Too Much TV: Disney Licenses Characters To Open AI, Invests $1 Billion

As part of this new, three-year licensing agreement, Sora will be able to generate short, user-prompted social videos that can be viewed and shared by fans, drawing from a set of more than 200 animated, masked and creature characters from Disney, Marvel, Pixar and Star Wars, including costumes, props, vehicles, and iconic environments. In addition, ChatGPT Images will be able to turn a few words by the user into fully generated images in seconds, drawing from the same intellectual property. The agreement does not include any talent likenesses or voices.

Alongside the licensing agreement, Disney will become a major customer of OpenAI, using its APIs to build new products, tools, and experiences, including for Disney+, and deploying ChatGPT for its employees.

As part of the agreement, Disney will make a $1 billion equity investment in OpenAI, and receive warrants to purchase additional equity.

Under the license, fans will be able to watch curated selections of Sora-generated videos on Disney+, and OpenAI and Disney will collaborate to utilize OpenAI’s models to power new experiences for Disney + subscribers, furthering innovative and creative ways to connect with Disney’s stories and characters. Sora and ChatGPT Images are expected to start generating fan-inspired videos with Disney’s multi-brand licensed characters in early 2026.

Among the characters fans will be able to use in their creations are Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Lilo, Stitch, Ariel, Belle, Beast, Cinderella, Baymax, Simba, Mufasa, as well as characters from the worlds of Encanto, Frozen, Inside Out, Moana, Monsters Inc., Toy Story, Up, Zootopia, and many more; plus iconic animated or illustrated versions of Marvel and Lucasfilm characters like Black Panther, Captain America, Deadpool, Groot, Iron Man, Loki, Thor, Thanos, Darth Vader, Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, Leia, the Mandalorian, Stormtroopers, Yoda and more.

More once I speak with a few more people. But I am sure this will end well for creators.

AGAINST MY WILL, I GET PULLED INTO THE OLIVIA NUZZI STORY
I have gone out of my way to not even mention the ongoing Olivia Nuzzi/RFK Jr./Ryan Lizza story. Because so much of it is gossip and to be honest, no one in this complex story comes off particularly well. And even more importantly, at this point it is almost impossible to know who is telling the truth.

But Lizza has been posting an ongoing series on about his relationship with Nuzzi and the events that led to her affair with RFK Jr. his Telos.news web site. He has alleged Nuzzi was not only having a relationship with RFK Jr. while also writing a profile of him for New York Magazine. But that she published an infamous story about then-President Biden's alleged cognitive issues while also serving as RFK Jr,'s unofficial media advisor.

Still, for all the salaciousness, I have never been tempted to write anything about this, because plenty of other people were covering it. And it just seemed petty and depressing to me.

However, Lizza posted part five of his rundown of their relationship Wednesday evening and I wanted to highlight part of it because it offers up a good look at what it is like to be an independent journalist. Especially when people start threatening to sue you:

Olivia pulled together a small group that would serve as a sort of crisis communications war room for her as the scandal widened in the coming days. Rachel Adler, Olivia’s agent at Creative Artists Agency, would serve as her main representative to the media. Matt Dornic, then unemployed but formerly CNN’s corporate spokesman and best known for managing a magazine profile that led to the head of CNN losing his job, would help manage the press.

According to several people involved in the discussions, Olivia’s team initially batted around a few ideas to make Oliver go away. Status was tiny and just getting off the ground. They doubted Oliver had libel insurance and thought they could scare him into backing down with legal threats. “They decided to deny it because he’s small and can’t afford a lawsuit,” said a participant in these early discussions.

As Oliver persisted, Olivia’s team developed a new lie. Rachel told Oliver I had made everything up and was spreading a false rumor about Bobby and Olivia. There was no relationship. It was all a lie concocted by her crazy ex. Strike two. Oliver knew this was false because he had already talked to me. I refused to confirm the story and did everything I could to nudge him away from pursuing it. Why would I want to be sucked into a tabloid scandal as the third wheel in Olivia’s nauseating adventures with an odious sex addict?

I deal with these types of issues on a regular basis. People threatening to sue me or lying to my face about some incident I can easily fact check. I am very careful with my reporting and sometimes as a result I lose out on a big story. But better to lose out than to be Dylan Byers in this excerpt:

Olivia’s initial plan, I was told contemporaneously by one of her closest advisers during this period, was to leak the false story of my role in her downfall to a “sleazy reporter” who would print it without much vetting.

Eleven reporters from eleven different publications called me with some version of this allegation. I felt like I was in a game of Frogger, dodging through heavy traffic as I desperately sought the safety of the opposite sidewalk.

Ten publications declined to print Olivia’s lies: The New York Times, The New York Post, Semafor, The Daily Beast, The Wall Street Journal, Vanity Fair, The Washington Post, People, Business Insider, and The U.S. Sun.

But Olivia’s plot to find a “sleazy reporter” who would print her claims without vetting was successful with one person at one outlet: Dylan Byers at Puck.

I am shielded from some of this chaos because I don't live in the NYC/DC media echo chamber and don't have to concern myself with having an uncomfortable moment at some upcoming cocktail party. But Lizza's piece is a reminder to be extremely skeptical of anything you read. And always try and figure out why sources are telling the stories they are telling. 

SPEAKING OF PUCK
Someone sent me a Matthew Belloni piece from yesterday in which he attempts to discern high much money David Ellison is willing to pay to win Warner Bros. Discovery. Much of it is just aggregated comments from various people, along with Belloni's trademark snark and speculation. But this paragraph jumped out at me:

To that point, Ted declared that his plan only calls for about $2 billion to $3 billion in synergies. Not a small number, but Netflix will save by not having to pay to put Superman, Friends, and other Warners content on Netflix—which qualifies as good news these days. That “should make the [Netflix] deal more favorable from the industry participants’ and regulators’ perspectives,” analyst David Joyce of Seaport Research wrote in a note yesterday, mirroring the Netflix messaging: The Netflix deal is better for Hollywood; the Paramount deal is better for the Ellisons.

But that is not how it works. If Netflix wants to put Friends or Superman on its service, it just doesn't get to do it for free because they own Warner Bros. Studios. Studios are contractually obligated to get the highest amount of licensing money offered for their content. It's why Peacock spent close to a billion dollars on the rights to The Office. They are all sorts of profit participants and rights owners who expect to get their share of any licensing fees. And there have been number of lawsuits in recent years filed by producers, writers and creators who claimed their work was being purposely undervalued by the studio.

I don't know what is more disturbing. about this. That the analyst didn't understand this basic fact or that it slipped right past Belloni.

YOUTUBE TV TO OFFER SKINNY CABLE BUNDLES
Ten years from now, media industry historians will point to unsuccessful effort to launch the sports platform Venu Sports. The Disney, Fox, and Warner Bros. Discovery joint sports streaming service attempted to launch in early, but efforts were halted after lawsuits were filed by Fubo and DirecTV. That settlement eventually led to Disney acquiring Fubo and DirecTV winning the right to launch a number of genre-specific skinny bundles centered around news, entertainment or sports.

YouTube's recent carriage dispute with Disney was about a number of issues, but a primary one was the right to offer similar skinny bundles to subscribers. And on Wednesday, YouTube said it will begin offering cheaper, more targeted packages of programming starting early next year.

There aren't many details on the what the company calls YouTube TV Plans, a collection of 10 different packages, designed "to offer more choice and flexibility to our subscribers." 

These mini-bundles are the next evolution in the cable bundle. Customers will able to order just the genres of television they care about the most - whether its live sports or every news channel available.

One other thought about the failure of Venu Sports is that if it had successfully launched, it would have made the current efforts to sell of Warner Bros. Discovery a lot more challenging.

ODDS AND SODS:
* If you are looking for a show that is wonderfully, aggressively odd, then Netflix has just added the 2020 AMC series Dispatches From Elsewhere which is part Twin Peaks, part Alice In Wonderland.

* Season four of The Lincoln Lawyer will premiere Thursday, February 5th on Netflix.

* I'm not saying that ABC's annual Dick Clark’s Rockin’ New Year’s Eve With Ryan Seacrest is old and out-of-touch. But the show just announced it is adding 81-year-old Diana Ross as a headliner for the evening.

* Money Heist spin-off Berlin is now Berlin And The Lady With An Ermine will premiere May 15th on Netflix.

* Jeff Garcia, best known as the voice of Sheen Estevez in Nickelodeon’s Jimmy Neutron franchise, died Wednesday at age 50.

* Prime Video has canceled the English-language Italian-produced series Hotel Costiera after one season. 

* The stand-up special Mike Epps: Delusional will premiere Tuesday, January 27th on Netflix.

EVEN YOUR FAVORITE TV CHEFS ARE IN IT FOR THE MONEY
The incredibly useful web site Heated has a piece on how California's efforts to ban Teflon cookware was stymied by efforts from a group of celebrity chefs. Who had a clear financial incentive to oppose the plan:

Days before Newsom was set to rule on the bill, a wave of similarly worded letters to the California State Legislature appeared. Celebrity chefs Rachael Ray, David Chang, Thomas Keller, and Marcus Samuelsson all insisted that Teflon was safe when used correctly. Their letters warned that the bill was alarmist, unnecessary, and unfair to home cooks and professional chefs alike. Their message was polished, unified, and amplified across national media.

In the end, Newsom echoed their concerns. “I am deeply concerned about the impact this bill would have on the availability of affordable options in cooking products,” he wrote in his veto message.

But the chefs weren’t acting alone. They were working on behalf of The Cookware Sustainability Alliance, a newly created lobbying group representing some of the world’s largest pan manufacturers, which argued the bill would drive up consumer prices and needlessly restrict a “safe” product.

The reason the chefs’ letters aligned so cleanly with the CSA’s talking points is, in retrospect, unsurprising: They all have financial relationships with companies that produce and sell PTFE-coated pans—the same companies that fund the CSA, a joint investigation by Atmos and Heated found.

Read the entire investigation, which seems like just another example of everyone's willingness to let money drive even their most basic decisions.

TWEET OF THE DAY



WHAT'S COMING TODAY AND TOMORROW

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 11TH:
* Had I Not Seen The Sun (Netflix)
* Little Disasters (Paramount+)
* Lost In The Spotlight (Netflix)
* Man Vs. Baby Series Premiere (Netflix)
* My Mother The Madam (LMN)
* Music Box: Whizkid: Long Live Lagos (HBO)
* NBC 2025 Year In Review (NBC)
* Never Alone For Christmas: Memphis (BET+)
* The Fakenapping (Netflix)
* The Game Awards 2025 (Prime Video)
* The Town (Netflix)
* Tomb Raider: The Legend Of Laura Croft (Netflix)

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 12TH:
* A Runaway Bride For Christmas (Lifetime)
* 93rd Annual Hollywood Christmas Parade (The CW)
* Christmas In Alaska (Lifetime)
* City Of Shadows Series Premiere (Netflix)
* Home For Christmas (Netflix)
* Influencers (Shudder)
* Sarah Squirm: Live + In The Flesh (HBO)
* Slaycation Season Two (WOW Presents Plus)
* Starring Dick Van Dyke (PBS)
* Tales Of The Teenage Mutant Turtles (Paramount+)
* Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour - The End Of An Era (Disney+)
* Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour - The Final Show (Disney+)
* Tell Me Softly (Dimelo bajito) (Prime Video)
* The Last Drive-In: Joe Bob's Cold Cruel Christmas (Shudder)
* Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery (Netflix)

SEE YOU EARLY FRIDAY MORNING!