PIA's Government Affairs team is soliciting feedback on Copyright Act Concerns:

A movement is underway in Congress to amend the Copyright Act in a manner that could adversely affect legitimate uses of copyrighted works and possibly increase the liability of printers. Under current law, a copyright owner in an infringement case can choose whether to receive actual damages or statutory damages. A court can award up to $150,000 for each work willfully infringed. If the infringed work is a compilation comprised of a number of components, the Copyright Act permits the owner to receive one award for the compilation of no more than $150,000. The proposed new law would amend the Copyright Act to authorize courts to break apart compilations for purposes of calculating damages and assess up to $150,000 for each component within a compilation, so long as such component has "independent economic value." This would dramatically increase the exposure of technology companies and users of copyrighted works to larger infringement claims because most works can in theory be broken into smaller units.

Share your feedback on PIA's Government Affairs ten question survey on copyright.