At the beginning of this year, a North Carolina videographer escalated a copyright fight with the State of North Carolina to the U.S. Supreme Court. In 2015, Nautilus Productions filed a Federal lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of North Carolina against then-governor Pat McCrory, the State of North Carolina, and others. The initial lawsuit filed concerned the recently passed “Blackbeard’s Law” which makes public “all photographs, video records, or other documentary materials of a derelict vessel or shipwreck,” and “relics, artifacts or historic materials” in the custody of the State or a state agency. NC Sets Sail for the Supreme Court: ?Blackbeard?s Law? and Modern Day Piracy | Journal of Business & Intellectual Property Law | Wake Forest School of Law (http://ipjournal.law.wfu.edu/2019/04/nc-sets-sail-for-the-supreme-court-blackbeards-law-and-modern-day-piracy/)

Could you explain this for the benefit of us Brits - I don't quite understand what the fight is about?

The State of North Carolina can use your footage of " derelict vessel or shipwreck,” and “relics, artefacts or historic materials” for free no matter how much time and effort the videographer has put into it.

Wow! That really is state piracy. How on earth do they set aside people's rights like this? I can see why people are angry.