Category: book authors

Agents for Jerry Falade reportedly withdraw $2 million book deal with Minotaur due to concerns about possible AI use. AI book witch hunt fells another author.

The Guardian reports that the agents for debut book author Jerry Falade withdrew the manuscript for his book “Call Me, I’ll Hide the Body.” The book was much coveted by publishers. Falade’s agent Marc Gerald held the auction for the U.S. print. Minotaur, an imprint of Macmillan US, won the auction for reportedly the price…
Read more: Agents for Jerry Falade reportedly withdraw $2 million book deal with Minotaur due to concerns about possible AI use. AI book witch hunt fells another author.
AI book witch hunt: BookTok rails v. The Atlantic’s Will Oremus article on Tuhin Chakrabarty’s study that suggests Daggermouth is partly AI-generated book based on AI detector Pangram & rare expressions. H.M. Wolfe denies it. BookTokkers defend her.

Will Oremus’s article on “Is This What Comes After AI Slop?, Daggermouth could be the first best-selling novel partly written by a chatbot.” BookTok is a fascinating community. The Atlantic’s Will Oremus may soon found out how fascinating–and fierce. This past week, Oremus wrote a 1,500 word essay, provocatively titled “Is This What Comes After AI…
Read more: AI book witch hunt: BookTok rails v. The Atlantic’s Will Oremus article on Tuhin Chakrabarty’s study that suggests Daggermouth is partly AI-generated book based on AI detector Pangram & rare expressions. H.M. Wolfe denies it. BookTokkers defend her.
James v. Snowflake Inc. U.S. copyright suits v. AI companies hit 60.

The U.S. copyright suits against AI companies just hit 60. Book author Darius H. James filed a copyright suit against Snowflake Inc. for its alleged training of its LLMs using RedPajama and Books3 dataset. The lawsuit was filed in the District of Montana. It has been assigned to Chief Judge Brian Morris. If there’s a…
Read more: James v. Snowflake Inc. U.S. copyright suits v. AI companies hit 60.
Judge Alsup issues opinion on preliminary approval of class action settlement in Bartz v. Anthropic. Naomi Jane Gray to be appointed special master for disputes over settlement claims. Payout increased to $3,100 per book.

Judge Alsup has issued his formal opinion in Bartz v. Anthropic preliminarily approving the $1.5 class action settlement between the Bartz book author class and Anthropic. (The Judge had preliminarily approved the settlement orally at the hearing on September 25.) Two new things: (1) “Because 482,460 works were finally identified, not 500,000, the total per…
Read more: Judge Alsup issues opinion on preliminary approval of class action settlement in Bartz v. Anthropic. Naomi Jane Gray to be appointed special master for disputes over settlement claims. Payout increased to $3,100 per book.
As Benioff faces backlash in SF, Salesforce hit with copyright suit for AI training allegedly on pirated books. Suits hit 53 in US.

Marc Benioff sparked backlash this past week for his comments in favor of bringing in the National Guard to San Francisco. Benioff later did damage control on Twitter. But it might be too little too late. To make matters worse, yesterday, book authors E. Molly Tanzer and Jennifer Gilmore, represented by the Joseph Saveri Law…
Read more: As Benioff faces backlash in SF, Salesforce hit with copyright suit for AI training allegedly on pirated books. Suits hit 53 in US.
Andrea Bartz declares victory, issues warning to AI companies in NYT: “I Beat the Anthropic AI Chatbot That Stole My Book”

Andrea Bartz, the lead plaintiff in the class action copyright lawsuit against Anthropic, wrote an Opinion piece in the New York Times, hailing the $1.5 billion settlement the court just approved. Bartz attacks Big Tech companies and sends an ominous warning of book authors waging copyright wars “for years to come.” This settlement sends a…
Read more: Andrea Bartz declares victory, issues warning to AI companies in NYT: “I Beat the Anthropic AI Chatbot That Stole My Book”
Copyright suits v. AI hits 49. Book authors Hendrix v. Apple.

On Friday Sept. 5, 2025, Hendrix v. Apple became the 49th copyright lawsuit filed against AI companies for allegedly infringing copyrights. Plus, the Hendrix suit is the 18th copyright suit filed by book authors. Docket here. (The total number of lawsuits was corrected on Sept. 14, 2025.) This lawsuit against Apple is the first against…
Read more: Copyright suits v. AI hits 49. Book authors Hendrix v. Apple.
Book authors led by Kai Bird file copyright suit v. Microsoft for its AI model

The copyright lawsuits keep coming. This time, Kai Bird and other book authors sued Microsoft for its training of its own AI model. (The prior lawsuits focused on Microsoft’s relationship with OpenAI, plus its incorporation of RAG.) This is copyright lawsuit No. 45. This lawsuit is also based on the alleged use of the now…
Read more: Book authors led by Kai Bird file copyright suit v. Microsoft for its AI model
Databricks opposes discovery of new model DBRX as beyond scope of book authors’ complaint v. Mosaic LLM

There’s a discovery battle brewing in the In re Mosaic LLM Litigation. Databricks opposes the discovery requests for evidence related to Databricks’ new model DBRX, which goes beyond the complaint against the model Mosaic LLM (that Databricks acquired the rights to). Apparently, the plaintiffs are seeking information related to the datasets used to train the…
Read more: Databricks opposes discovery of new model DBRX as beyond scope of book authors’ complaint v. Mosaic LLM
Judge Chhabria sternly warns Meta not to hold back relevant discovery, citing “magnitude of this case”

Judge Chhabria is not one to mince words. Once again, he’s stressed he importance of the Kadrey v. Meta lawsuit. Plus, he has given another stern warning to Meta to refrain from engaging in any discovery abuse. ORDER: The Court declines at this late stage to address the plaintiffs’ assertion (in their 487 opposition to…
Read more: Judge Chhabria sternly warns Meta not to hold back relevant discovery, citing “magnitude of this case”