A federal court just put a $1.5 billion price tag on it.
A federal judge just approved the largest copyright settlement in history, $1.5 billion, paid by Anthropic, for training Claude on pirated books.
The Scale
~500,000 works covered. ~$3,000 paid per work. 91% of claims already paid out.
The Detail That Makes It Real
Bloomsbury (publisher of Harry Potter) alone gets ~$42.3 million for 14,087 titles.
Why It Took A Court
A 2-year lawsuit, three named authors, and a federal judge, because it wasn't volunteered.
The Open Question
No settlement like this exists yet for video, scripts, or performances used to train AI video models. Is one coming?
My Honest Take
Not "sue everyone." Your work has a real, now-provable price tag, and a court just agreed.
Craft Has A Price Tag Now
A federal court just put a number on it.