OpenAI shut down its shortform video app Sora, burning bridges with partners and creators, and did not announce a rumored plan to fold it into ChatGPT. Disney had not finalized its $1 billion, three-year deal with OpenAI over character licensing in Sora, and executives held a meeting about the deal just 30 minutes before OpenAI announced Sora’s death via a post on X. An early test of ChatGPT ads also burned bridges with advertisers, who bought more than $200,000 of ads apiece but did not receive the data needed to assess performance, and had to call or email the company to place ads. CEO Sam Altman has not posted on X since the Sora announcement; his last two blog posts, both about Sora, were written six months ago. Altman wrote, “People are generating much more [video] than we expected per user,” and added, “We are going to have to somehow make money for video generation.” Shuttering Sora will not make up OpenAI’s revenue shortfall, estimated at roughly $1 billion a month. The Instant Checkout shopping feature announced in 2025, which was supposed to attract a million merchants, is also being dumped. Altman told staff on Tuesday that he is no longer running the company’s safety and security teams and is focused on raising.