‘We Have to Draw a Line in the Sand’

The hour-long AI-generated standup special “George Carlin: I’m Glad I’m Dead” was condemned by the late comedian’s family upon its release and now faces allegations of copyright and likeness infringement.

George Carlin: I’m Glad I’m Dead hit YouTube on January 9 and just a few weeks later it’s being called a “casual theft of a great American artist’s work” in the new lawsuit filed by Carlin’s estate, as reported by TheWrap.

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The estate further alleges that “none of the defendants had permission to use Carlin’s likeness for the AI-generated special … nor did they have a license to use any of the late comedian’s copyrighted material.”

Those defendants include Dudesy LLC, as well as podcast hosts Will Sasso, Chad Kultgen and 20 additional John Does. According to Jerold Hamza, executive of Carlin’s estate and his longtime manager, the defendants “created a script for a fake George Carlin comedy special and generated a sound-alike of George Carlin to ‘perform’ the generated script.”

“We have to draw a line in the sand,” Carlin’s daughter Kelly told The Hollywood Reporter. “This is going to be a fight on every front, with entertainment at the center.”

In a social media post following the special’s release, Kelly told Robin Williams’ daughter Zelda and Joan Rivers’ daughter Melissa, “They’re coming for you next.”

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“The irony of all of this is that my father was such a unique thinker,” Kelly told THR. “One thing he said to people is ‘Think for yourself,’ and here are these people absorbing his material to try and think like him. It’s the ultimate zombification of a human life.”

In creating the special, the “Dudesy AI” claimed that it “listened” to “all of George Carlin’s material” in order to mimic both his comedic style and jokes. The estate is arguing that because of this, the final product is “not a creative work.”

Instead, the suit alleges that the special is “a piece of computer-generated click-bait which detracts from the value of Carlin’s comedic works and harms his reputation.” It also argues that “younger audiences” who perhaps discover Carlin through this AI special may be discouraged from “engaging with his real work that is his legacy.”

In one of the first major strikes against AI-generated content featuring a deceased celebrity, the suit is seeking for the immediate removal of the special, as well as unspecified damages.

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The Dudesy AI uses a similar format to how it created the Carlin special to create new episodes of the podcast itself, scraping existing online content about Sasso and Kulten. The difference, though, is that the comedians are willing participants in the project.

According to THR, the challenge in similar cases has been proving that the AI tapped into copyrighted works. In this case, though, the suit notes that the defendants “admitted that they input thousands of hours of George Carlin’s original copyrighted routines to an AI machine.”

“In short, Defendants sought to capitalize on the name, reputation, and likeness of George Carlin in creating, promoting, and distributing the Dudesy Special and using generated images of Carlin, Carlin’s voice, and images designed to evoke Carlin’s presence on a stage,” the suit argues.

The complaint also argues against a possible First Amendment defense by saying it “has no comedic or creative value” and does not “satirize [Carlin] as a performer or offer an independent critique of society.”