I have very little in common with Australian author Tim Winton. He has written many books, and I have written one. His titles are bestsellers; my book was mainly purchased by friends and family. He loves the ocean, whereas I am happier on land.
Despite our differences, it turns out both Tim Winton and I are part of the same unfortunate club: Australian authors being ripped off by Meta.
Author Tim Winton and I are part of the same unfortunate club.Credit: Violeta J Brosig, Blue Media Exmouth
As with any good story, let’s start at the beginning. In January, a collection of authors, including Ta-Nehisi Coates, Junot Díaz and comedian Sarah Silverman, filed a suit against Meta for copyright infringement.
The claim alleged that Meta knowingly used Library Genesis (LibGen), an online trove of more than 7.5 million pirated books, to train its generative AI language model, Llama. On March 20, The Atlantic published a tool that made it possible to search LibGen for the first time, allowing authors to see if their copyrighted work was being used to develop Meta’s AI.
And that’s where Tim Winton and I (along with thousands of other Australian authors) come in.
Searching the database, I could see all of Winton’s books and classics from Charlotte Wood, Helen Garner and Richard Flanagan.
Garner says she can’t understand it. “I contemplate this development with a weary, helpless disgust,” she told this masthead. “I don’t get it on any level, morally, legally or aesthetically. It’s sort of suicidal – the human race trying to invent its way out of existing.”
My own 2018 collection of essays, Today I F----d Up (still available for purchase), a book that came and went without much fuss, was there too.
If AI is brave enough to skim from my blink-and-you’ll-miss-it debut novel, is anyone safe?
According to Lucy Hayward, chief executive officer of the Australian Society of Authors, not really.
It’s nice to know someone is reading my book, but it would be even nicer to get paid for it. Credit: Screenshot
“In the last month, over 1600 authors have been in touch to register that their works were included in the database, representing over 9000 Australian books and translations,” says Hayward.
“The scale of it is quite terrifying, copyrights existed for a long time, and it’s very straightforward: if you want to use an author’s or illustrator’s work, you must obtain consent and compensate them fairly.”
Lucy Hayward, the chief executive of the Australian Society of Authors, says the rise of AI in stealing Australian authors’ work is terrifying.
Young adult novelist Gabrielle Tozer is one of the authors whose work from which Meta benefits with neither consent nor financial compensation.
All seven of her novels, including The Intern and Remind Me How This Ends, appear in the database.
“I couldn’t believe it, I was furious, anxious, disheartened and drained,” says Tozer. “As if making a living as a working writer isn’t tough enough without this.”
Bestselling author Danielle Binks, who works as a literary agent with Jacinta di Mase Management, was similarly shocked to discover four of her five novels in the LibGen database.
“As an author, it feels like I am being made to participate in the death of my own industry, which is depressing,” says Binks. “But speaking as an agent, I know that the most expensive part of the entire publishing process is the author; find a way to eliminate them and things turn dark quickly.”
Danielle Binks is a Melbourne-based writer and literary agent with Jacinta di Mase Management. She is the author of bestselling middle-grade book The Year the Maps Changed, and the award-winning young adult books; Begin, End, Begin: A #LoveOzYA Anthology, as well as The Monster of Her Age.
According to the ASA, most authors earn a living through their copyright, and in Australia, make on average just $18,200 per year from their creative practice.
Hayward argues that the inevitability of artificial intelligence chatbots like ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini and Meta’s Llama means authors shouldn’t be “anti-tech”, but they need to be protected.
“This is one of the world’s richest companies, and they’ve chosen to benefit from authors’ work, allegedly without permission and payment. Why are authors expected to subsidise the cost of developing AI technology?”
It’s a question the government has been trying to answer. Last year, a Senate select committee handed down a report on how tech companies like Amazon, Google and Meta have used Australian data to train their AI products.
The report found that creative workers were at the most imminent risk of AI severely affecting their livelihoods and recommended payment mechanisms be implemented to compensate creatives when AI-generated work was based on their material.
Since the report, the ASA has continued lobbying the federal government to introduce legislation.
“We’re calling for a new law that requires big tech to pay ongoing compensation where Australian works are used to train models offshore,” says Hayward.
Similar models have been adopted elsewhere in publishing. This month, Melbourne publisher Black Inc Books asked its authors to consent to their work being used to train AI. Under the deal, the publisher will split the net receipts with the author.
“We’re advocating for a 75-25% split in favour of the author because the text is valuable, so the publishers take what’s essentially a commission for brokering the licensing arrangement,” says Hayward.
In response to questions, federal Arts Minister Tony Burke didn’t address AI-specific legislation, instead pointing to the Creative Australia Bill 2024, which sees the creation of a new body, Writing Australia, which will receive $26 million over three years to strengthen the sector.
“Writing Australia starts from July 1 this year, and this was a deliberate decision to ensure we not only have dedicated funds but also advice to support Australian writers,” Burke said.
“There will be artists who choose to use AI, but there’s a difference between an artist volunteering to use it and someone who’s written something for a publisher and discovering that some other company has stolen it.”
With an election looming, the reality of a deal between Meta and the government remains unclear, leaving authors like Binks pinning their hopes on the power of real-life connection.
“One thing AI can’t do is get an author in front of a cohort of kids in a school and sit down with them and talk to them about how much they love stories and storytelling,” she says. “Maybe they can train a system to write like me, but they can’t look a child in the eye while they hear a story for the first time.”
Meta declined to comment, citing the ongoing litigation.
The Booklist is a weekly newsletter for book lovers from Jason Steger. Get it delivered every Friday.