The rise of generative AI is reshaping the book publishing industry, with three literary prize winners so far this year accused of using the technology and publishers facing what one judge called an "existential threat."
Louise Doughty, a judge on the 2026 Commonwealth Short Story Prize whose winner was accused of AI use, said the industry is "only at the beginning of understanding the depth of that threat, and how we can combat it."
Readers can still broadly discern AI-generated text through certain "tells," according to Matthew Rubery, professor of Modern Literature at Queen Mary University. He identified patterns including "It's not X, it's Y" constructions, always giving three examples, and laboured metaphors. However, he cautioned that the signs "change a lot" and it is "very tough to keep up with it."
One emerging solution is human-authored certification. Trevor Woods, CEO of certification company Proudly Human, said he expects AI detection tools to become less effective over time but has seen a spike in interest that could birth a "brand new industry" worth "hundreds of millions or billions of dollars." He said individual authors, publishers and writers' groups would foot the bill, adding that asking tech companies or governments to pay was not realistic: "It's like asking the bad guys that have robbed you of everything to then give you a little bit of money back to try and make you feel better about it."
Ms Doughty expressed concern about the use of AI tools to detect AI-generated writing, noting they were used to level accusations at this year's Commonwealth Short Story Prize winner despite the prize's own investigations finding the work was human-authored. She warned that accusations "will always be easier to level at new authors" who lack a body of work for comparison, producing false positives and degrading reader trust.
At last week's Joint Select Committee hearings on artificial intelligence, the Australian Publishers Association called for laws requiring disclosure of AI use in texts. However, publishers fear the government is moving in the opposite direction. A leaked proposal would create an "opt-out" system where tech companies could train AI on authored work without permission until rights holders told them to stop.
Hachette Australia and New Zealand head Louise Stark told the committee: "AI companies seeking an opt-out model are asking government to reverse a basic principle: if you want to use someone else's work, you should first seek permission." She said an opt-out model "shifts the burden onto the very people whose rights should be protected."
The Australian Society of Authors noted that tech companies have already scraped vast amounts of authored work, citing a UK report that found 86 per cent of authors surveyed reported an income drop due to generative AI. Kylie Moore-Gilbert, author of The Uncaged Sky, said AI-generated summaries and knock-offs of her memoir posted online had cost her royalties.
Australian Publishers Association head of policy Stuart Glover said AI displacement was difficult to quantify but had softened the non-fiction book market, particularly instructional books such as travel guides and cookbooks. "Anything which has a hard reference edge to it I suspect is in a kind of terminal decline," he said.
Australian Copyright Council CEO Eileeen Camilleri explained that for copyright to subsist, a work must be created by a human author. Using an AI spell-checker or editor would not void copyright, but "where you put in a prompt and get it to generate … copyright is unlikely to subsist."
The Joint Select Committee's final report is due on November 30.