Dozens of staff at HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, Hachette: without author consent, publishers are quietly using AI to make back-cover copy, cover art, more (Adam Morgan/Wired)
Workers at three major publishing houses tell WIRED that LLMs are being used for publicity, cover art, back cover copy …
Dozens of staff at HarperCollins, Simon & Schuster, and Hachette have reported that their publishers are using artificial intelligence (AI) tools without author consent. According to Wired, these tools are being used to generate back-cover copy, cover art, and marketing materials. The staff, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said that executives have directed the use of large language models like Claude and ChatGPT.
The AI tools are being used for various tasks, including emailing literary agents and writing publicity materials. Some staff have been tasked with discovering new use cases for the AI tools. HarperCollins, for example, purchased licenses for Claude from Anthropic, but initially struggled to implement them.
At the same time, some authors have faced consequences for allegedly using AI to help write their books. According to an editorial staffer, many cases of AI use by authors have gone unreported.
Brief written by urgent.news from Techmeme, Wired — 2 reports on this story. Machine-written — may contain errors; check the original before relying on it.
This story
This is one outlet's version. Read the fullest account.
