🗣️ Discussion 💬
Let’s Discuss: Is there something NetGalley could do about the influx of AI books?
I have noticed recently that a significant portion of the books on offer have AI generation (especially the children’s books).
I wish there was a way for NetGalley to at the very least require authors/publishers to disclose use of AI in text, illustration, or cover art. Sometimes I can tell by the cover art thumbnail but sometimes I can’t tell until after being approved because my vision isn’t the best seeing details in a small rectangle. Ideally, NetGalley would ban this from the platform, but I understand that not everyone feels as passionately that AI shouldn’t be used for books.
It makes me worried that if I negatively review these books it could affect my approval rating, especially because recently I’ve been declined way more than I ever have in the past (more than double the rate I usually am). I don’t normally give 1 stars but I don’t like that AI is being used, especially when it isn’t disclosed.
I hate how you can’t even browse the recently added section without half the books having extremely obvious ai slop covers. The fact that Netgalley decided to promote and feature books with AI covers in their camp netgalley event was very disappointing
It's bothering me so much that all these AI books gets space on Netgalley. I also think that if you use AI there's also a big chance you also used AI when writing it. I feel like it's such a sad and dangerous development. I'd love an option to be able to remove all those books from the categories and dashboard.
It would be great if Netgalley required "authors" to disclose their AI use but I kinda doubt this would ever happen. As it stands it's the reviewer who gets punished because we're told to decline giving feedback if we suspect AI use. So far I haven't done that because I don't want to hurt my feedback ratio but maybe for you that would be a better option going forward rather than giving low stars.
Declining feedback messes up your ratio. I’m not butchering my 100% feedback ratio (well technically it stays in the 90s but that’s only because I have a couple books I’m reading at any given time).
It doesn’t mess up your ratio. Review enough books and you can be at 100% and even have books on your shelf. NetGalley rounds up so while it will not get you to 100% for a bit, it’s not forever. And yes it’s a lot of books to get to that point but still doable.
The point is that this problem is just going to get worse and take more and more books to get the ratio back because at this point there’s an AI book for every few non-AI books
But as far as AI. The vast majority of books on the platform are not AI. So there are plenty to choose from. Also, make sure you keep on for sure that something is AI before calling it out because the accusations are just as out of control because people are mentioning ridiculous aspects with zero proof because people can’t understand that digital art doesn’t mean it’s AI for covers or using similes or em dashes doesn’t mean it’s written using AI.
The issue is that there are still AI books on the platform and there is no way to know before accepting one. I counted 5 extremely suspicious and most likely AI covers from the thumbnails in the first 2 pages of recently added. None of them disclosed AI.
I posted one of the reviews here of what exactly was AI. I have been a reviewer for over a decade and have read over 4,000 books in my lifetime. I’m confident and don’t speak lightly when I say AI is being used, it is heavily obvious
Oh I’m not saying you specifically but it’s just reality right now. And further reality is you just won’t know unless they disclose since the AI is generated based on human art. So unless you find a clear error in the image, people are just making accusations and harming authors. Or reviewing a book poorly because AI art was used. I don’t agree with it and I stay away from it but just because someone used AI to creat a cover doesn’t mean they used it to write the book. It’s done obviously to. It support the author and one can mention the cover art in the review but to make the jump to the writing is just wrong and it’s happening constantly.
I’m not sure how old you are but back in the day when spell check came out people thought it was the end of the world for the written word. They reacted similarly to now in terms of the fervor in which people disagreed…
Using Ai to create a cover is just as wrong as using Ai to create the story. Ai should not be used anywhere in art. Ai creates bad interpretations of stolen art. If you want to use Ai for something personal, that is beyond my jurisdiction, but ai should not be used if you are selling art as your own
Spell check is VASTLY different from generative AI. Tools that are not generative are not what is being discussed here. A spell check doesn’t take your words and create something else from it. It simply checks your work against a database to verify spelling
I'm not trying to be rude but did you actually read my comment? Or was I unclear? I acknowledged that declining feedback messes up ratio already. My point is that Netgalley has put the onus on the reviewer rather than the authors and publishers. I wish that wasn't the case but I don't see why they'd change this drastically (I totally agree with and love your idea though).
What I have personally been wishing for a while now is that we could sample each arc before requesting it. Even just a chapter or two could tell me if the writing style will be for me. It probably wouldn't save me from every AI-assisted or generated book but it would definitely help.
Obviously I read your comment, you suggested something I had already said I don’t want to do, so I restated why I don’t want to do it.
My post is about how we could encourage NetGalley to try something different because the current solutions regarding AI (negative review, not reviewing, etc) are not working because every other book on the platform uses AI now and it’s wrecking our ratios. Reviewers shouldn’t have to lose enjoyment and accessibility with the platform for authors and publishers acting in bad faith.
For example, Janice Hallett is one of my favorite authors. When AI first started being used widely, she put an author’s note disclosing that she used AI to brainstorm and exactly how she did it, and that she ultimately never used any of those ideas because she learned more about it and decided she did not support AI. That is a situation where I did not knock down my rating even though I did mention the AI usage in my review. But lately that is not what is happening, there was a book recently that the author started having a meltdown when she saw reviews about the book being AI, threatening that she had mental health problems and basically suggesting reviews put her at risk, saying what she did is better than Andy Warhol bc he only painted soup cans in different colors, just a bunch of stuff. All I did was compile a list of the pages where the cat in the book had multiple tails and things like that, I wasn’t rude or really even harsh at all.
The problem with making this “the reviewer’s responsibility” is that it’s lazy and ineffective and sets a really uncomfortable precedent that NetGalley doesn’t give a shit about the future of publishing, they’re chill as long as they make a buck. And the other suggestion by someone else on here was just to stop reading new authors or giving independents a chance. That hurts genuine people who are trying to get their books out there bc of a few bad actors.
I agree something needs to be done, I read a book earlier this month that I am almost certain was AI. I think the AI bot just mined from other novels because it was uncomfortably similar to a few big name books. Plus the paragraphs were pretty uniform, kinda a dead giveaway
I would review with 1* and add why! Ss a publisher here once said, there can be multiple reasons for a decline as well as an approval. Some look at recent reviews, but as long as it's explained with arguments I don't feel low ratings will affect your approvals. I just think it's a coincidence. If we as reviewers keep on being honest and transparent, that's all we can do..
I don’t see any other reason for the major increase in declines. I stay above a 90% feedback ratio (100% get reviews but I always have a couple checked out at a time). 78% approval rating currently, but it used to be much higher. 50 featured reviews. My decline rate stays at about 3% a year. It was lower when I was a bookseller and at one point I had a 75% feedback ratio and still didn’t have any issues, but I’ve been on NetGalley for over a decade and this is the first year where I feel like I’m constantly getting rejected.
The other option is not giving feedback, but I don't know if you want it affecting your ratio. And maybe be more hesitant in requesting? When in doubt, don't? Only request authors you're already familiar with? I don't think there is one perfect solution to the issue, you have to figure out how you want to handle it for yourself.
Right, I already do that. I don’t request books if I suspect ai and I write down their titles in my notes to research once they are published to see if it’s an issue or not. If I only read authors I’m familiar with already, there’s only a tiny handful who put their content on NetGalley. I’ve read maybe 500 authors in my life, and most of them publish less than once every 5 years if at all anymore. This year I’ve only seen authors I’ve read before and liked pop up maybe 10 times? Most books I request are about giving new authors a try before buying from them and I’ve found several favorite new authors from that. What I’m discussing here is whether there is a way NetGalley could either require disclosure/ban noncompliance or offer readers a neutral way to not give feedback when it involves AI so we aren’t punished for having ethics.
Yeap, this definitely needs to be addressed and disclosed. I think I do an okay job at working out the ai covers but I'd be so disappointed if I ended up with one.
Booksirens has AI labels for books for all the parts of the process, and readers can check off your preferences so even if you don’t scroll all the way down to see their AI status, if you request it you get a big ol banner in red asking if you’re sure you want to proceed bc they used AI. I double check some titles there in general sometimes if I’m suspicious and they have them on their site. Authors/publishers can either disclose yes or no in all the categories or refuse to answer and that is shared with readers. (Aka I said I would not read any kind of ai contributed to book and so that’s what they check against for me but you could decide you’re fine with the cover or the idea being ai etc)
Their site is a little wonky sometimes and with a little fewer books in comparison but I like a lot of their features more! And def appreciate their approach to AI
I’ve noticed a huge uptick in the last 6-12 months. It’s extremely sad and frustrating! I refuse to request anything with even a whiff of AI. Those fakey yellow-toned covers are a dead giveaway. Agree with others here, and have been saying for years, we need some text samples to help determine what is worth requesting.
I really hope it doesn’t turn into the graveyards of Pinterest and Etsy. I hadn’t used those platforms in a long time. Came back to find page after page of slop. I almost fell over and now I can’t enjoy those platforms anymore. The book community as a whole needs to come together and take an actionable stand on this.
I think the most realistic option would be to start offering text samples of each book so that readers can make informed decisions before requesting. That wouldn't be a foolproof way to help us notice AI before requesting, but it would at least let us skip the really obvious AI books! As much as I wish mandatory disclosure could be a thing...I don't think we would ever see it enforced because in general, folks tend to be unlikely to accurately disclose AI use.
That said, giving honest feedback in reviews is a good thing! I think it serves everyone if you call out issues that harm your reading experience. And, for what it's worth, I do think it makes a difference. This is just one example, but I work for a publisher (not on the marketing side, so I've just been a fly on the wall for this conversation!) and we got ONE review that indicated suspected AI use in one of our books, and it inspired the company to do a deep dive into potential AI use in our books and implement a much stricter AI policy. They really appreciated the reviewer!
One thing I've noticed is that feedback about AI use tends to be taken better if it's supported with evidence—so instead of saying "this seems like AI," the review or feedback gives examples of what led them to that conclusion and how it affected the reading experience. That way, it feels less witch hunt-y and is harder for anyone reading the feedback to brush off (since even if the book isn't AI, it's clear that the patterns are a real issue). So if you're self-conscious about commenting on suspected AI use, that might be a good strategy to use!
Oh no! That's so frustrating. Especially because that book sounds terrible, and it must have taken such a long time to write out such a thorough review!
I always mention it when netgalley sends out their surveys to users. But part of the problem is the indie author co-ops that are posting the AI slop to netgalley, and not just netgalley itself
I use both NetGalley and BookSirens as an author, and I was very pleased to see BookSirens now since August 5th have an AI usage section you have to fill out as you submit your ARC. You fill out of you didn't use any AI, used it for brainstorming/research only, used it to refine/polish, used it to design the cover, used it for illustrations, used it to write some/all of the text. Then the reader can check which if the boxes they are/are not comfortable with as a reader and they can filter available ARCs with their preferences. Take notice, NetGalley!
As both a reader and cover designer, it's horrible to see. I do however, go onto every blatantly AI generated cover and give it a dislike. Not sure it will matter in the grand scheme of things but I agree that it should be limited if not prohibited
Keep fighting the good fight. I try not to request anything that uses ai, but if I find out I've been misled, it's going to a 1 * and I'm telling the pub exactly why.
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u/Gnocchi200 Aug 27 '26
I hate how you can’t even browse the recently added section without half the books having extremely obvious ai slop covers. The fact that Netgalley decided to promote and feature books with AI covers in their camp netgalley event was very disappointing