Grammarly has disabled its tool offering generative-AI feedback credited to real writers
Superhuman took its writing assistant Grammarly on a real ride when it came to its approach to AI tools. In August, the company launched a feature called Expert Review that would offer feedback on your writing, offering AI-generated comments that would appear to come from a famous writer or academic. These recreations were based on “publicly available information from third-party LLMs”, which sounds a lot like the involvement of web crawlers of dubious legality.
Suggested experts would be based on the topic and could be anyone from great scientific minds to best-selling fiction authors to friendly tech bloggers in your neighborhood. Alive or dead, the names of these writers appeared on Grammarly without their permission or knowledge. “References to experts in this product are for informational purposes only and do not indicate any affiliation with Grammarly or endorsement of such individuals or entities,” the company covered in a disclaimer on the service.
As one might imagine, once people noticed it, much of the living contingent of these writers were not very pleased. In fact, an attempted class action lawsuit is already underway against Superhuman. The company initially attempted to respond to complaints by allowing writers to opt out of the platform. Which I’m sure was a big relief to the deceased contingent and to the survivors who don’t follow AI news closely and may still not know they were being cited by the tool.
Today, Shishir Mehrotra, CEO of Superhuman, wrote in a LinkedIn post that the company would disable Expert Review while it reevaluates the feature. “Agent was designed to help users discover influential perspectives and insights relevant to their work, while also providing experts with meaningful ways to build deeper relationships with their fans,” he said. Yes, Carl Sagan must lament the lack of deep relationships with his afterlife fans.
Updated, March 11, 2026, 5:34 p.m. ET: Updated to note the current class action lawsuit filed against Superhuman over this feature.
