music.

The current state of AI and copyright law is, at best, ambiguous, making Sora a potential lightning rod for legal challenges. Last week, the Wall Street Journal reported that OpenAI has sent letters to copyright holders notifying them that they’ll have to opt out of the Sora platform if they don’t want their material included, which is not how these things usually work. The law on how AI companies should handle copyrighted material is far from settled, and it’d be reasonable to expect lawsuits challenging this.

This “opt-out” approach flips traditional intellectual property rights on their head, placing the burden on creators to protect their work from potential algorithmic ingestion. Such a stance is likely to provoke strong resistance from artists, studios, and rights organizations eager to protect their valuable assets in the digital age.

In last week’s blog post, Altman wrote that OpenAI is “hearing from a lot of rightsholders” who want more control over how their characters are used in Sora. He says that the company plans to give those parties more “granular control” over their characters. Still, “there may be some edge cases of generations that get through that shouldn’t,” he wrote.

But another issue is the ease with which you can use the cameos of real people. People can restrict who can use their cameo, but what limits will there be for what these cameos can be made to do in Sora videos?

This is apparently already an issue OpenAI is being forced to respond to. The head of Sora, Bill Peebles, posted on October 5 that users can now restrict how their cameo can be used—preventing it from appearing in political videos or saying certain words, for example. How well will this work? Is it only a matter of time until someone’s cameo is used for something nefarious, explicit, illegal, or at least creepy, sparking a lawsuit alleging that OpenAI is responsible? Imagine, for instance, a politician’s hyperrealistic AI cameo appearing in a fabricated scandalous video just weeks before an election, regardless of their consent or the restrictions they set. The potential for reputational damage and legal repercussions is immense.

The ability to create hyperrealistic avatars of real individuals presents a profound ethical and legal quandary. While safeguards are being implemented, the inherent risk of misuse, from defamation to identity fraud, is substantial. The effectiveness of these restrictions in preventing malicious applications will be a key factor in determining Sora’s ethical standing and legal future.

Actionable Steps for Navigating the Sora Era

1. For Content Creators: Explore Responsibly & Document Usage. While the temptation to leverage Sora’s creative power is strong, understand the evolving legal landscape. Document your creative process, especially regarding source material, and be mindful of using copyrighted or trademarked elements. Experiment with original concepts to truly harness its unique capabilities without legal entanglements.
2. For Copyright Holders: Proactive Monitoring & Assert Your Rights. Don’t wait to be notified. Actively monitor for unauthorized use of your intellectual property on AI platforms. Engage with legal counsel to understand your rights in this new digital frontier and be prepared to assert them, either through direct communication with platform providers or, if necessary, through legal action.
3. For Users: Cultivate Digital Literacy & Critical Engagement. As AI-generated content becomes indistinguishable from reality, develop a heightened sense of digital literacy. Question what you see, understand the source, and be aware of the ethical implications of creating or sharing deepfake content, even if for entertainment. Exercise caution with your personal data and cameo permissions.

Overall, we haven’t seen what full-scale Sora looks like yet (OpenAI is still doling out access to the app via invite codes). When we do, I think it will serve as a grim test: Can AI create videos so fine-tuned for endless engagement that they’ll outcompete “real” videos for our attention? In the end, Sora isn’t just testing OpenAI’s technology—it’s testing us, and how much of our reality we’re willing to trade for an infinite scroll of simulation.

Sora stands at the precipice of a new digital age, promising an unparalleled creative playground while simultaneously posing formidable questions about its sustainability, economic viability, and the very fabric of our legal and ethical frameworks. Its journey will undoubtedly be fraught with challenges, but the answers it provides will shape the future of AI-generated content and our relationship with simulated realities.

Share Your Thoughts

What do you think about the rise of AI-generated content and Sora’s potential impact? Share your insights and concerns in the comments below, or subscribe to our newsletter for more deep dives into the future of AI.

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