'Don't be deceived by the billions. They are not all coming to me. They are shared by many writers in the USA.'
Renowned South African author Zakes Mda is one of a group of writers who will be compensated for their work which was illegally used by the artificial intelligence (AI) company, Anthropic.
The Bartz v Anthropic case, in which authors Andrea Bartz, Charles Graeber and Kirk Wallace Johnson claimed that Anthropic relied on pirated e-books downloaded from “shadow libraries” such as LibGen to train its Claude large language models (LLMs).
The settlement reached earlier this month will see authors whose US publications have been used by the company to train AI models receive a share of $1.5 billion (about R26 billion).
“Don’t be deceived by the billions,” Mda said on social media. “They are not all coming to me. They are shared by many writers in the USA.”
According to the seasoned author, six of his novels were used by a US start-up founded in 2021. These books include The Heart of Redness, The Madonna of Excelsior and The Whale Caller.
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The Bartz v Anthropic case
In June of this year, Judge William Alsup issued a summary judgment ruling, holding that Anthropic’s use of lawfully acquired books for AI training was “transformative” and thus protected by fair use under US law.
However, he also ruled that Anthropic’s creation and retention of a “central library” comprised in part of pirated works was not transformative and constituted copyright infringement.
Amazon and Alphabet, the parent company of Google, back Anthropic. According to Alsup, the company holds more than seven million pirated books in a “central library”.
Alsup said that Anthropic had violated the authors’ rights by saving pirated copies of their books as part of a “central library of all the books in the world”.
Mda said he was informed of the ruling by his agents in London.
You may remember an article in a South African newspaper [I don't remember which one, but they did interview me then] a few months back reporting that my books and those of Nadine Gordimer were used to train ChatGPT without our permission. Some of you who are bo-tsebanyane…
— Zakes Mda (@ZakesMda) October 6, 2025
“However little, I will be compensated for each of the books that were used. Damn! I didn’t know of my contribution in the development of AI,” he said.
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State of affairs in SA
Mda said he only shared the news with his followers because he wondered how the state of affairs was in South Africa regarding AI and copyright.
“What about our South African writers? You can’t tell me that these AI developers only used books published in the USA. Does South African law allow South African-based writers to fight for their intellectual property rights in South African courts?”
Currently, South Africa is governed by the Copyright Act 98 of 1978, which primarily protects various works, including films, sound recordings and broadcasts, granting creators exclusive rights to control their distribution and use.
The Act also covers aspects such as moral rights, copyright ownership, the transfer of rights and exceptions for private use, criticism and education.
Had a case like the Bartz v Anthropic case been in South Africa, the authors wouldn’t have won because the South African Act needs to be modernised.
Hence, the Copyright Amendment Bill (CAB) can provide better digital rights protection and strengthen the powers of the Copyright Tribunal.
The bill is currently awaiting a ruling from the Constitutional Court after being passed by Parliament and referred for judicial review by President Cyril Ramaphosa.
The president’s hand was forced by Section27, representing Blind SA, in an urgent application in the Constitutional Court against Ramaphosa for failing to sign the CAB.
In 2022, the Constitutional Court declared the Copyright Act unconstitutional to the extent that it limited access to reading materials for persons who are blind and visually impaired.
In particular, the Act requires persons who are blind or visually impaired to obtain the consent of the copyright holder before converting books and other published works into formats they can read, such as Braille or large print.
The CAB goes hand in hand with the Performers’ Protection Amendment Bill, which could significantly impact the livelihoods of actors.
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