---
title: "Generative AI Floods and Dilutes the Book Market"
source: "arXiv AI/CL/LG（论文）"
source_tier: "t2"
url: "https://arxiv.org/abs/2607.20349v1"
permalink: "https://feed.astralor.com/items/itm_b17a3a9a539393c43d64503a"
published: "2026-07-22T16:33:20.000Z"
score: 81
channel: "ai"
tags: ["AI detection","Kindle Unlimited","Amazon","Fair Use","generative-ai","Self-Publishing"]
---

# Generative AI Floods and Dilutes the Book Market

## AI commentary

> This paper truly reveals how AI reshapes traditional markets through sheer quantity rather than quality—a wake-up call for anyone in creative industries and copyright policy. The data is solid, and the conclusions deserve serious consideration from platform policymakers.

## At a glance

Based on full-text AI detection across 14,419 self-published genre-fiction books on Amazon from 2023 to 2026, the study finds that books with over 25% AI-generated text form a large share of the catalog but a smaller share of sales. However, they are gaining sales share and scarce top-rank positions. The number of selling books grew 19.2-fold while revenue grew only 8.9-fold, reducing revenue per book. Books without AI text lose the most ground in genres with high AI diffusion. Generative AI reshapes the market through scale, not quality, directly impacting the fair use defense.

## Key points

- Books with over 25% AI text have a large catalog share but small sales share.
- These books are gradually gaining sales share and top-rank positions.
- The number of selling books grew 19.2-fold, revenue only 8.9-fold, reducing per-book revenue.
- Books without AI text lose the most ground in genres with high AI penetration.

## Full text

Generative AI can produce book-length works of fiction at near-zero cost. These books are often dismissed as low-quality ``slop'' that buyers will ignore, and are assumed to carry little commercial weight. We test that assumption with full-text AI detection across 14,419 self-published genre-fiction books sold on Amazon from 2023 to 2026, matched to daily sales records through June 2026. None of these books disclose whether or not they contain AI-produced content. We find that books for which we detected substantial AI text ($>$ 25\%) make up a large share of the catalog but a smaller share of sales. Even so, they reach commercial scale, winning a growing share of sales over time and taking more of the scarce top-rank positions once held by books with no detected AI text. Over this period, the number of books with observed sales in a quarter grew 19.2-fold, while quarterly revenue grew only 8.9-fold. The market therefore added selling books faster than it added revenue, and revenue per selling book fell across most genres. Books with no AI text lose the most ground in genres with high AI diffusion, and most of all where Kindle Unlimited availability is high. Among top-selling books, those with substantial AI text draw on more distinctive language from existing books than do books with no AI text; for these books overlap rises with revenue, a gradient we do not detect for books with no AI text. Generative AI can thus reshape a creative market through scale rather than quality. Our results bear directly on the market-effect question at the center of the fair use defense to copyright infringement.

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