Copyright Small Claims Court?

One of my favorite blogs, The Patry Copyright Blog, is reporting about an attempt by some members of the House of Representatives’ IP subcommittee to create the equavelent of a small claims court for copyright infringement claims.

If this were to pass, it would make it easier for creators of copyrighted works with little commercial value to get their cases heard and obtain damages. This would be seen as a boon for bloggers and other copyright holders on the Web who fall victim to plagiarism but have little financial stake in their work, much like their plagiarists.

Though details about how such a court would work are sketchy right now since the matter is just in hearings and still very much in the air, it would appear to fix what many see as one of the major holes in copyright enforcement.

I’ll be following this matter as it develops. Here’s a link to the subcommittee’s page .

(Note: The entry linked above is actually from 3/31. I apologize for the delay in getting this up but, for whatever reason, it just appeared in my feed reader)

[tags]Plagiarism, Copyright Infringement, Content Theft, Copyright Law, Intellectual Property, Congress[/tags]