Amazon says its AI video model can now generate minutes-long clips

Nova Reel is only available through AWS platforms and services, including Bedrock, Amazon’s AI dev suite, and customers must request access. As with most generative AI systems, there are questions as to whether Reel was developed using ethically sound methods.

Video-generating models are trained on a vast number of examples of videos to “learn” the patterns in these videos to generate new clips. Some companies train models on copyrighted videos without obtaining permission from the owners or creators, and, when these models “regurgitate” copyrighted stills, it exposes users of the models to IP lawsuits.

Amazon hasn’t revealed the source of Reel’s training data, nor has it provided an explicit way for creators possibly feeding the models’ datasets with their videos to opt out. The company has, however, said that it’ll protect any AWS customers accused of violating copyright with media generated by its models, in keeping with its indemnification policy.

Updated 4:57 p.m. Pacific: An earlier version of this article implied that developers have to request special access from Amazon to use Nova Reel. That’s incorrect; while developers have to request access, AWS automatically approves these requests. We regret the error.