5 questions marketers have about Sora and the synthetic social era

"The promise of near-instant, realistic video may sound like a dream for cash-strapped, content hungry brands. However, marketers are increasingly nervous about risks such as copyright liability, brand safety and ethics, wanting answers before committing to public-facing AI-video produced ads, according to four creative agency and marketing execs. The number of AI video apps on the market is growing. In addition to Sora, there's a list that includes Midjourney, Google Veo and Meta Vibes. Meanwhile, marketers are grappling with the synthetic social and video surge."

"Major Hollywood studios, including Disney, Universal and Warner Bros. Discovery, have filed pending lawsuits against Midjourney over copyright infringement and usage rights that could set a precedent for IP usage in AI. "That was the first hurdle we hit with clients who were like, 'I'm exposed. I'm not interested because you can't indemnify me, and neither can the tool and the tool is just scraping everything'," said Khari Streeter, chief creative officer at Burrell Communications Group, a collection of multicultural marketing communications agencies."

AI video tools can produce near-instant, realistic clips that appeal to brands needing high volumes of content. Marketers express concern about copyright liability, brand safety, intellectual property and disinformation risks. Pending lawsuits by major studios against image-generation platforms highlight unresolved IP questions. Clients worry about indemnification and the opaque data sources used by many AI systems. Some marketers plan to use AI video for low-risk internal or test scenarios while avoiding public-facing ads until legal and ethical clarity emerges. Voice cloning and identity misuse add further safety concerns, prompting calls for stricter controls and transparency.

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