Useless copyrights?

I often wonder what copyrights are good for in today’s publishing industry. Almost all fiction books (and probably all books) list the author(s) as the copyright holders. Whether authors are self- or traditionally published, what recourse do they have? If someone “steals” their intellectual property (that can assume many forms), is an author going to take that someone to court? Better said, can an author convince a lawyer to take that someone to court?

Unless a book is making a lot of money,...