In February 2026, a major legal confrontation erupted between Hollywood's largest entertainment studios and Chinese technology conglomerate ByteDance over its newly launched AI video generator, Seedance 2.0. The tool, an upgrade to ByteDance's generative AI platform, allows users to create short, 15-second videos from simple text prompts and is currently available to Chinese users via the Jianying app, with a planned global rollout on the CapCut platform.
The core of the dispute centers on allegations of "blatant" and "massive scale" copyright infringement. Major studios, led by Paramount Skydance and The Walt Disney Company, have issued cease-and-desist letters to ByteDance, accusing the Seedance platforms of illegally using their intellectual property to generate content. Paramount's letter, sent by intellectual property head Gabriel Miller to ByteDance CEO Liang Rubo on Saturday, specifically names franchises such as South Park, SpongeBob SquarePants, Star Trek, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, The Godfather, Dora the Explorer, and Avatar: The Last Airbender. Miller stated the AI-generated content is often "indistinguishable, both visually and audibly" from Paramount's copyrighted characters and stories.
Disney's legal notice, delivered a day earlier, accused ByteDance of a "virtual smash-and-grab of Disney's IP," citing the appearance of characters like Spider-Man, Darth Vader, and Grogu (Baby Yoda) in user-created videos. David Singer, a partner at Jenner & Block writing on Disney's behalf, called ByteDance's actions "willful, pervasive, and totally unacceptable."
The industry's response has been unified and forceful. The Motion Picture Association (MPA), through CEO Charles Rivkin, demanded ByteDance "immediately cease its infringing activity," noting the service launched "without meaningful safeguards" against copyright violation. Rivkin emphasized that this disregards laws that "protect creators and facilitate millions of American jobs." The Human Artistry Campaign, backed by major Hollywood unions, condemned Seedance 2.0 as "an attack on every creator around the world," while the actors' union SAG-AFTRA stated it "stands with the studios" in their condemnation.
The controversy highlights a critical tension between rapid AI innovation and established intellectual property law. It follows the 2023 Hollywood strikes, which partly focused on AI protections, and ongoing lawsuits against other AI image generators. The outcome could set significant legal precedents regarding fair use, derivative works, and platform liability for AI-generated content, potentially accelerating legislation like the U.S. NO FAKES Act and forcing the industry-wide implementation of technical safeguards such as proactive content filters and digital watermarking.
