Automated Literature Creations by Robots
In a recent discovery, librarian Sondra Eklund unearthed a children's book titled Rabbits: Children's Animal Fact Book from publisher Bold Kids, which she suspected might have been created by an ai checker. The book, featuring the same clip art of a bunny eating a carrot and stock photos of rabbits, contained strange, made-up facts and repetitive content.
This incident is not an isolated one. Librarian Robin Bradford accidentally purchased an ai detector audiobook on OverDrive, which had a narrator named "Scarlett (synthesized voice)". Similarly, Sarah Manning, a collection development librarian at Boise Public Library, pondered whether a book with illustrations created using AI tool Midjourney, which trains its model on vast copyrighted data sets, should belong in a library due to potential copyright issues.
The question of ai-generated material in libraries is causing a stir among librarians. Lukeman Literary Management, a literary agency representing authors like Michael Robotham and Anne Amrum, has admitted to using a hybrid human/AI approach in some of their titles. However, the firm's use of AI technologies remains unclear.
In May, the US Copyright Office (USCO) released a pre-publication version of part three of its report, which stated that making commercial use of vast troves of copyrighted works to produce expressive content that competes with them in existing markets goes beyond established fair use boundaries. The report further stated that the output of generative AI can be protected by copyright if a human author has determined sufficient expressive elements.
Despite these developments, libraries like Hoopla are struggling to enforce AI policies on collection development. Hoopla relies on accurate metadata from its vendor partners to flag low-quality, ai-generated content, but the lack of industry standards necessary for this flagging is causing trouble.
Research and advocacy organization Library Futures is calling on Hoopla to filter out low-quality, ai-generated ebooks from its collections. Some libraries have developed policies regarding staff and patron use of AI, but collection development policies regarding AI are harder to come by.
The American Library Association (ALA) has taken a step towards addressing this issue. A resolution to create an artificial intelligence cross-divisional working group passed at ALA's 2025 Annual Conference and Exhibition in Philadelphia. This working group will be charged with developing a unified, critically informed ALA position on AI and libraries for Council consideration.
As the use of AI in book publishing continues to grow, librarians are left to grapple with the implications for their collections. Whether ai-generated material belongs in a library at all is a question that many librarians, like Manning, are still pondering. With potential copyright issues and the lack of industry standards, the future of AI in libraries remains uncertain.
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