Publishing Nerd Corner: Your Copyright and the Anthropic Settlement

Hey ho, welcome to the Publishing Nerd Corner, where we dive into the more technical aspects of authorship.

Jess here. I love it when Sarina schools me on all things publishing nerdery, so we decided to make it official and create a whole new series. I have a long list of things I want her to explain for us, so stay tuned for more.

In the meantime, our first Nerd Corner chat is a timely episode about the Anthropic case specifically and registering your copyright specifically.

We’re going to discuss:

* The benefits of registering your copyright with the United States Copyright Office.

* The possibility of a settlement in the Anthropic lawsuit, and what that could mean for authors.

* Why copyright registration will be part of any potential settlement.

* How to register your copyright.

* Did your publisher fulfill its obligation to register your copyright?

For more information about the benefits of copyright registration, see the Copyright Alliance

To register your copyright yourself, you’ll need Copyright.gov.

You will also want to read the Authors Guild post about, “What Authors Need to Know About the Anthropic Settlement”

Hit that “play” button and nerd out with us for fifteen minutes!

Transcript below!

EPISODE 466 - TRANSCRIPT

Jess Lahey

Hey, it's Jess Lahey. If you've been listening to the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast for any length of time, you know that, yes, I am a writer, but my true love, my deepest love, is combining writing with speaking. I get to go into schools, into community organizations, into nonprofits, into businesses, and do everything from lunch-and-learns, to community reads, to just teaching about the topics that I'm an expert in. From the topics in The Gift of Failure, engagement, learning, learning in the brain, cognitive development, getting kids motivated, and yes, the topic of over parenting and what that does to kids learning, to topics around The Addiction Inoculation, substance use prevention in kids, and what I've been doing lately that's the most fun for me, frankly, is combining the two topics. It makes the topic of substance use prevention more approachable, less scary when we're talking about it in the context of learning and motivation and self-efficacy and competence and, yes, cognitive development. So if you have any interest in bringing me into your school, to your nonprofit, to your business, I would love to come. You can go to Jessicalahey.com. Look under the menu option “Speaking” and go down to “Speaking Inquiry.” There's also a lot of information on my website about what I do. There's videos there about how I do it. Please feel free to get in touch. And I hope I get to come to your community. If you put in the speaking inquiry that you are a Hashtag AmWriting listener, we can talk about a discount. So that can be one of the bonuses for being a loyal and long-term listener to the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast. Hope to hear from you.

Multiple Speakers

Is it recording? Now it's recording. Yay! Go ahead. This is the part where I stare blankly at the microphone. Try to remember what I'm supposed to be doing. All right, let's start over. Awkward pause. I'm going to rustle some papers. Okay. Now, one, two, three.

Jess Lahey

Hey, welcome to the Hashtag AmWriting Podcast. I'm Jess Lahey, your host, along with another host today—this is going to be super fun. We are the podcast about writing: short things, long things, poetry, prose, book proposals, querying agents—we're basically the podcast about getting the work done. I am Jess Lahey. I'm the author of The Gift of Failure and The Addiction Inoculation. And you can find my journalism at The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Atlantic.

Sarina Bowen

And I'm Sarina Bowen, the author of many contemporary novels, and also a council member on The Authors Guild. And it is in that spirit that we are bringing you a special episode today, which we're calling part of our Publishing Nerd Corner segment.

Jess Lahey

Our favorite stuff.

Sarina Bowen

Yeah, so publishing nerd stuff. Here we go, and the topic is pretty timely.

Jess Lahey

And juicy.

Sarina Bowen

And juicy. We're talking about why authors copyright their work, what it means, and how it ties into everything going on with the Anthropic lawsuit and potential settlement.

Jess Lahey

So, backing up, could you tell us a little bit about the Anthropic lawsuit, and sort of what it was about, and why everybody's talking about it right now?

Sarina Bowen

Of course. So, Anthropic is an AI LLM, Large Language Model Company, just like OpenAI is the same as ChatGPT. Anthropic are the people who make Claude, but all the AI big companies are being sued right now, including Meta, including Microsoft, or...

Jess Lahey

Google. Google.

Sarina Bowen

Yeah, sorry.

Jess Lahey

Not Microsoft.

Sarina Bowen

And also the new one is there's a new lawsuit against Apple. So, basically, everybody who went out and made a big LLM model using stolen, pirated books and articles downloaded from the Internet is being sued variously by different organizations, and it looks like the Anthropic lawsuit might be resolved first.

Jess Lahey

Okay, so what are they being sued for?

Sarina Bowen

They're being sued for a couple of things. First is the wholesale piracy of lots of books downloaded off the internet, and second, for feeding all of those books into their models to teach them how to speak and compose.

Jess Lahey

A while ago, weren't some—I think some—internal memos around the whole Meta thing where, essentially, they acknowledged how much it would cost to purchase legally all of the things they needed to model, do their large LLMs, and they decided, “Wow, that would be a lot of money.”

Sarina Bowen

Right.

Jess Lahey

“We'll just steal them.”

Sarina Bowen

We don't want to deal with copyright. Well, specifically, the most interesting internal memos that we've seen have been involved in the Meta case, which we're not really talking about tonight, but yeah, there are some big smoking guns out there. But I wanted to take this opportunity to talk about the practical nature of copyrighting your work, because there's a potential settlement on the table that's taking shape in terms of how authors will be paid some portion of a $1.5 billion settlement from this Anthropic suit, potentially, and whether or not you have a registered copyright on your book is going to matter. So, first of all, in this case, the judge did rule—well, we wanted him to rule—that using these books to train the model was not a fair use situation.

Jess Lahey

Right. They were trying to say, “No, no, this is just fair use.”

Sarina Bowen

Right.

Jess Lahey

“We shouldn't have to pay anybody.”

Sarina Bowen

And unfortunately, we don't have a ruling in favor of this concept yet, and The Authors Guild cares very much that it's not fair use and will continue to fight for that. But we instead were ruled in this case something that is actually quite powerful and important to the whole conversation, which is that the judge said that Anthropic downloading all of these titles—these millions of stolen books—from a piracy site was, in fact, illegal and that they are going to have to pay. So the ruling was against them. So now this is a class-action suit, and in a class-action suit, all of the parties in the class—you can opt out if you want to, like if you're an author who would rather sue them individually, you can still do that. But it looks like in defining the class of who is eligible to receive a payout; you're going to have to have a registered copyright. Your copyright will have had to have been registered within five years of publication, and also before they downloaded it.

Jess Lahey

So, to clarify, some of the questions I've seen floating around on the interwebs are about, “Oh, but there was that big list that was published by The Atlantic.” You could go to The Atlantic and just see, and “oh my gosh, I had six titles that were on that list. Does that mean that I'm going to get money for all of those titles?”

Sarina Bowen

Okay, well, that is a great question. And actually, I need to stipulate real quick that I am not a lawyer.

Jess Lahey

Right.

Sarina Bowen

You're a lawyer, and almost certainly I'm going to make an error when I'm speaking on this tonight. I have spent a lot of time listening in meetings about these things, so I feel comfortable enough to discuss it with you tonight. But, um, but I'm going to make a mistake. So you need to check everything...

Jess Lahey

Right.

Sarina Bowen

…when you make your own legal decisions. So wait, what was the question?

Jess Lahey

So the question was about that big list at The Atlantic.

Sarina Bowen

Oh yeah!

Jess Lahey

That was like, what, 5 million titles or so?

Sarina Bowen

Well, that list was taken from a specific piracy site.

Jess Lahey

Right.

Sarina Bowen

But it doesn't know which titles the company actually downloaded, so only the company has that list. So, first of all, that database is sort of handy and interesting, but it is not definitive in terms of this list.

Jess Lahey

So do not count on looking at that list and saying, “Oh, I have six titles there, maybe I'll get a payout for all six titles.”

Sarina Bowen

Right. So, um, but let's—we really need to talk about copyright registration because there's so much misinformation floating around out there. So it's true that if you sit down right now and write something, you already own the copyright for it. So that's powerful—sort of—right? Um, but the point of registering your copyright—and these benefits are right on the Copyright Alliance website. So we're going to link to the copyright website—but, um, one of the primary reasons why people register is because registration is a necessary prerequisite for bringing, for U.S. copyright owners, to bring a copyright infringement suit in federal court. And of course, this is a federal court action, but also because statutory damages and attorneys’ fees can only be sued for if you have a registered copyright. If you just own your copyright without registering it, you can sue for damages. The damages in the copyright suit are pretty hard to prove, or at least quantify. So that is why the statutory part of damages is what is being enacted in this judgment.

Jess Lahey

But Sarina, I have a publisher. Didn't my publisher register my copyright for me?

Sarina Bowen

Well, probably. My newer contracts all say the publisher must register them, and as far as I can tell, those newer contracts, the publisher did. So, yay. But I do have an old contract from about 2014 that only says that the publisher may register it. And guess what—they didn't. So, first of all, you need to see—you can go to a different database, which is the U.S. government copyright database—and look yourself up and see if your book is in there. And honestly, if your publisher was supposed to register you, and they didn't, The Authors Guild would really like to hear from you, because they're sort of looking into this. Suddenly, you know, in the last 10 days, there's a bunch of people who are like, “Oh my goodness, hang on, they didn't actually do it.” So that's something to think about, something to look at.

Jess Lahey

Yeah.

Sarina Bowen

Meanwhile, because statutory damages are what is going to be paid by this company, that is why the registration—it's not just to make people mad. It's not just to… it's not a gatekeeping thing. It's a legal issue with the settlement. So if you have not been in the practice of registering your copyrights, it's a pretty darn good idea to do that now. It's a completely online process. The site is quite antiquated and not that much fun to work with, and there are some moments in there when you're like, “I don't understand what's being asked of me.” But it's worth taking the time. It costs, I believe, $65 for a single title. They mail it to you at home, and then you have the certificate forever with your copyright registration number, but it's also kept in that database. You are required to deposit a copy—two copies of… well, a digital copy of your book, or two physical ones, and we usually use digital at this point. But totally worthwhile, and all the people who've been slogging it out on the copyright website up till now are probably feeling pretty good about it.

Jess Lahey

Okay, so there's been this settlement, and I don't know yet whether or not my book is included in that settlement because Anthropic has not turned over their list yet, but let's say I'm on it. When can I get my sweet, sweet dollars?

Sarina Bowen

Well, right now there is a really important The Authors Guild blog post about what to do, and we will also link to that, and they, in turn, link to—I think it's the lawyer's website with a form, a contact form—saying, yes, you know, please keep me in your thoughts and send me the email so that when the list is really ready, we can find each other.

Jess Lahey

And another plug for why you should be a member of The Authors Guild, if you qualify to be a member of The Authors Guild, is that The Authors Guild made sure that their authors were included in the class action suit.

Sarina Bowen

Well, just that they're going to hand the names.

Jess Lahey

Yes. Exactly.

Sarina Bowen

Except I actually think that if you have multiple titles, if you have multiple publishers, if you use a pseudonym—there's lots of reasons to go to that lawyer's page and fill it out anyway.

Jess Lahey

Yeah.

Sarina Bowen

So, I mean, the worst that can happen is that both The Authors Guild and you have turned in your name, and they'll have to sort out some duplicates. But that is not the end of the world. And I went there, and I'm filling it in as well.

Jess Lahey

The Authors Guild is a great source of reliable, factual information on what is going on with this suit at the moment.

Sarina Bowen

It is, and it's not like… I'm very proud of my work on the council, but it's like a couple of meetings a month. But what's really happening is that the people who work at The Authors Guild—it's their job. It's a bunch of lawyers who are very good at copyright law, and they've been working on this, like, you know, without sleeping practically, for like a year and a half. So, you know, all of these suits are what they're focusing on all day long. And they want to make sure that the greatest number of authors receive the compensation that they deserve, and it's basically like their whole entire lives right now.

Jess Lahey

It's always cool, actually, as a side note, in the annual meetings—I like to attend the annual meetings virtually—and it's always amazing when they give sort of a download of what's been accomplished by The Authors Guild over the past year. So it amazes me, the advocacy that's going on.

Sarina Bowen

It's a lot of suing people who aren't working on behalf of authors and against book bans and things like that.

Jess Lahey

Absolutely, absolutely. Is there anything else that we need to know that's pressing?

Sarina Bowen

Register your copyrights, people, let's go.

Jess Lahey

Go to the show notes. The links will be in the show notes, as Sarina said. Worst case scenario, you go to that lawyer website, law firm website, and you double—you know, you've done it, and so has your publisher. But who cares, whatever, as long as you've done the work. And, in fact, I will, when I write the show notes, be going back and doing the same myself. And you know, this is a moving target. This is not over yet. This is a continuing saga.

Sarina Bowen

Right.

Jess Lahey

Yeah, and it's definitely not like a done deal, like, “Yay, I'm going to be getting a check in the mail next week.”

Sarina Bowen

No.

Jess Lahey

That's not the way...

Sarina Bowen

It's going to take a long time, but there's going to be more of these suits. So, of course, the best time to register your copyright was five years ago. The second-best time is right now.

Jess Lahey

So, go do that. You have a to-do list. You have homework. Go do those things. And thank you for explaining that stuff. And thank you also for working with The Authors Guild. Because I know it's a ton of work. Not only is it a ton of work for you, doing the meetings and all that sort of stuff, but it's hard to go online and see on social media so many people misunderstanding either what this case is about, and you do a lot of clarifying, which is very sweet.

Sarina Bowen

Oh, thank you. But you know what? It's complicated.

Jess Lahey

It is very complicated.

Sarina Bowen

And I am not a lawyer, and I put in the time to understand it. But the truth is, it's hard. We're dealing with some really complicated concepts. IP is tricky, and, you know, I learn a little more every year, but it's hard, and if it confuses you, you are forgiven for feeling that way.

Jess Lahey

So, again, thank you. Go do your copyright thing. Go to the law firm website, go to The Authors Guild website, and just catch up. Catch up on what this is all about. And we will keep you posted in our little nerdy corner here, which I'm really excited about. I have a full page of questions I want to ask Sarina about some of the things that she understands really well about publishing and all of the stuff that goes into it—all these things, especially about independent publishing—that is not a world I'm a part of, but you always seem to have great answers to those questions. So we will be delivering those questions and answers to you in our Nerd Corner. And thank you so much for being with us. And until next week, keep your butt in the chair and your head in the game.

Narrator

The Hashtag AmWriting Podcast is produced by Andrew Perella. Our intro music, aptly titled Unemployed Monday, was written and played by Max Cohen. Andrew and Max were paid for their time and their creative output, because everyone deserves to be paid for their work.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe