RE: Copyright of received correspondence

From: John Mitchell <Mitchell[_at_]InteractionLaw.com>
Date: Fri, 11 Feb 2005 11:30:30 -0500

Some correspondence may be very creative, but in my judgment a C&D letter would have to be pretty extraordinary to be copyrightable. It is primarily facts (or allegations that certain facts are true), and a non-creative "stop it" message. (If it came from a form book, the form was intended to be copied.)

If it were me, unless I saw anything particularly original in the C&D letter, I would go right ahead. And even if arguably copyrightable, publishing it for criticism and comment on a matter of public concern and for no commercial purpose would appear to weigh in favor of fair use in 3 out of the 4 fair use factors.

John

---

John T. Mitchell
http://interactionlaw.com
1-202-415-9213

> -----Original Message-----
> From: CNI-COPYRIGHT -- Copyright & Intellectual Property
> [mailto:CNI-COPYRIGHT[_at_]cni.org] On Behalf Of James Love
> Sent: Thursday, February 10, 2005 2:10 PM
> To: CNI-COPYRIGHT -- Copyright & Intellectual Property
> Subject: [CNI-(C)] Copyright of received correspondence
>
>
> This is a pretty basic question, but what is the law with
> regard to the
> copyright on a letter that you receive from someone. If one gets a
> cease and desist letter, a rejection of an article, a letter of
> recommendation, or countless other letters or emails
> specifically sent
> to a person, can the person receiving the letters publish them in a
> book, a web page, etc, without permission? I see a fair
> amount of this
> taking place, but don't fully appreciate the legal issues.
>
> Jamie
>
> --
> James Love, Director, CPTech, http://www.cptech.org
>
> Consumer Project on Technology in Washington, DC
> PO Box 19367, Washington, DC 20036, USA
> Tel.: 1.202.387.8030, fax: 1.202.234.5176
>
> Consumer Project on Technology in Geneva
> 1 Route des Morillons, CP 2100, 1211 Geneva 2, Switzerland
> Tel: +41 22 791 6727
>
> Mobile +1.202.361.3040
> james.love[_at_]cptech.org
>
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Received on Fri Feb 11 2005 - 21:30:30 GMT