Re: lawsuit on copying ideas

On Tue, Mar 28, 2000, Eric Eldred <eldred[_at_]eldritchpress.org> wrote:
>
> On Thu, 23 Mar 2000, Timothy Phillips <hrothgar[_at_]telepath.com> wrote:
> >
> > On Wed, 22 Mar 2000, Steven D. Jamar <sjamar[_at_]law.howard.edu> wrote:
> > >
> > > I hope no one trusts Mr. Riolo's interpretation and characterization
> > > of US copyright law. What he says is not correct. It is wrong. It
> > > is wrong in ways that may not seem to matter to him, but do matter
> > > to lawyers and the courts.
> >
> > Even Mr. Jamar recognizes that the line between ideas and expression
> > is not always clear. In light of that, dogmatic absolute assertions
> > that "ideas are not copyrightable" are inconsistent.
>
> if the database protection act passes, then facts and lists
> and the like can be copyrighted. at this point, Mattel
> claims that the list of sites blocked by CyberPatrol is
> covered by copyright.
>
> the statement "ideas are not copyrightable" might be
> translated (if one is a legal pragmatist) into the
> prediction that courts will rule that things we call
> "ideas" are not protected by copyright law. however,
> the prediction might be meaningless tautology if it
> predicts that if the courts rule that the expression
> is copyrightable, then it can't be a mere "idea".
>
> a similar situation happens today with patents: the
> idea of what can be patented seems to have loosened
> and who knows how courts will catch up with it.
>
> so at present (and i'm not a lawyer nor a professional
> philosopher) i'd have to suggest that "ideas are not
> copyrightable" is a good platform from which to pitch
> arguments to a judge, but it's open to interpretation,
> and can't be used to settle arguments in this forum.
>
> since this is my idea, and not copyrightable, i guess
> it must belong to "the public domain," which might
> answer another question floating around here.

As I understand it, the DB protection proposal is characterized by its supporters as "sui generis" protection to avoid the constitutional requirements that Feist applies to copyright. So it would be a congressional exercise of the commerce power, not implementation of the copyright clause of the Constitution. Whether that argument would prevail in a lawsuit if the DB proposal became law, is another question.

Jim Brennan
<brennandot[_at_]prodigy.net> Received on Thu Mar 30 2000 - 14:43:10 GMT