Abhinav Choudhry

Kyrie Zhixuan Zhou, Abhinav Choudhry, Ece Gumusel et al.

Text-to-video generative AI models such as Sora OpenAI have the potential to disrupt multiple industries. In this paper, we report a qualitative social media analysis aiming to uncover people's perceived impact of and concerns about Sora's integration. We collected and analyzed comments (N=292) under popular posts about Sora-generated videos, comparison between Sora videos and Midjourney images, and artists' complaints about copyright infringement by Generative AI. We found that people were most concerned about Sora's impact on content creation-related industries. Emerging governance challenges included the for-profit nature of OpenAI, the blurred boundaries between real and fake content, human autonomy, data privacy, copyright issues, and environmental impact. Potential regulatory solutions proposed by people included law-enforced labeling of AI content and AI literacy education for the public. Based on the findings, we discuss the importance of gauging people's tech perceptions early and propose policy recommendations to regulate Sora before its public release.

Bohui Shen, Shrikar Bhatta, Alex Ireebanije et al.

As AI-generated video platforms rapidly advance, ethical challenges such as copyright infringement emerge. This study examines how users make sense of AI-generated videos on OpenAI's Sora by conducting a qualitative content analysis of user comments. Through a thematic analysis, we identified four dynamics that characterize how users negotiate authenticity, authorship, and platform governance on Sora. First, users acted as critical evaluators of realism, assessing micro-details such as lighting, shadows, fluid motion, and physics to judge whether AI-generated scenes could plausibly exist. Second, users increasingly shifted from passive viewers to active creators, expressing curiosity about prompts, techniques, and creative processes. Text prompts were perceived as intellectual property, generating concerns about plagiarism and remixing norms. Third, users reported blurred boundaries between real and synthetic media, worried about misinformation, and even questioned the authenticity of other commenters, suspecting bot-generated engagement. Fourth, users contested platform governance: some perceived moderation as inconsistent or opaque, while others shared tactics for evading prompt censorship through misspellings, alternative phrasing, emojis, or other languages. Despite this, many users also enforced ethical norms by discouraging the misuse of real people's images or disrespectful content. Together, these patterns highlighted how AI-mediated platforms complicate notions of reality, creativity, and rule-making in emerging digital ecosystems. Based on the findings, we discuss governance challenges in Sora and how user negotiations inform future platform governance.