Several authors who expected payments from Anthropic’s $1.5 billion copyright settlement reported receiving unexpected emails this week informing them that someone else had filed a claim on their payouts.
The settlement and its rules
Anthropic reached a settlement last year in a class action over use of copyrighted material; a judge had ruled that training AI models on copyrighted works can fall under fair use while outright piracy does not. The settlement received final approval in July, clearing the way for payments to be distributed.
Under the terms, nearly 500,000 titles are covered and each allegedly pirated work carries a $3,000 payment. If the book remains in print with a traditional publisher, the payment is split 50/50 between author and publisher. If a book was self-published or the publisher reverted the rights (the book went out of print and rights reverted to the author), the author should receive the full amount.
Reported problems
Authors have posted on social media that some publishers appear to be claiming more than their fair share. Mystery and thriller author April Henry said HarperCollins claimed one of her books that she says reverted at least 17 years ago, and on the same day she received a credit-alert indicating the publisher had been added as her employer — which she says was never the case.
On the Writers Beware blog, Victoria Strauss described two broad categories of complaints she has received: publishers seeking payment for works they no longer have a legitimate claim to because rights reverted, and publishers seeking 100% of a payment when they are only entitled to 50%. Strauss urged caution about attributing malice, suggesting many errors could reflect poor recordkeeping, and noted some publishers have acknowledged mistakes and asked Anthropic to correct them.
Authors Guild CEO Mary Rasenberger told The New York Times she does not view this as “a grab by the publishers” and does not believe publishers are intentionally trying to harm authors. She described the issues as predictable outcomes of bad recordkeeping and a confusing settlement process.
Still, Strauss warned that the complaints she’s seen are only a small window into a much larger system, and that the unusually large number of similar reports in a short period suggests the errors may be widespread and systemic rather than routine glitches.
Agents making claims too
Strauss also said she has received reports that some literary agencies are filing claims, which surprised many because agents are not rights holders to the books they sell. Author Courtney Milan (pen name of Heidi Bond) posted on Bluesky that some agents appear to be trying to claim percentages of the Anthropic settlement and expressed strong opposition to that practice.
How authors can dispute allocations
The Authors Guild and Courtney Milan provided information on how authors can dispute the allocation of payments. One complicating factor is the date of rights reversion: for an author to claim 100% of a payment, the rights must have reverted before the settlement’s download date of August 10, 2022.
Why this matters
The payments at stake are material for individual authors, and mistakes or inaccurate claims can meaningfully affect their income. While industry leaders attribute most problems to recordkeeping and procedural confusion, the volume and repetition of the same types of errors reported by authors have prompted calls for clearer processes and greater transparency in distributing the settlement funds.
