Midjourney wants the Hollywood studios that sued it to show the court how they use AI
Midjourney has made a pointed legal move in its ongoing copyright dispute with some of Hollywood's biggest studios, asking the court to require Disney, Warner Bros., and Universal to hand over information about their own internal use of AI. The request signals that Midjourney intends to put the studios' relationship with generative AI tools under scrutiny as part of its defense strategy.
The studios originally sued Midjourney over claims that the image generation platform trained its models on copyrighted material without authorization - a complaint that has become a familiar flashpoint in the broader legal battle between the entertainment industry and AI companies. Midjourney's counter-move suggests it may be preparing to argue that the studios have themselves adopted or benefited from similar AI technologies, which could complicate the moral and legal framing of the plaintiffs' position.
This kind of discovery request - asking opposing parties to produce internal documents and data - is a standard litigation tool, but the target here is notable. Major studios have been publicly cautious about their AI use, particularly given ongoing tensions with writers, directors, and actors whose unions have negotiated hard to limit AI's role in production. Any disclosures forced by the court could surface details the studios would prefer to keep out of the public record.
The outcome of this discovery dispute could have implications beyond the Midjourney case. Courts are still working out the boundaries of copyright law as it applies to AI training data, and the conduct of the companies on both sides of these lawsuits is likely to factor into how judges and eventually legislators frame the rules. If Midjourney succeeds in obtaining the studios' AI records, those documents could become a meaningful piece of evidence - not just in this case, but as a reference point in the wider legal conversation about how the creative industry interacts with generative AI.
