The intersection of copyright and antitrust (paper topic)

To date, the RIAA has filed thousands of infringement suits against individuals who have allegedly downloaded or distributed copyrighted material.  The litigation strategy takes full advantage of the power of the Association, including ex parte discovery orders, settlement demands via letter with no opportunity for negotiation of terms, and pursuing default judgments for $750 per song alleged (a number over 750 times the amount which the song could have been purchased for.)  This litigation strategy is intuitively collusive, with high powered companies joining resources to protect their power.  The reality is that rarely is a monopolistic purpose articulated, and to date, these litigation strategies have been effective not only in winning at least one large jury verdict (i.e. Jammie Thomas), but in coercing many people into settling whose cases may have been much weaker.  

My plan is to look at the ways in which antitrust counterclaims and the affirmative defense of copyright abuse have been used in response to infringement suits filed by the RIAA.  My hope is to articulate the ways in which this sort of mass litigation feels like monopolistic activity, but falls outside the reach of antitrust law generally.  My thesis is that the overbroad grant of property rights under the current copyright scheme has led to an ability by multi-billion dollar companies to legally collude to maintain monopoly power without much legal recourse.  The state of the law and the difficulties in standing and proof, combined with the massive resources, both in litigation power and lobbying power, of the RIAA leave those accused of infringement without meaningful options beyond settlement, which is based generally on a statutory damages scheme which is massively out of proportion to the harm allegedly caused by any potential infringement.  What remains to be seen is whether there is a monopolistic benefit to enforcing copyright in this manner (litigation against individuals by a group of copyright holders), or whether they are simply using permissible litigation strategies to enforce their lawful copyrights.  In any event, I hope to shed some light on the breakdown, if not in the market for digital music distribution, at the very least in the statutory grant of rights and remedies for copyright holders.