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More than 400 Hollywood creatives and entertainment-industry figures asked the Trump administration in March 2025 to preserve copyright protections as it developed a national AI Action Plan. Their letter did not call for an AI ban or for OpenAI and Google to be shut down. It urged the administration to reject a broad exemption for training AI models on copyrighted work without permission or payment.
What happened?
On March 15, 2025, more than 400 people from film, television, music, publishing and related creative fields submitted an open letter to the Trump administration’s Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). The letter was part of the administration’s request for public input on a national AI Action Plan.
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The signatories objected to proposals that could make it easier for AI companies to use copyrighted works as training data without licensing those works. Their request was directed at the policy process—not personally delivered to President Donald Trump—and it did not ask the government to prohibit artificial intelligence.
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Who signed the letter?
Reported signatories included Ben Stiller, Mark Ruffalo, Guillermo del Toro, Natasha Lyonne, Paul McCartney, Cynthia Erivo, Cate Blanchett, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Cord Jefferson, Ava DuVernay, Ron Howard, Taika Waititi, Ayo Edebiri, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Janelle Monáe, Rian Johnson, Paul Giamatti, Chris Rock, Michaela Coel, Aubrey Plaza and Paul Simon.
However, describing the group simply as “400 celebrities” is misleading. The letter also involved cinematographers, producers, editors, designers, musicians, composers, union members, Academy members and other creative professionals. It argued that the issue extended beyond Hollywood to writers, publishers, photographers, scientists, engineers, software developers and other knowledge workers.
What did the creators want?
The letter’s central position was that creative work should not become cost-free commercial input merely because it can be collected and processed at scale. Its practical requests were to:
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- Reject a special government exemption for unrestricted AI training on copyrighted works.
- Require AI companies to negotiate licenses with rights holders.
- Recognize the economic value of scripts, films, television programs, music, voices and other intellectual property.
That position does not mean every signatory opposed every use of AI. It means they objected to the use of creative work without meaningful permission, compensation or a clearly defined legal framework.
What did OpenAI propose?
In a submission dated March 13, 2025, OpenAI argued that existing fair-use principles support AI development. Its position was that training models involves learning patterns, structures and contextual information rather than simply distributing the original works to the public.
OpenAI also urged the United States to protect American companies’ ability to learn from copyrighted material. Its submission connected access to training data with economic growth, technological leadership and competition with China. It recommended monitoring foreign copyright rules and opposing policies that could make training data less available to U.S. companies.
OpenAI did not describe its position as abolishing copyright and stated that creator rights and interests should be protected. The disagreement was over whether existing principles are flexible enough to permit large-scale commercial training, or whether broader licensing requirements are necessary. OpenAI’s 15-page submission is available here.
What did Google propose?
Google’s submission also supported a balance between copyright protection and AI development, but it emphasized fair-use principles and text-and-data-mining exceptions. Google proposed rules that would allow AI systems to learn from publicly available copyrighted material under defined conditions.
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The company argued that requiring developers to negotiate with every data holder before model development or experimentation could be lengthy, unpredictable and impractical. That is not identical to OpenAI’s submission, although both companies supported rules that would preserve broad access to training material.
Google’s 12-page policy submission set out its position. Terms such as “stealing” or “exploiting” were used by critics and supporters of the Hollywood letter, not as neutral descriptions of Google’s proposal.
Why is fair use at the center of the dispute?
Under U.S. copyright law, fair use can permit certain uses of copyrighted material without permission. Whether AI training qualifies depends on facts including the purpose of the use, its commercial character, the nature of the works, the amount copied and the effect on existing or potential markets.
That makes the question more complicated than “AI training is legal” or “AI training is illegal.” Training use is not automatically the same as infringement in an AI-generated output. Separately, a model’s ability to reproduce passages, generate substantially similar material or imitate a living artist can raise additional issues.
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Fair use is also not a blanket commercial license. At the time of the March 2025 submissions, the materials described a contested legal and policy question rather than a settled rule covering all AI training. The letter itself did not change the law, and the administration’s request for input was not a final regulation.
The real policy collision: innovation versus control
| AI companies’ argument | Creators’ argument |
|---|---|
| Broad access to training data accelerates U.S. innovation. | Copyrighted works are valuable property and should not be used commercially without permission. |
| Licensing every work may be slow, expensive and impractical. | Transaction costs do not justify weakening copyright protections. |
| China may not impose equivalent restrictions. | U.S. competitiveness should not be built by removing creators’ bargaining power. |
| Training produces new systems that learn patterns from large datasets. | Those systems depend on vast quantities of human-created work. |
Both sides describe themselves as supporting innovation. Their disagreement is over who should bear the cost of obtaining the data that makes commercial AI systems valuable.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.Why licensing is difficult
Licensing could give creators consent, payment and negotiating power. But a system requiring individual negotiations for millions of works could favor the largest technology companies and rights owners, while leaving independent creators with limited leverage.
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The debate also has an important power imbalance. A major studio, record label, newspaper or platform may be able to negotiate an AI deal. An individual actor, writer, musician, photographer or independent publisher may not have comparable resources or bargaining power.
Were the signatories against AI?
No. The more accurate description is that many signatories opposed unauthorized or uncompensated use of creative work.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt told TheWrap that he was not opposed to artificial intelligence itself. Director Ángel Manuel Soto similarly said he wanted AI to make creative work more efficient while ensuring artists were treated ethically and paid when their work was used.
That distinction matters because “Hollywood versus AI” is effective shorthand but too broad. The dispute concerned training data, copyright, licensing and compensation—not every application of the technology.
What the story does not mean
- It was not a demand to ban OpenAI or Google.
- It did not establish a new copyright law.
- It did not prove that all AI training is legal or illegal.
- It did not show that all signatories opposed artificial intelligence.
- It did not concern only actors or celebrities.
- It did not primarily address digital replicas, voice cloning, deepfakes or synthetic performers. Those are related but distinct issues.
- It did not show that the Trump administration adopted the creators’ position.
What happens next?
The underlying dispute can move through litigation, legislation, licensing negotiations and industry-wide agreements. Courts may be asked to apply fair-use principles to particular datasets and uses, while lawmakers may consider whether existing rules are sufficient for commercial model training.
Any eventual framework will have to balance several competing goals: preserving creator control and compensation, avoiding impossible transaction costs, supporting smaller AI developers, maintaining U.S. competitiveness and protecting markets for human-made work.
The March 2025 letter was therefore best understood as a policy intervention in an unresolved copyright fight. It challenged the idea that AI companies should receive broad permission to use human-created work simply because licensing at scale is difficult.
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