About the SA Blog Network  Compound Eye  Compound Eye  The many
facets of science photography Compound Eye Home  Why are
copyright lawsuits ridiculously big?  Email   PrintPrint  The
answer can be found in this recent report from the U.S.
copyright office:  …federal court is effectively inaccessible to
copyright owners seeking redress for claims of relatively low
economic value, especially individual creators who are of
limited resources. It has been estimated that the median cost
for a party to litigate a copyright infringement lawsuit with
less than $1 million at stake through appeal is $350,000. Such
costs, of course, are not only completely disproportionate to
what most individuals could invest in a lawsuit, but also to
what a copyright claimant could ever hope to recover in a
relatively modest infringement case.  If the Acme Corporation
uses $250 worth of my photographs without paying for them, and
subsequently wastes an additional $500 worth of my time as I
track down the problem and assemble a response