Re: Re: Re: Re: COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT

From: Andrew SkinnerLopata <asl[_at_]callatg.com>
Date: Mon, 25 Jul 2005 16:00:32 -0400

NOTHING IN THIS EMAIL SHOULD BE CONSTRUED AS LEGAL ADVICE.

Mr. Riolo and Ms. Devine,

With respect, it seems you are talking past each other and not clarifying much.  Ms. Devine is correct (and I believe Mr. Riolo understands this as well), that there is copyright protection in a compilation.  Mr. Riolo is correct (and I believe Ms. Devine understands), that names are not copyrightable.

I believe that Ms. Devine's difficulty is in understanding that certain elements of a whole work may be protected, while others are not.  What "elements" are protected is the important inquiry. 

Facts and ideas are NOT protected by copyright.  One may have protection in a whole work, which may be a compilation, but one will never have protection in any of these elements (facts and ideas) within the work.  Copyright protects the expression of an idea and creativity.

Copyright does not protect "sweat of the brow" work.  See Feist v. Rural Telephone Service.  Ms. Devine seemed concerned that others were using data she spent much time and work gathering.  Others are free to use and copy facts from whatever work they read (unless it's a trade secret and they are under an obligation to keep it secret).  Hard work is not a rationale for copyright protection (at least not in the U.S.), and the products of hard work alone do not create that protection.

Ms. Devine may wonder where this leaves her work.  I do not know what Ms. Devine's book looks like, and I do not know what the alleged infringing copies look like, and I certainly wouldn't be giving legal advice to a stranger over the internet. 

That said, Feist stands for the proposition that a work must have the requisite "originality" to gain any copyright protection.  A telephone book arranged in alphabetical order doesn't pass that test.  I have not read any case law on the subject, but I would guess that geneological information (names, dates of birth, parentage) organized in the obvious chronological fashion would have little or no copyright protection.  There may be some protection in organization of such a book or the prose in such a book, but the facts within the prose are NOT protected by copyright.  Direct quotes of prose may or may not be infringment and may or may not be a fair use of the work (many factors govern this).

I hope this helps make some sense of the seemingly contradictory advice you've been getting.

Others feel free to correct me where I've mistated the law.

Respectfully,
Andy

******************************************
Andrew SkinnerLopata, Associate
Kaufman & Stewart, Attorneys at Law
270 Oakway Center
Eugene, OR  97401-5663
541.342.5587
asl@callatg.com

Joseph Pietro Riolo wrote:

On 7/20/05, Katheryn (Fitzwater) Devine <bankdevine@mchsi.com> wrote:
  

You seem to be an attorney well versed in copyright law, overriding all
other
attorney's who have dealt with this subject.
Are you an attorney?
    

No, I am not.  I am a generic person at the lowest stratum of
our society.  My occupation is computer programmer, if you really
want to know it.

There are many attorneys that do not know much about copyright
law and give wrong information.  But then, there are many attorneys
that know a lot about copyright law and give right information.
Just because a person is an attorney does not necessarily mean
that he is right at all the times.  Also, just because a person is not
an attorney does not necessarily mean that he is wrong at all
the times.


  

YOU SEEM TO HAVE "MISSED THE MESSAGE"
IT IS NOT (NOT, NOT, NOT) ILLEGAL TO COPY NAMES.
IT IS (IS, IS, IS) ILLEGAL TO COPY AN ORIGINAL WORK WHICH COMPILES NAMES
IN AN "ORIGINAL FORM"
    

Then, your copyright is limited to the compilation.  That is all you
can claim copyright.  Anyone else is free to copy the names that
appear in your compilation as long as he does not copy your
compilation and as long as he does not copy any of the creative
parts in your compilation.


  

SIR, MY "EXPLANATION" CAME DIRECTLY FROM THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS ATTORNEY
SO TAKE UP YOUR "OPINION" WITH THEM.
    

Then, what did he or she exactly say?


  

YES I CAN, AND IT HAS BEEN VERIFIED BY EXPERTS.
YOU CAN TAKE ANY LINE ITEM FROM MY PUBLICATION AND PUBLISH THAT, BUT YOU
CANNOT (CANNOT, CANNOT) TAKE ANY COMPILATION OF THAT DATA.
    

This is another area that you are not familiar with.  You
should know that not every compilation is copyrightable.
It all depends on what kind of compilation that you use.

If it is just a plain collection of the names that you find
from the public records, the compilation that you have is
not copyrightable.  If you have your own creative criteria
that you use to decide whether to include names in your
compilation, it is very likely that your compilation is
copyrightable.  You seem to assume that just because
you have compilation, you automatically have copyright
in it.

Just because you received the notice of copyright
registration from the Copyright Office does not automatically
mean that you have copyright in your compilation.  It
only means that the burden of proving that your compilation
is not copyrightable is shifted to defendants if you decide
to sue them.

Without knowing what is your criteria for collecting names
from the public records and what is your criteria for compiling
them, I could not say whether your compilation is copyrightable.


Joseph Pietro Riolo
<josephpietrojeungriolo@gmail.com>
<riolo@voicenet.com>

Number of days left until 1-1-2019 when all knowledge of 1923
in the land of the U.S.A. will be freed from their copyright
owners' prisons: 4,911

Public domain notice:  I put all of my expressions in this
post in the public domain.

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Received on Tue Jul 26 2005 - 00:00:32 GMT