Thousands of authors publish 'empty' book to protest AI training on their work
Mar 10th 2026
About 10,000 authors have published Don’t Steal This Book, a volume made up only of contributors' names, to protest AI firms training models on copyrighted material without permission and to press the UK government ahead of a March 18 assessment on planned copyright changes.
- About 10,000 writers including Kazuo Ishiguro and Richard Osman put their names in Don’t Steal This Book, which contains only a list of contributors.
- Copies are being handed out at the London Book Fair ahead of the UK government's March 18 deadline for an economic assessment of proposed copyright changes.
- Organiser Ed Newton-Rex says generative AI is using authors' work without permission and undermining creators' livelihoods.
- Publishers' Licensing Services is launching a collective licensing scheme to give AI companies legal access to published works.
- The government is weighing options from leaving law unchanged to allowing use unless authors opt out, and has not ruled out a copyright waiver for commercial research; Anthropic last year settled a US class action for $1.5bn over alleged use of pirated books.