Two of the biggest issues facing the publishing industry in 2025 have been AI companies’ use of copyrighted materials to build their large language models without compensating authors, and the ongoing surge in book bans. The Authors Guild has been one of the leaders in the fights against these threats, and spearheading its efforts has been Mary Rasenberger, who marked her 11th anniversary as head of the organization in November.
A lot of Rasenberger’s time this year was spent overseeing the guild’s role as a formal partner with the class counsel in the copyright lawsuit against Anthropic that resulted in a $1.5 billion settlement. Among the actions the guild took were advising the class counsel on publishing contracts and how to phrase the notices sent to authors eligible for monetary awards to ensure they’d receive their shares of the settlement. To that end, Rasenberger notes, the guild is continuing to provide up-to-the-minute information to authors and agents about the suit and how to file claims or opt out.
The Authors Guild and Rasenberger received good news this fall when a judge ruled that a class action lawsuit against OpenAI could move forward. The guild, along with a number of authors, filed the suit in 2023, and the case was later combined with other copyright lawsuits against the AI giant.
This year also saw the guild sue the National Endowment for the Humanities and DOGE for rescinding grants as part of the Trump administration’s anti-DEI and anti-LGBTQ+ agenda. The guild won an injunction against the government, and Rasenberger says she is heartened by the judge’s “issuing a strongly worded opinion holding that the terminations violated the First Amendment.”
“I joined the Authors Guild over a decade ago because of the critical role it has played over the last century in protecting authorship and fostering the wonderful abundance of literature we have today,” Rasenberger says. “My goal as its current steward is to continue that tradition and ensure that our literary culture remains as strong, robust, diverse, and rich as it is today.”
