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AI Is Driving More Changes in Publishing — Now It’s KDP and the Copyright Office

The Guerrilla Publisher

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AI is changing publishing faster than authors can keep up—and now Amazon KDP and the U.S. Copyright Office are showing just how quickly the rules can move.

Amazon KDP just cut the number of new titles publishers can create each week from 10 per format to 2. Meanwhile, while registering a copyright for one of our authors, I discovered that an AI question I had encountered on previous applications was suddenly gone.

I could find no announcement explaining why.

The Copyright Office has NOT announced that it has abandoned its existing policy on AI-generated material. But the disappearance of that question raises an interesting problem I've been talking about for a long time:

How do you actually police the distinction between human authorship, AI-assisted writing and AI-generated material?

And the Copyright Office and Amazon aren't alone in trying to figure this out.

Draft2Digital is drawing harder lines around machine-generated books. The Authors Guild is pushing restrictive AI protections in publishing contracts. Spotify is moving in the opposite direction, giving independent authors access to AI-powered audiobook creation.

There is no industry-wide agreement about AI in publishing.

And that's the point.

Authors are obsessing over whether they are “allowed” to use AI while the institutions themselves are still changing their own rules.

So what should authors do?

Choose your position.

Stand behind it.

Let the cards fall where they will.

And when meaningful new information changes the equation, adapt.

In this video, we look at what is changing right now in self-publishing, Amazon KDP, copyright registration and AI—and why independent authors need to stop reacting to every new development and start making decisions like publishers.

0:00 Authors are asking the wrong AI question
0:47 The AI question the Copyright Office quietly dropped
6:40 Amazon cuts KDP title limits by 80%
10:28 Draft2Digital and the Authors Guild draw their AI lines
13:51 Spotify's free AI audiobooks
19:07 Choose. Hold. Adapt.

ABOUT ME
I'm Lara Helmling, founder of Forest City Publications, an independent publishing company helping authors professionally produce, publish and market their books.

JOIN THE INDEPENDENT AUTHORS GUILD
If you're serious about building an independent author career, come join us in the Independent Authors Guild. We talk about the things independent authors actually have to navigate: publishing, book production, marketing, AI, copyright and building a sustainable author business.

https://www.skool.com/independent-aut...

NEED HELP WITH YOUR BOOK?
Email me at lara@forestcitypublications.com.

I do read the emails I receive, but please be patient with me. I receive a lot of them, and it can take me some time to respond.

IN THIS VIDEO
• AI and the rapidly changing publishing industry
• Amazon KDP's new title creation limits
• KDP publishing changes in 2026
• U.S. Copyright Office and AI
• AI and copyright registration
• Human authorship vs. AI-generated material
• AI-assisted writing and copyright
• Draft2Digital's approach to AI-generated books
• The Authors Guild's AI position
• Spotify and AI audiobook narration
• How independent authors should respond when the rules change

#SelfPublishing #AIWriting #AmazonKDP

20 Comments

@AlBTross11 1 day ago

Usually videos about AI and books assumes the person either writes the book themselves or has AI wrote the whole thing. There is a lot of inbetween.

@ManchesterMickey 2 days ago

Reading between the lines, power is slipping from institutions to the author and they are panicing. All they care about is how this will impact their bottom line.

@morisysh 1 day ago (edited)

I'm sitting around waiting for the public to make up its mind. I'm not worried about any given platform or publisher's rules (I don't need to comply: I can release on my own platform). What concerns me are the public and often completely random accusations, the drive-by review-bombing, the trolling, the bullying, the witchhunt -- which can come down on anyone's head whether they touch AI or not.

@DavidWisehart 2 days ago

I used to be a work-for-hire ghostwriter, writing a novel per month for years, and never got copyright to the books I wrote. The copyright office granted the copyright to people and corporations who never wrote (or, in most cases, edited) a word of the text. My clients were not required to disclose to the copyright office who actually wrote the book. Now, AI is acting as a ghostwriter for non-writing "authors." The copyright office should treat AI ghostwriters like human ghostwriters, granting copyright to the person or entity that employs them.

@justinfank5262 2 days ago

What I’ve noticed a lot of is people that are heavily claim not using AI at all are still getting medium to high ai probability in their writing. I’ve even seen cover art that was 100% done by the human hand having a low to medium ai likelihood. No matter how much you stay away from ai, ai is still embedded one way or another. A author I know who wrote her entire manuscript herself, had it ran through a ai detector which came back at 68% ai generated. Most people who know her knows she never used ai in her writing. Now she did use Grammarly for punctuation and grammar. There is so many problems with this whole ai thing that is hurting and scaring the crap out of people.

You always make great and very informative videos. Thank you for the time you dedicate to this and helping everyone with the information you provide us.

@irishsage2459 1 day ago

I had a friend publish his book. He spent over $700 on a artist to do his cover, then posted it on a Facebook group.
Immediately every single comment called it AI slop, even though he showed the incomplete artwork and his receipt of payment. Did it change anything?
Absolutely not.
People still screamed AI.
There is definitely a hysterical view out there. I think it's used to gatekeep, especially self published authors.

@robynsnest8668 2 days ago

Somehow I see this fight happened over Photoshop, Gramarly, Spellcheck, typewriters and even the printing press. "You're not pure" purists cause the issues. The irony, the antiAI gatekeepers using AI to detect AI based on human language that forms the basis of the very AI detectors. The levels of irony are amazing.

@Dark-Light_Delirium 2 days ago

I'm just doin me, making the most mind blowing book I possibly can.

@Midsummer333 1 day ago

Ten. Ten titles per week. How??? I just released my 1st book in an epic series after 5 years of research, writing, plotting and extensive editing (and not on Amazon because how can you be against AI and support Bezos?). Now I’m on book two. It won't take 5 years (because the long part is done), but it won’t be done this week. Geezus!

@CarolPulitzer 2 days ago (edited)

Brilliant as usual, Lara.
I'm very happy I have a folder called PROOF I WROTE LD BEFORE I GOT AI. I'm also very happy to have AI find every grammatical error, make some really bad editorial suggestions, reject them, and occasionally give me a good idea for a transition.
Mainly, it's fantastic for talking about things other than my book and it's given me ideas for my next one.
I'm sure it'll be a good writer one of these days but,in my opinion, it's not there yet. Not anywhere close. Sentence fragment as AI would say😊

@themeditationguru8032 1 day ago

Always informative and worth hearing every word! Thank you

@virginiacosmides7605 2 days ago

Excellent show. Good information here.

@judyfaust9823 1 day ago

You make so much sense!! Thank you for sorting this out with a flexible, realistic attitude and for respecting the individual's choices.

@DanielBritt-z7x 1 day ago

I would say a.i. can be used for true, hard information research, not the story telling itself; the time it cuts down on in doing research is amazing.

@suzihixon 1 day ago

Very good measured analysis. I love this. I’ll see you over in your community

@ancientwisdom108 1 day ago (edited)

13:53 Spotify audio book
I'm loving this clear thinking woman more and more.
Blessings from Florida 🙏🌍🕊🕊

@FrancesHavey-l3r 13 hours ago

Pure gold — thanks, Lara!

@my9129 1 day ago

Thanks for putting this detail out, only someone filing all the time would notice. The rules about AI for copyright are legal slop. It was always doomed to this outcome. There are no human words and AI words, there are just words. It’s no different than it was before with proving that a particular human authored something rather than being helped or having a ghost writer for the entire manuscript.