“Many other authors are discovering the same thing; social media is full of reports like mine.”
Our reading, the sentence that was checked:
Many other authors are discovering that Meta used their works from the pirated database.
Assessment: Supported Evidence as of
Where and when Gary Marcus wrote it
Marcus on AI, Meta pirated at least 101 of my books and articles, and tens of millions of others, paragraph 7.
- Said
- Source observed
- live page, full text, public
- Evidence as of
- the cutoff for this assessment
- Assessment recorded
- assessment marcus-meta-pirated-at-least-101-of-my-books-ce0340-a1
We recorded 2 claims from this post. See every claim from this post.
The wording above is the version this site observed on 2026-10-28. The source may have been edited after 2025-03-20. This page does not claim the wording was captured then.
What the claim commits to
- Kind
- Observation
- Deadline, as the speaker wrote it
- None stated. This site does not add one.
- Deadline state when assessed
- No horizon
- Deadline state on 2026-10-29
- No horizon (the release’s reference date)
From the speaker
- Many other authors
- are discovering the same thing
- social media is full of reports like mine
Our interpretation
- The plain reading is that numerous other authors were publicly reporting discoveries of their works in LibGen and associating those discoveries with Meta's reported use.
- This assesses the existence and breadth of those reports, not whether each author's inference about actual training use was correct.
- Many and full are ordinary qualitative descriptions of widespread discussion, not a numerical threshold or a claim about all social-media users.
- For the ongoing observation, use March 2025 through the post date as the current reporting period. Later publications may document events within that period, but later discoveries alone cannot support it.
Counts as supported if: Dated author accounts and contemporaneous reporting establish numerous independent discovery reports circulating by March 20, 2025.
Counts as contradicted if: A sufficiently comprehensive contemporaneous record establishes that reports were isolated or that the claimed wave began only after March 20.
Retrospective: these criteria were written after the outcome was public.
Current assessment
Was it true for the period described?
Outcome: Supported
The dated evidence matches what the claim committed to, under the criteria frozen before grading.
Scored on a plain reading. The speaker named no measure for this claim, so it was judged on the reading an informed reader would take, stated below under our interpretation. Both reviews had to find that reading fair.
- Evidence as of
- Deadline state when assessed
- No horizon
- Assessment recorded
- Policy version
- 2026-10-28.7
Rationale
Independent author accounts document a wave of discovery reports beginning March 20, including repeated Bluesky posts, reports from multiple writer friends, and an original scholarly discussion post. This supports the ordinary qualitative claim that many authors were reporting similar discoveries. It does not verify every author's conclusion that Meta used each listed work.
Limitations
- The evidence establishes widespread reports qualitatively, not a measured share of social media.
- Katsu's account includes March 21 as well as March 20.
- Original reports establish what authors reported, not whether their underlying training-use inferences were correct.
Evidence (3 items)
Supports the claim: Alma Katsu,
On Thursday and Friday morning, author after author was searching the site, then posting on Bluesky: OMG.
Why it matters here: Katsu explicitly places the start of repeated author discovery posts on Thursday, March 20. Her account also covers Friday; only its Thursday component bears on the target period.
- Where
- Paragraph 4
- Publisher
- Alma Katsu
- Kind of source
- Secondary summary
- Describes events of
- Public from
Supports the claim: Keith Roysdon,
One of my writer friends said a couple of her books were there. Another had 15 of her 19 books pirated on LibGen.
Why it matters here: This same-day account describes separate discoveries by writer friends. The surrounding post also describes Roysdon's own search and a broader wave of public reports.
- Publisher
- Keith Roysdon
- Kind of source
- News report
- Describes events of
- Public from
Supports the claim: Ross Bender, PMJS public discussion group,
I found two articles of mine from Monumenta Nipponica and two from Japanese Journal of Religious Studies.
Why it matters here: This original public message independently demonstrates a scholar reporting discovery of his own works after reading the Atlantic investigation. It corroborates the occurrence of reports, not Meta's use of those particular files.
- Publisher
- Ross Bender, PMJS public discussion group
- Kind of source
- Demonstration
- Describes events of
- Public from
Where it was said (1)
Said once in the sources this register covers.
: Marcus on AI, Meta pirated at least 101 of my books and articles, and tens of millions of others
Many other authors are discovering the same thing; social media is full of reports like mine.
- Where
- paragraph 7
- Published
- 2025-03-20
- Source observed
- , live page
- Access
- full text, public
History
Assessment versions
- Assessment marcus-meta-pirated-at-least-101-of-my-books-ce0340-a1: Current. Outcome: Supported. Evidence as of 2026-10-28. Public date not recorded.
Recorded events
Assessment publishedBy this site
First assessment published after both reviews and the final-text check passed.
About assessment marcus-meta-pirated-at-least-101-of-my-books-ce0340-a1.