{"id":3488379,"date":"2026-03-12T16:42:40","date_gmt":"2026-03-12T16:42:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/12\/a-writer-is-taking-legal-action-against-grammarly-for-converting-her-and-other-authors-into-ai-editors-without-their-permission\/"},"modified":"2026-03-12T16:42:40","modified_gmt":"2026-03-12T16:42:40","slug":"a-writer-is-taking-legal-action-against-grammarly-for-converting-her-and-other-authors-into-ai-editors-without-their-permission","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/2026\/03\/12\/a-writer-is-taking-legal-action-against-grammarly-for-converting-her-and-other-authors-into-ai-editors-without-their-permission\/","title":{"rendered":"A writer is taking legal action against Grammarly for converting her and other authors into \u2018AI editors\u2019 without their permission."},"content":{"rendered":"<div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/a-writer-is-taking-legal-action-against-grammarly-for-converting-her-and-other-authors-into-ai-editors-without-their-permission.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\"><\/div>\n<p id=\"speakable-summary\" class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Last week, Grammarly unveiled a contentious feature that employs AI to mimic editorial feedback, creating the illusion that users are receiving critiques from figures like novelist Stephen King, the late scientist Carl Sagan, or tech journalist Kara Swisher. However, Grammarly did not obtain consent from the numerous experts featured in this function, referred to as \u201cExpert Review,\u201d to utilize their names.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Julia Angwin, one of the affected writers and a journalist, has initiated a class action lawsuit against Superhuman, the company that owns Grammarly, claiming that the organization infringed on the privacy and publicity rights of her and the other writers it represented. This class action allows other writers to join Angwin in her legal action.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cAfter decades of perfecting my craft as a writer and editor, I am disheartened to learn that a tech firm is profiting off a fraudulent version of my hard-earned knowledge,\u201d Angwin expressed in a statement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The irony of this situation is palpable \u2014 Angwin has dedicated her career to investigating how tech companies affect privacy. Other critics of such technology, including prominent AI ethicist Timnit Gebru, were also featured in Grammarly\u2019s \u201cExpert Review.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The \u201cExpert Review\u201d feature, offered exclusively to subscribers at $144 annually, unfortunately falls short of its promise to provide meaningful feedback.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Casey Newton, the creator and editor of the tech newsletter Platformer and another individual impersonated by Grammarly, input one of his articles into the system and received feedback from Grammarly\u2019s representation of tech journalist Kara Swisher. The feedback generated by Grammarly\u2019s imitation of Swisher was so indistinct that it raises the question of why the company would bother using these writers\u2019 personas at all.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This is what Grammarly\u2019s representation of Kara Swisher suggested to him: \u201cCould you briefly compare how daily AI users versus AI skeptics articulate risk, creating a through-line readers can follow?\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-techcrunch-inline-cta\">\n<div class=\"inline-cta__wrapper\">\n<p>Techcrunch event<\/p>\n<div class=\"inline-cta__content\">\n<p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<span class=\"inline-cta__location\">San Francisco, CA<\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<span class=\"inline-cta__separator\">|<\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<span class=\"inline-cta__date\">October 13-15, 2026<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Newton conveyed the message from the AI&#8217;s rendition of Kara Swisher to the actual, living Kara Swisher.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cYou greedy information and identity thieves better prepare for me to unleash my full McConaughey on you,\u201d Swisher texted Newton (in reference to Grammarly). \u201cAlso, you suck.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Grammarly has since taken down the \u201cExpert Review\u201d feature, as reported in a LinkedIn post by Superhuman CEO Shishir Mehrotra. While Mehrotra issued an apology, he continued to advocate for the concept behind the feature.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cEnvision your professor refining your essay, your sales manager reworking a customer pitch, an insightful critic questioning your arguments, or a prominent expert enhancing your proposal,\u201d he articulated. \u201cFor experts, this is an opportunity to forge that same pervasive connection with users, similar to what Grammarly has established.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/a-writer-is-taking-legal-action-against-grammarly-for-converting-her-and-other-authors-into-ai-editors-without-their-permission.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\"><\/div>\n<p id=\"speakable-summary\" class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Last week, Grammarly unveiled a contentious feature that employs AI to mimic editorial feedback, creating the illusion that users are receiving critiques from figures like novelist Stephen King, the late scientist Carl Sagan, or tech journalist Kara Swisher. However, Grammarly did not obtain consent from the numerous experts featured in this function, referred to as \u201cExpert Review,\u201d to utilize their names.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Julia Angwin, one of the affected writers and a journalist, has initiated a class action lawsuit against Superhuman, the company that owns Grammarly, claiming that the organization infringed on the privacy and publicity rights of her and the other writers it represented. This class action allows other writers to join Angwin in her legal action.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cAfter decades of perfecting my craft as a writer and editor, I am disheartened to learn that a tech firm is profiting off a fraudulent version of my hard-earned knowledge,\u201d Angwin expressed in a statement.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The irony of this situation is palpable \u2014 Angwin has dedicated her career to investigating how tech companies affect privacy. Other critics of such technology, including prominent AI ethicist Timnit Gebru, were also featured in Grammarly\u2019s \u201cExpert Review.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The \u201cExpert Review\u201d feature, offered exclusively to subscribers at $144 annually, unfortunately falls short of its promise to provide meaningful feedback.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Casey Newton, the creator and editor of the tech newsletter Platformer and another individual impersonated by Grammarly, input one of his articles into the system and received feedback from Grammarly\u2019s representation of tech journalist Kara Swisher. The feedback generated by Grammarly\u2019s imitation of Swisher was so indistinct that it raises the question of why the company would bother using these writers\u2019 personas at all.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This is what Grammarly\u2019s representation of Kara Swisher suggested to him: \u201cCould you briefly compare how daily AI users versus AI skeptics articulate risk, creating a through-line readers can follow?\u201d<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-techcrunch-inline-cta\">\n<div class=\"inline-cta__wrapper\">\n<p>Techcrunch event<\/p>\n<div class=\"inline-cta__content\">\n<p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<span class=\"inline-cta__location\">San Francisco, CA<\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<span class=\"inline-cta__separator\">|<\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<span class=\"inline-cta__date\">October 13-15, 2026<\/span>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Newton conveyed the message from the AI&#8217;s rendition of Kara Swisher to the actual, living Kara Swisher.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cYou greedy information and identity thieves better prepare for me to unleash my full McConaughey on you,\u201d Swisher texted Newton (in reference to Grammarly). \u201cAlso, you suck.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Grammarly has since taken down the \u201cExpert Review\u201d feature, as reported in a LinkedIn post by Superhuman CEO Shishir Mehrotra. While Mehrotra issued an apology, he continued to advocate for the concept behind the feature.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cEnvision your professor refining your essay, your sales manager reworking a customer pitch, an insightful critic questioning your arguments, or a prominent expert enhancing your proposal,\u201d he articulated. \u201cFor experts, this is an opportunity to forge that same pervasive connection with users, similar to what Grammarly has established.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3488380,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"Default","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3488379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3488379"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3488379"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3488379\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3488380"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3488379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3488379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techingeek.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3488379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}