OpenAI's Promised Media Manager Tool Remains in Limbo Amid Copyright Concerns

It's been seven months since OpenAI announced its ambitious "Media Manager" tool.

However, the platform remains absent, with little indication of when — or if — it will launch at all.

Initially unveiled in May of 2024, Media Manager was described as a solution for creators to manage how their copyrighted text, images, audio, and video are included in OpenAI's AI training datasets.

However, the tech giant's progress on the tool appears to have been stalled, raising questions about its priorities and ability to address escalating intellectual property (IP) disputes.

A Once Promising Solution

Media Manager was pitched as a tool to identify copyrighted content and provide creators with control over whether their works are included in OpenAI's AI training datasets.

It was intended to mend concerns from creators and fend off ongoing legal challenges regarding copyright violations. However, according to sources familiar with the project, the said tool never seemed to be a high priority internally.

"I don’t think it was a priority. To be honest, I don’t remember anyone working on it," a former OpenAI employee told TechCrunch. 

A non-employee who previously collaborated with OpenAI also noted in December that Media Manager discussions have been dormant for months, with no significant updates from the company.

Adding to this uncertainty, Fred von Lohmann, a legal team member overseeing Media Manager, transitioned into a part-time consulting role in October. 

Despite an initial timeline suggesting the tool would arrive "by 2025," OpenAI has provided no recent updates on its development status. While the phrasing of the timeline could technically include the entirety of 2025, observers interpreted it as targeting an earlier release.

Legal and Ethical Challenges in AI Training

AI models like OpenAI's ChatGPT and Sora, its video generation tool, rely on vast datasets to learn and generate text, images, and videos.

While these models can create impressive content, they are also prone to repeating copyrighted material, raising significant legal and ethical concerns amongst users and creators alike. 

Generative AI is “built atop the theft of creative professionals’ work”.

This clear, concise summary in the LA Times of the huge problem at the core of much generative AI is well worth a read.https://t.co/uFxoCD14lTpic.twitter.com/uEbdjHuMSd

— Ed Newton-Rex (@ednewtonrex) June 19, 2024

In one instance, Sora has reportedly generated content featuring TikTok's logo and recognizable characters from popular video games. Similarly, ChatGPT was previously found quoting copyrighted articles verbatim.

Such incidents have led to a wave of lawsuits against OpenAI, including from authors Sarah Silverman and Ta-Nehisi Coates, as well as major media organizations like The New York Times.

In response, OpenAI has introduced opt-out solutions for creators.

Artists can now submit forms to request that their work be excluded from future datasets, and webmasters can block OpenAI's data crawlers. However, these methods have been widely criticized as insufficient.

Media Manager was intended to address these shortcomings by offering a comprehensive, user-friendly system for creators to assert control over their works. But as months pass without visible progress, skepticism grows about whether OpenAI will deliver on that promise.

OpenAI failed to deliver Media Manager, their opt-out mechanism for AI training, by their target of 2025.

- It seems not to have been an internal priority
- It would likely be widely rejected by creators anyway, as it unfairly shifts the burden of controlling AI training onto… pic.twitter.com/ELYCicpJeq

— Ed Newton-Rex (@ednewtonrex) January 1, 2025

Industry experts remain doubtful about Media Manager’s effectiveness even if it eventually launches.

Fairly Trained Founder Ed Newton-Rex believes Media Manager could unfairly shift responsibility onto creators.

"Most creators will never even hear about it, let alone use it [...] But it will nevertheless be used to defend the mass exploitation of creative work against creators’ wishes," he told TechCrunch.

For now, OpenAI continues to lean on its fair use defense in ongoing lawsuits while implementing filters to reduce the risk of copyright violations.

Whether Media Manager will eventually surface as a meaningful solution — or fade into obscurity — remains an open question.