Anthropic's record copyright deal stalls over fee questions

A federal judge declined to finalize Anthropic’s $1.5 billion settlement with authors on Thursday, asking for more detail on attorney fees and payments to lead plaintiffs before signing off on what would be the largest copyright settlement in U.S. history.

U.S. District Judge Araceli Martinez-Olguin probed lawyers on several unresolved issues during a May 14 hearing in San Francisco. That leaves about 120,000 authors and copyright holders waiting for resolution of a case that’s been dragging on since 2024.

Anthropic accused of downloading 7M+ pirated books

The lawsuit accused Anthropic of downloading more than 7 million pirated books from shadow libraries LibGen and PiLiMi to train its models.

Now-retired Judge William Alsup ruled in June 2025 that Anthropic’s use of the books for AI training qualified as fair use, as long as the works were obtained legally. But he found that stockpiling pirated copies in a “central library” that went beyond training purposes wasn’t protected.

That ruling set up a trial, originally scheduled for December 2025, where Anthropic faced potential damages in the hundreds of billions of dollars. Rather than go to trial, Anthropic agreed to the $1.5 billion settlement.

Alsup preliminarily approved it in September 2025. The case was later reassigned to Martinez-Olguin after Alsup retired.

Authors and publishers filed claims covering more than 91% of the ~480,000 eligible works in the settlement class, according to court filings cited by Reuters. That participation rate dwarfs the 9% median for U.S. consumer class actions, based on a 2019 Federal Trade Commission (FTC) report.

“This claims rate is another reason why this settlement is so historic and demonstrates the overwhelming support of the class,” lead plaintiff attorney Justin Nelson of Susman Godfrey told Reuters in April.

Each title would receive at least $3,000 before costs and fees, split between authors and publishers, according to the Authors Guild. Self-published authors and those whose rights have reverted would keep the full amount.

The standard default split between publishers and authors for non-educational works is 50/50.

Some authors opted out of the Anthropic settlement

Anthropic’s settlement has drawn criticism from some authors, who argue that the total amount is too low compared to the scale of the alleged piracy.

Other authors have challenged the proposed attorney fees. The plaintiff law firms, Susman Godfrey and Lieff Cabraser, are requesting $187.5 million, or 12.5% of the fund. That’s down from the $300 million they originally sought after Alsup pushed back in December.

More than 25 writers opted out of the settlement entirely. That group, which includes novelists Dave Eggers and Vendela Vida, filed a new lawsuit against Anthropic in California on May 13. One day before the final approval hearing.

Several other authors and publishers with similar claims have separate ongoing lawsuits against the company.

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