Hollywood makes money on fake AI trailers — details
Several major Hollywood studios, including Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount, and Sony Pictures, allegedly made money from fake trailers created with the help of AI. Instead of blocking the channels that posted such videos, the studios asked YouTube to redirect the advertising payments coming from these videos to them.
The Verge writes about it.
Why did film studios not block such trailers?
The actors' union SAG-AFTRA reacted strongly, saying that studios are profiting from trailers that use AI-generated fragments of actors' images without their consent. In a statement, SAG-AFTRA said that such an attitude undermines efforts to protect actors' rights and implement clear rules for the use of their appearance or voice in AI content.
The industry has encountered fan trailers before, but now tools like OpenAI Sora or Google Veo make the process of creating "fake" videos easier than ever. Instead of issuing copyright infringement notices to YouTube channels Screen Culture and KH Studio, Hollywood companies chose to monetise these trailers instead of removing them. As a result, the number of low-quality AI videos posing as genuine trailers has only increased.
According to Deadline, Screen Culture has 1.4 million subscribers and about 1.4 billion views, while KH Studio has 683 thousand subscribers and 560 million views. The scheme of creating fake videos is almost the same: short excerpts from real films or TV series are combined with AI-generated elements. Often, such videos are passed off as early versions of future blockbusters (for example, Superman or Jurassic World: Rebirth) or imitate series sequels and adaptations of popular franchises that do not actually exist.
"I'm sure most of us have seen fake trailers like these being shared across social media by people who believe them to be genuine," Deadline writes, adding screenshots from the Screen Culture YouTube channel, where dozens of such fake videos can be seen.
Finally, two days after the Deadline investigation was published, YouTube stopped monetization on the Screen Culture and KH Studio channels. According to the company, the authors violated the monetization policy: the content should not be "repetitive or duplicate" or created "solely to get views". In addition, YouTube rules prohibit misleading the audience by presenting fake trailers as officially released.
Deadline also notes that Screen Culture and KH Studio may appeal to restore advertising payments. KH Studio's channel has already seen changes: while earlier videos were labelled as "first trailer", the latest publications are called "concept trailer".
For members of the actors' union, who are currently actively fighting for the right to consent when their image is used in AI content, the news that the studios were making a profit instead of protecting their interests is an extremely unexpected and unpleasant blow.
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