Settlement of Anthropic lawsuit gets tentative approval

On September 25, 2025, Judge William Alsup of the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California gave preliminary (tentative) approval to a proposed $1.5 billion settlement of some of the claims raised in a class-action copyright infringement lawsuit against Anthropic PBC, the developer of the “Claude” generative AI language model and subscription services.

Some NWU members and other writers could get significant payments under the settlement: $3,000 or more for self-published or rights-reverted single-author books or ebooks, and $1,500 or more for most single-author books or ebooks published by traditional publishers, with major exceptions for “work-for-hire” books, for which writers will get nothing and only publishers will be paid, and “education works” (vaguely defined) for which the author/publisher split remains to be determined based on original contracts.

This is not the settlement that we as a union want, or that writers as creative workers deserve. But if writers do nothing, they may receive nothing, or less than they are entitled to. So in this moment, the NWU urges ALL writers to be proactive to see if their work is included and make claims for their full share of the settlement money – and to object if they think the settlement is unfair and should be rejected.

What’s the NWU’s reaction to this court action?

1. It’s good that some writers will be paid something, but we aren’t “satisfied”. The wrongs against us by Anthropic (much less other AI companies) aren’t “redressed” by this settlement. We continue to call for systemic action in accordance with our Platform and Principles for Policy on Generative AI.
2. We are angry that Anthropic has bought off these claims for less than 1% of its company valuation, and that so many other categories of creators whose work was copied and used by Anthropic without permission or payment are left out of this settlement. There may be technical legal reasons for this, but we will continue to struggle for fair pay for all creators. That Anthropic is willing and able to pay $1.5 billion to settle just a fraction of the claims against it is indicative of the scale of theft of our work and of Anthropic’s ability to pay. But this settlement won’t deter Anthropic and other generative AI companies. It will encourage them to continue their misconduct.
3. We share many of Judge Alsup’s concerns and questions about whether all authors will get adequate notice and how the money will be divided.
4. We will do our best to inform our members and other writers about the proposed settlement, how to find out if they are included, how to make claims for all the money to which they are entitled, and how to raise any objections to the settlement proposal so that they can be considered at the hearing on final approval or disapproval of the proposal.

What’s included in the settlement? Who will get paid?

The settlement covers just under 500,000 “works”. Each work as that term is used in the settlement could include multiple works as that term is used in copyright law: chapters, articles, stories, poems, prefaces and introductions, etc., possibly all by different authors.

According to the settlement plan, a searchable list of the works included in the settlement will be posted on the settlement website within the next week. There’s no way to predict how many of your works are included (if any), until this list is made available and you have searched it thoroughly.

The list of works included in the settlement has already been finalized and filed with the court under seal, but the NWU has not yet seen it.

The settlement includes only a small fraction of the millions of books, Web pages, etc. copied by Anthropic without payment or permission. Only works in some (not all) of the compilations of pirated books and ebooks copied by Anthropic are included in the settlement. Of those, only those with an ISBN or Amazon ASIN (or included in an edition with an ISBN or ASIN) and for which copyright was timely registered are included. Publishers are usually supposed to handle registration of copyrights in books and ebooks they publish, but frequently neglect to do so.

The NWU is not a party to this lawsuit and had no role whatsoever in negotiating the settlement, determining which of the works pirated by Anthropic would be included in the settlement or how the settlement money would be divided, or choosing who would be appointed by the court to represent authors and publishers.

The settlement applies only to writers. Photographers, illustrators, and graphic artists will get nothing from the settlement, even if their work was included in books copied by Anthropic.

It’s not yet clear whether translators will get paid, but they won’t find out unless they make claims as “co-authors” of translated works included in the settlement.

I’m a writer whose work has been included in books or ebooks. What can I do?

You shouldn’t count on receiving notice or a claim form. Many authors will get no notice. If you think there is any chance you might be included, you should provide your current address to the newly-appointed settlement administrator and watch for a notice and claim form in the mail.

Look for an envelope that looks like this:

If any of your work is included in the settlement, including if it was published in any of the “works” (books and ebooks) listed as included in the settlement, you can choose to (1) do nothing, (2) opt out of the settlement, or (3) make a claim for a share of the settlement.

To make a claim for a share of the settlement, complete and submit the claim form including all your eligible works and the full percentage to which you are entitled for each work. The claim form will look like this, but you should use the copy you get from the settlement administrator, if you get one.

If you do nothing, you might get nothing at all. You might get a payment anyway, if your publisher tells the settlement administrator that you are entitled to a share, and if they can find you. But it could be less than you are entitled to.

There’s little reason for anyone to opt out except in the highly unlikely event that you are planning to bring your own separate lawsuit against Anthropic. (Good luck with that.) If you opt out, you will get no money from the settlement.

If and only if you make a claim, you can also file an objection to the settlement, as discussed further below.

Copyright registrations filed by publishers typically give authors’ addresses in care of the publisher, even when copyright is registered in the name of the author. Once a book is out of print and the publisher is no longer paying royalties to the author, the publisher has no reason to keep track of the author’s address. If a publisher makes a claim for a work included in the settlement, but the author’s address is unknown, the publisher gets to keep 100% of the payment for that work. So publishers have a financial incentive not to provide authors’ addresses, or not to bother to update old addresses they have on file for authors of out-of-print books.

Contributors to anthologies, collections, and other multi-work books are especially unlikely to receive notice, much less to receive the full payment to which they are entitled, unless they come forward to provide their current contact information and claim their works and rights.

You probably won’t get a notice about any rights you’ve inherited from a writer who died. If someone left you all of their possessions, that included their copyrights, even if they weren’t mentioned specifically in their will or bequest. If no more royalties were being paid, neither the publisher nor the class action settlement administrator is likely to know you were an heir to these rights, much less how to find you. You will need to search by the name of the deceased and the titles of their works or any books or ebooks in which they were included. If the estate was divided, you should also provide the names and current contact information for any other heirs, if you can, so that they can also get notified and paid.

Works included in books and ebooks published around the world were copied by Anthropic and may be included in the settlement, if they were registered with the US Copyright Office. (The NWU has argued for decades that copyright registration is a “formality” prohibited by the Berne Convention on Copyright. But the US government thumbs its nose at international law.) Writers worldwide may be eligible for payments, and should check whether their work might be included and, if so, submit claims.

You must be an owner or part owner of some “exclusive” rights to reproduction to be eligible for a share of payment, but it’s not clear which rights to which work or portion of a work must be exclusive. This is one of the issues that will probably have to be adjudicated by the “Special Master” for this case, after claims are submitted. The only way to find out how much money you are entitled to is to make a claim for all works and the largest share to which you think you might be entitled.

Much of the critical time for authors to receive notices and make decisions will come during the end-of-year holiday period, when mail is slower than usual and publishers could be difficult to contact and slow to respond.

As a writer, you may receive a (partially) prefilled claim form, but you should not assume it is accurate or complete. Even if it is, you still need to fill in the percentage of the rights you hold (often 100%, but if you are silent, the publisher may get 50% and you may get only 50%, as the default for most types of books). Stories, articles, poems, and chapters included in books are unlikely to be separately listed, or listed in your name. You will need to search the list of included “works” for each book in which any of your work appeared, using the book title and the main author or editor of the book, not your name or the title of your contribution to the book. If you were the editor or compiler of an anthology, you should also provide the names and current contact information for each contributor, if you know it, so that they can be notified and paid.

Is this the final answer? What will happen after claims and objections are submitted?

Judge Alsup gave only preliminary approval today, in accordance with normal class action procedure. Authors included in the settlement can object to any aspect of the settlement, including the approval of a single “class” lumping together authors and publishers. There will be another hearing next year, held by either Judge Alsup or another judge. (Judge Alsup recently announced his intention to retire at the end of 2025, which makes further proceedings significantly harder to predict.) At this hearing, the judge will decide — based on how the claim process has gone and any objections raised by authors or publishers or “friends of the court” — whether to give final approval, disapprove the settlement, or rescind the class certification (e.g. if they decide authors and publishers should be separate classes).

Any member of the class who files a claim can also file a request for the judge to reject the tentative settlement. You don’t need a lawyer, and you don’t have to show up in court to object to the settlement. But if you can get yourself to San Francisco on the day of the final hearing on approval or disapproval of the settlement, you can ask to speak in person – even if you don’t have a lawyer – to explain why you think the judge should reject the settlement.

The judge can’t rewrite the settlement (although they can pressure the parties to do so, as Judge Alsup has done). The judge can only approve or disapprove whatever the parties propose.

Be careful what you wish for. If the single class is de-certified or final approval of the tentative settlement is rejected, new classes and/or a new settlement might be proposed, or the case might go to trial (win or lose), or the decisions in the case to date could be appealed. The outcome could be more money, a different division of the money, less money, or no money at all.

The NWU will be providing additional advice and assistance for completing and submitting claims once the list of works is made public. Note, however, that we aren’t lawyers, this isn’t legal advice, and the settlement has many complications, pitfalls, and ambiguities. Ultimately, disputes between publishers and authors as to the division of settlement payments will be resolved by a “Special Master” to be appointed later by the court.

Slides from our NWU members-only Town Hall last week explaining and discussing the proposed settlement will be posted on the members-only section of the NWU website. A link and the password to the PDF of the slides will be included in the NWU newsletter, along with information about how to get advice and help from the NWU. We’ll be holding additional events for members to explain and discuss the tentative settlement as the notice, claims, objection, and final approval hearing process goes forward.