NPR.

Up until mid-last month, if your copyright wasn't infringed on for a book, music, movies,

anything, you really just had one option, suing in federal court, which can be expensive.

The average case costs $400,000.

And a lot of the time people don't realize they're doing anything wrong. They use something

cute on Pinterest or Facebook and download it. Maybe they add a mustache to a picture of

their new kitten and post it on Instagram. But that can be a big problem for a lot of

small businesses and artists who can't afford to go to federal court.

They're just fairy wings. I want to say, okay, so they're just fairy wings. So where do

fairy wings come from? Can you find me the fairy that grew these? Because I personally want

to meet her. Globally, online piracy of copyright runs into the tens of billions of dollars.

Very hard for small businesses or fairy sized businesses to fight. But now there's a new

option. The copyright claims board. It's like small claims court for copyright issues. It's

only $100 to file a claim. And you don't even need a lawyer.

But this is a new process. So there are some big questions. Like what happens when you

make going to court? Very, very cheap. I'm Whalen Wong.

And I'm Sally Herschiff. This is the indicator from planet money. Today on the show, we ask

lawyers to argue the case for and against the new copyright claims board.

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