Washington — The House Judiciary Committee is holding a hearing this afternoon on its proposed copyright small claims bill ahead of an expected vote. Matt Schruers, Vice President of Law and Policy for the Computer & Communications Industry Association is testifying at the hearing on the “Copyright Alternative in Small-Claims Enforcement Act of 2017.”
Schruers told members of Congress that CCIA supports the object of copyright that creators have the incentives, tools, and remedies to bring the product of their creativity to market.
He said that while the bill may be aimed at remedies for meritorious copyright infringement claims, nearly half of copyright cases launched in recent years were from industrial-scale plaintiffs filing shotgun-style suits accusing individuals, sometimes wrongly, of piracy.Schruers expressed concerns that “the small claims process would be invoked by the least meritorious litigant, including those for whom alleging infringement is business model.
He recommended Congress explore means to lower the costs of registering copyright and providing resources to inform rightsholders of existing tools and remedies available to creators under current law.