Disgruntled Artists Release OpenAI's Sora To The Public

There is a group of very unhappy artists that resorted to leaking OpenAI's video generator Sora just to protest.

The text-to-video model was first announced in February of this year, with the company showing off its impressive ability to generate photorealistic — albeit imperfect — video footage.

The problem is that OpenAI has yet to publicly release the model, only allowing a small group of beta testers to take Sora for a spin.

Now, though, a group within the of testers who claim to have gotten early access to the tool say they've leaked the model to the public in protest, as The Verge reports — only for OpenAI to shut it down just three hours later.

The artists used the opportunity to make a greater point about how the AI industry is exploiting labor by making them "PR puppets."

"We received access to Sora with the promise to be early testers, red teamers, and creative partners," reads an open letter posted to public AI model repository Hugging Face.

"However, we believe instead we are being lured into 'art washing' to tell the world that Sora is a useful tool for artists," they added, referring to the process of covering up the shortcomings of a corporation by employing art in a positive way.

"We are not your: free bug testers, PR puppets, training data, validation tokens," the letter reads.

The artists took aim at OpenAI — which has raised a tremendous amount of money by coming up with AI models that ingest the work of human artists and then churn out more in their style — for demanding free labor.

"Hundreds of artists provide unpaid labor through bug testing, feedback, and experimental work for the program for a US$ 150 B valued company," the letter reads.

"While hundreds contribute for free, a select few will be chosen through a competition to have their Sora-created films screened," the artists wrote, "offering minimal compensation which pales in comparison to the substantial PR and marketing value OpenAI receives."

The artists also criticized OpenAI for requiring "every output" to be screened "before sharing."

In a statement to The Verge, OpenAI spokesperson Niko Felix argued that participation in the preview is "voluntary, with no obligation to provide feedback or use the tool."

"Sora is still in research preview, and we’re working to balance creativity with robust safety measures for broader use," the statement reads.