Free Republic

Inventors, scientists, and researchers have been at the core of America’s success since our earliest days… With tight economic conditions and emerging economies, America’s innovation will be facing many challenges if Intellectual Property is not protected.

Not content with the current (and already massive) statutory damages allowed under copyright law, the RIAA is pushing to expand the provision. The issue is compilations, which now are treated as a single work. In the RIAA's perfect world, each copied track would count as a separate act of infringement, meaning that a copying a ten-song CD even one time could end up costing a defendant $1.5 million if done willfully. Sound fair? Proportional? Necessary? Not really, but that doesn't mean it won't become law. The change to statutory damages is contained in the PRO-IP Act that is currently up...