On Monday, a judge approved a $1.5 billion settlement between Anthropic and authors, ending the largest copyright class-action ever certified and granting the largest copyright settlement ever reached.
Back in May, some authors fought to block the settlement, which was proposed after the court ruled that Anthropic training AI on books was fair use; however, its piracy of works was likely not.
Authors opposing the settlement argued that lawyers’ fees were too high and authors’ payouts were too low. Hoping to avoid accepting the estimated $3,000-per-work payout and file separate lawsuits to seek higher damages, a handful of authors tried to opt out past the deadline.