Actually, you're 100% right. I think I was trying to decide between the phrase "content cartel" and "copyright maximalists", so my aging brain settled on "content maximalists". Would you change that to "copyright maximalists" for me, please :)

It means the big old school content "gatekeeper" companies, and their trade groups like the MPAA, RIAA, ASCAP, etc., whose economic power is being eroded by digitalization and the internet, and who are fighting back by taking extremist positions in defense of their copyright ownership.

I would love to be a judge, but it ain't gonna happen.

Thanks for the advice. Wish I had a clue as to what to do about it.

Regrettably, they vary from judge to judge and from court to court and are not predictable, since they are "discretionary".

I can tell you that if I were deciding UMG v Veoh I would have awarded Veoh its attorneys fees.

As I said, the judiciary has a number of rules, and engages in many practices, which make the cost of lawyering more expensive than it needs to be. I could write a book on the subject.

No it doesn't need as many hours of legal work as most big firms put into a case, which is why a good small firm like mine is wildly more efficient than the big firms, and can beat much bigger firms day in and day out. But under the rules and practices in place, it's still an unnecessarily expensive undertaking to litigate.

I don't make the rules; but I have to live with them in my daily life.

The money goes to pay lawyers. With expensive cases, these days it's usually large teams of clones run by large, usually multistate, often multinational, law firms. The judiciary has a number of rules and engage in a number of practices which are based on the assumption that the parties have endless means with which to pay lawyers, and which benefit the large law firms and the wealthier clients who can afford them. So the real fault is with the judiciary.

Woe betide the client with limited means, and woe betide the small law firms that get caught up in these affairs if their clients don't have that kind of dough. My small law firm can kick the butt of any large law firm, but only if we have a client that can afford to pay the bills.

Hey have you been reading about our actual history? Don't you know that's not permitted.

Correction. In copyright cases, the court has discretion to award attorneys fees to the prevailing side. 17 USC 505

You're wrong if you thing that will improve access to the courts; it would only make it worse. It would make it an even higher stakes poker game. The real things that would improve access to justice are such things as (a) making it easier rather than harder to bring class actions, (b) making it easier rather than harder for other forms of contingent cases, (c) investing money in civil legal aid, (d) developing laws to encourage prepaid legal services, and (e) the courts not bending the law -- as they sometimes do -- to accommodate large corporations abusing the judicial system (see my article on how the RIAA was given numerous unfair advantages by the courts in its war against ordinary people: "Large Recording Companies vs The Defenseless", ABA Judges Journal, Equal Access to Justice issue, 2008)