As a follow-up to the Anthropic copyright settlement book search tool, here’s how the National Writers Union sees the settlement:

This is not the settlement that we as a union want, or that writers as creative workers deserve. But if writers do nothing, they may receive nothing, or less than they are entitled to. So in this moment, the NWU urges ALL writers to be proactive to see if their work is included and make claims for their full share of the settlement money – and to object if they think the settlement is unfair and should be rejected.

They are encouraging authors to register themselves with the settlement administrator, noting:

If you do nothing, you might get nothing at all. You might get a payment anyway, if your publisher tells the settlement administrator that you are entitled to a share, and if they can find you. But it could be less than you are entitled to.

There’s little reason for anyone to opt out except in the highly unlikely event that you are planning to bring your own separate lawsuit against Anthropic. (Good luck with that.) If you opt out, you will get no money from the settlement.

There’s a minute chance enough authors (and publishers) will object to the settlement that it doesn't go through. I’ll admit there’s a small part of me that hopes it blows up, mainly because I feel Anthropic is getting away with massive piracy for a pittance. You can be completely in the tank for AI and still want to see Anthropic (and OpenAI and Meta and …) fairly compensate the creators on whose works these AIs are trained. I suspect, though, that most authors will roll their eyes in contempt and begrudgingly accept these token payments rather than risk getting nothing.

A perfectly calibrated settlement.