After Sora: the exports, a live tool's clauses, and where a free text comes from
The help centre states the Sora app was discontinued on April 26, 2026 and the API on September 24, 2026, with export offered at the sunset address and data deleted after any final export window. Runway's terms take a perpetual licence over inputs and outputs. The sources half is the public-domain line and each library's warning. As of 2026-09-25.
1Clause rows this register already read
One live tool's clause rows, then the two register rows that decide the other half of the question: whether the text itself is free.
- Your contentYou warrant you hold all rights and permissions needed to provide your content
- Your contentAn irrevocable, perpetual, transferable and sublicensable licence to inputs and outputs
- Your contentInputs and outputs may be used to train and improve its models
- Your contentContent submitted to a public area can be seen, used and reproduced by other users
- Terms read; not statedNot stated in the terms read (2026-09-25)
- Works published before 1978Every work published in the United States before January 1, 1931 is in the public domain
- Works published before 1978Older published works ran up to 95 years: a first term of 28 years and a renewal of 67
- Full licenseReaders outside the United States are told to check their own country's laws
2What the help centre states about the ending
Sora's side of this page is short because the notice is short. The help centre entry on the discontinuation states the app ended on April 26, 2026 and the API on September 24, 2026, that export was offered at an address kept for the sunset, and that data is deleted after any final export window. Nothing in the notice speaks to who owns a generated clip; it speaks to how long a copy can be collected.
That is the shape of an ending in this market: an export window with a date, then deletion. A series held only inside such a tool is held on that clock, and the rows below show what the alternative arrangement — a live tool — asks in exchange for staying.
3What a live tool's terms still ask of the text
Runway is on this page as the live arrangement, and its register rows read as follows. Users warrant that they hold all rights and permissions needed to provide their content. The licence taken is irrevocable, perpetual, transferable and sublicensable, over inputs and outputs. Inputs and outputs may be used to train and improve its models. Content submitted to a public area can be seen, used and reproduced by other users. What deletion does is not stated in the terms read.
Put beside the sunset notice, the two tools answer different questions. One says how long your copy lasts; the other says what the copy is while it is there. An adaptation has to read both, because a book's text passes through the upload clause before any clip exists at all.
4The sources half: a text that is free where it will be shown
The other half of the rights question belongs to the book, not the tool, and this register reads it from official pages. The U.S. Copyright Office line is a date: every work published in the United States before January 1, 1931 is in the public domain, and older published works ran up to 95 years, a first term of 28 and a renewal of 67. Project Gutenberg states its own limit plainly — readers outside the United States are told to check their own country's laws in addition to its terms.
None of that is a verdict on any particular book; it is the two readings an adapter compares against the country the film will be shown in. The register keeps each row with its source and the day it was read, and the copyright term for six jurisdictions is laid out on the register's own pages.
5The question the threads keep filing
The gathered material counts the name above in five figures, and the question filed beneath this page — whether it is even legal to make these AI dramas — was grouped with 43 similar posts under copyright and legal themes. The two lines quoted below are the other face of the same moment: creators asking what to do now that the app is gone.
A register of statutes and terms does not answer a legal question, and this page does not try. What it does is put the two halves where they can be read together: the copyright term of the source text, quoted from the office that publishes it, and the clause the tool asks you to promise when the text is uploaded.
6What the named tools' own pages state
| Tool | What its own pages state it is, or was | What its own pages say about your material | Terms read |
|---|---|---|---|
| Runway | Its Gen-4.5 model plus other video and image models, an agentic creative collaborator and editing | Standard and Pro monthly credits don't roll over; Max rolls over up to one month; purchased credits never expire | 2026-10-13 |
| SceneMixer | “Responsibility for what you generate and what you fed in sits with you, and our liability is capped in the terms.” | Not published on the page read | 2026-10-13 |
| Sora | App discontinued April 26, 2026; API discontinued September 24, 2026 | Export was offered at sora.chatgpt.com/sunset; data is deleted after any final export window | 2026-10-13 |
Inclusion rule. Named here: the tools this page reads, and the pipeline whose rows this register keeps. A tool's cell carries the wording of the page read; the pipeline's cell is one sentence quoted from its own published pages. Where a page does not state a point, the cell says so instead of borrowing the reading from elsewhere. Order. Alphabetical by tool name.
7What the gathered threads asked and counted
The question below is the one the collection kept meeting after the shutdown notice, and the quoted lines under it are what creators posted on the day.
| Name | Posts | Comment mentions | Positive | Negative |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sora | 11729 | 4662 | 1112 | 452 |
Inclusion rule. Names carried in the gathered material and read on this page. A thread arguing with itself can land in the positive column and the negative column both. Order. Descending by posts.
| Question | Similar posts | Theme |
|---|---|---|
| Is it even legal to make these AI dramas? | 43 | copyright-legal |
Inclusion rule. Questions filed in the gathered material and bearing on this page's subject. Order. Descending by similar posts.
Sora is dead — what do creators do now?
r/SoraAi, collected 2026-10-14
Will you miss making Sora videos?
r/SoraAi, collected 2026-10-14
8When the named tool's own terms are the easier fit
- Finishing stays inside the tool — 4K upscaling, HDR, ProRes and image sequences on the higher plan are stated on its own pages, so the export format is chosen while the work is still open.
- The credits' life is stated before you buy — Monthly credits that do not roll over, and purchased credits that never expire, are the arrangement a long adaptation budgets against in advance.
- The clauses are read, quoted and dated — Warrant, licence, training and visibility rows for this tool already sit on the register with the day they were read, which is what a swap away has to be measured against.
The search behind this page asks whether these AI dramas are legal to make; the answer is split, because a book has a term and a tool has terms. Two more reads sit beside this one: Morphic against Higgsfield and DramaSo's beat sheet.