Yesterday (March 20, 2025) I wrote here about discovering two of my four co-authored true crime books were among those pirated through LibGen for AI training.
(Scroll down to read that entry.)
This morning, a quick update: Yesterday it was said that more than 2 million books, articles and academic papers were pirated. Today Authors Guild, a writers collective, says that number is actually 7.5 million.
Authors Guild (I’m not a member, but I might join) has really stepped up, as did the Atlantic, the magazine that called a lot of attention to the piracy this week and included a search function. It was certainly known that LibGen – which may be working with or at the behest of Meta, those wonderful people behind Facebook and Instagram, in this AI training theft was doing this, but I think this flew under the radar until this week.
A class action lawsuit is in the works, but Authors Guild provided a link to a form that writers can fill out to ask that their work be removed.
Here’s the Authors Guild piece:
https://authorsguild.org/news/meta-libgen-ai-training-book-heist-what-authors-need-to-know/
Solidarity!
keithroysdon 