Case updates

For more details and doc­u­ments, see Court Lis­tener.

March 21, 2024

Plain­tiffs filed oppo­si­tions to defen­dants’ motions to dis­miss, and responses to Mid­jour­ney’s and Run­way’s requests for judi­cial notice.

• Plain­tiffs’ oppo­si­tion to Sta­bil­ity’s motion to dis­miss

• Plain­tiffs’ oppo­si­tion to Run­way’s motion to dis­miss

• Plain­tiffs’ response to Run­way’s request for judi­cial notice

• Plain­tiffs’ oppo­si­tion to Mid­jour­ney’s motion to dis­miss

• Plain­tiffs’ oppo­si­tion to Mid­jour­ney’s request for judi­cial notice

• Plain­tiffs’ oppo­si­tion to DeviantArt’s motion to dis­miss

Novem­ber 29, 2023

Con­sis­tent with the Court’s order of Octo­ber 31, Plain­tiffs filed an amended com­plaint.

Plain­tiffs’ first amended com­plaint (with exhibits A–N included)

Plain­tiffs’ first amended com­plaint

Exhibit A - Plain­tiff Images in LAION-5B

Exhibit B - Plain­tiff Images in LAION-400M

Exhibit C - Plain­tiff Copy­right Reg­is­tra­tions

Exhibit D - Sta­bil­ity Text Prompts

Exhibit E - Run­way Text Prompts

Exhibit F - Mid­jour­ney Text Prompts

Exhibit G - Sta­bil­ity Image Prompts

Exhibit H - Run­way Image Prompts

Exhibit I - Mid­jour­ney Image Prompts

Exhibit J - Mid­jour­ney Name List

Exhibit K - Mid­jour­ney Show­case

Exhibit L - DeviantArt Terms of Ser­vice (Nov. 11, 2022)

Exhibit M - DeviantArt Terms of Ser­vice (Jan. 11, 2023)

Exhibit N - DeviantArt Pri­vacy Pol­icy (Jan. 11, 2023)

Octo­ber 31, 2023

On July 19, the Court held a hear­ing on the motions to dis­miss filed by Sta­bil­ity AI, Mid­jour­ney, and DeviantArt, as well as an anti-SLAPP motion filed by DeviantArt and joined by the other defen­dants.

In its order fol­low­ing the hear­ing, the Court denied Sta­bil­ity AI’s attempt to dis­miss plain­tiffs’ most sig­nif­i­cant claim, namely the direct copy­right-infringe­ment claim for mis­ap­pro­pri­a­tion of bil­lions of images for AI train­ing. The Court also denied Mid­jour­ney’s attempt to dis­miss the class alle­ga­tions.

Beyond that, as is com­mon in cases like this, the Court gave the plain­tiffs per­mis­sion to address remain­ing plead­ing issues by fil­ing an amended com­plaint (by Novem­ber 29). The Court also deferred rul­ing on defen­dants’ anti-SLAPP motion.

Over­all we con­sider this a pos­i­tive rul­ing for the plain­tiffs, as the most sig­nif­i­cant claim in the com­plaint is now on a path to trial. The Court has set a case-man­age­ment con­fer­ence for Novem­ber 7, 2023. Dis­cov­ery in the case has been pro­ceed­ing.

July 12, 2023

Plain­tiff Karla Ortiz tes­ti­fied at a hear­ing of the U.S. Sen­ate Com­mit­tee on the Judi­ciary, Sub­com­mit­tee on Intel­lec­tual Prop­erty, on the sub­ject of AI and copy­right.

• Writ­ten tes­ti­mony of Karla Ortiz

• Video of U.S. Sen­ate sub­com­mit­tee hear­ing

June 2, 2023

Plain­tiffs filed oppo­si­tions to defen­dants’ motions to dis­miss, Mid­jour­ney’s request for judi­cial notice, and DeviantArt’s anti-SLAPP motion.

• Plain­tiffs’ oppo­si­tion to DeviantArt’s motion to dis­miss

• Plain­tiffs’ oppo­si­tion to Sta­bil­ity’s motion to dis­miss

• Plain­tiffs’ oppo­si­tion to Mid­jour­ney’s motion to dis­miss

• Plain­tiffs’ oppo­si­tion to Mid­jour­ney’s request for judi­cial notice

• Dec­la­ra­tion of Joseph Saveri in sup­port of Plain­tiffs’ oppo­si­tion to Mid­jour­ney’s request for judi­cial notice

• Exhibit 1 to Saveri dec­la­ra­tion

• Exhibit 2 to Saveri dec­la­ra­tion

• Exhibit 3 to Saveri dec­la­ra­tion

• Plain­tiffs’ oppo­si­tion to DeviantArt’s anti-SLAPP motion

April 18, 2023

Defen­dants filed motions to dis­miss Plain­tiffs’ com­plaint. Defen­dant Mid­jour­ney also filed a request for judi­cial notice. Defen­dant DeviantArt also filed an anti-SLAPP motion. Details.

Jan­u­ary 13, 2023

Ini­tial com­plaint filed on behalf of plain­tiffs Sarah Ander­sen, Kelly McK­er­nan, and Karla Ortiz.

• Class-action com­plaint

• Class-action com­plaint: Exhibits