There is no doubt that many creators recognize the competition from GenAI as an existential threat. In the U.K., a survey released in January 2026 by the Society of Authors, the Association of Illustrators and other creator organizations found that around a third of illustrators and literary translators, and more than half of photographers, had lost commissions to GenAI. Among the authors, more than 85 percent reported decreased earnings and feared that GenAI could imitate their style. Also in January, the French division of Harlequin, which is part of publisher HarperCollins, announced a trial with an AI translation company. According to the Association of Literary Translators of France, the trial saw translators’ contracts being terminated and replaced with lower-paid work editing AI-generated translations.
The current landscape is particularly difficult for emerging authors, Eli Keren, a literary agent and chair of the U.K. Association of Authors’ Agents sub-committee on AI in publishing, told me. It’s difficult to break out when magazines, competitions, literary agents and online retail platforms are flooded with AI-generated work. This year’s Commonwealth Short Story Prize became mired in controversy after speculation that one of the winning entries, Jamir Nazir’s “The Serpent in the Grove,” contained AI-generated text. (After an investigation, the Commonwealth Prize decided it was satisfied that AI was not used to write Nazir’s story.) More established writers are affected too: Bad actors are releasing copycat AI-generated books on the same day as highly anticipated novels and biographies, Keren explained, to trick readers and steal book sales that they have not earned and do not deserve.
Earlier this year, Grammarly, a platform that claims to improve people’s writing, launched a short-lived GenAI tool that provided editorial feedback in the style of famous authors, including writer Stephen King, historian David Abulafia and journalist Julia Angwin. Angwin is now leading a class-action lawsuit against Superhuman, the owner of Grammarly, in the Southern District of New York. “I have worked for decades honing my skills as a writer and editor,” Angwin said, speaking about the case. “I am distressed to discover that a tech company is selling an imposter version of my hard-earned expertise.” But Angwin’s case is not based on copyright infringement. This is likely because an author’s literary style is not generally protectable under copyright law, despite it being the essence of what makes their works unique. Instead, Angwin claims that Grammarly infringed the privacy and publicity rights of her and many other authors by appropriating their names and identities for commercial purposes without consent. But not all jurisdictions offer these so-called personality rights, meaning protection of this nature for authors is patchy.
If these forms of market dilution, which result from the mass theft of creators’ works, are not recognized under copyright law, this raises urgent questions about the purpose of copyright in the age of AI, what it can protect and the future of creative labor.
Faced with these gaps in protection, some creators and legal experts argue that copyright law is no longer fit for purpose and needs to be reformed. Yet there’s no guarantee that reform will make things better for creators.
The fucked up thing about AI right now is that AI companies get to act like we’re in a post-copyright world, pirating from literally everyone, while the rest of us are still stuck in copyright hell.
I think intellectual property as a concept is bad, but I think that as long as it still exists companies need to be held to task when they flagrantly violate it. It needs to be enforced universally, or not at all. I don’t think it’s realistic that the rich will dismantle IP in the name of AI progress, I think we’re just seeing what we’ve always known which is that money lets you get away with anything.
That’s the double-standard that they always upheld. Two large companies play by the rules. A small artist always plays by the rules when faced with a large company’s copyright. But, one large company stealing against a small artist? The company steals anything they want, as long as they can get away with it.
Marathon vs. Antireal is a prime example. They steal her artwork and style, put it in the game, and get away with it. The only reason they settled and paid her was because:
If any of those weren’t true, they would have gotten away with it, stolen it outright, and not paid her at all.
No AI involved in any of that. No need when corporations already held the power for centuries.
I think they’ll accidentally do so, by creating so much from AI and a judge declares that it can’t be copyrighted because X% is AI generated, and existing precedent already required human input for copyrighted material.