Computer as Author continued

I did not see the following example mentioned during the recent thread on computers as authors. Nor do i _recall_ it being mentioned any other time over the last year or so. The fact that it was not brought up, made me suspect that the following article in _Omni_ was a "New Year fools" joke. A number of points in the article left me suspicious. Therefore I checked _Books in Print_ and found the following listing there:

_Just This Once: A Novel written by a computer programmed to think like the worlds best selling author_ by French, Scott, as told to. Carol Pub. Group (c)1993 LC-92-39500 ISBN-1-5972-173-1 $18.95.

Without further ado:

from: _Omni_ magazine, Jan. 1995; p. 29 by Anita Bartholomew, (Law column) "When Computers Copy Style: The case against Hal and the future of copyright."

The first novel authored by a computer, _Just This Once_ by Scott French (really a Macintosh IIcx tho). Scott spent 8 years training a computer to learn the style and formula of Jacqueline Susann's famous novels. He programmed in 20,000 rules which
"Hal" turned into the novel published by Carol Publishing. A
lawsuit threatened by the estate of Ms. Susann for copyright infringement discouraged most of the mainstream publishers that *had* been excited about the book. French met Steven Schragis head of Carol Publishing (a lawyer as well), and he decided to
"risk it". The case was settled secretly out of court, but
reliable sources say the estate will collect 50% of the profits from the sale of the book.

What's next for French? He recently contacted an author of bestselling  spy novels to get permission to have Hal "do" his style. The author was noncommittal. However, two weeks later French received a letter from the author's lawyer saying: "Try it, and we'll see you in court." The publisher, is hesitant about another round, (i.e. not as much fun the second time). It just may be tho, "where the publisher's fun ends, the lawyers begins."

• my 2 cents start here

The book *is* an *original work*! So, where is the problem?

It has been made abundantly clear, an author cannot copyright an idea! how about a "style"? we have the software "look-and-feel" suits out there all the time... If a human author writes a novel in the "style" of Danielle Steele, Tom Clancy, Steven King or John Grisham, etc... why not a computer?

The article, stated: "French fed Hal two earlier novels" (by Susann). I suppose one might say that OCR'g a copyrighted novel was sufficient infringement (assuming that is what is meant by the word "fed")... If however, OCR'g a book for *personal use* is not a "fair use", then one possible remedy might be the following tedious scenario:

Scan/OCR one page of a copyrighted book. When finished proofing that page (front and back) you have a "fair use" copy of ONE page of a several hundred page book. *Significantly* less that 1% of the whole. Next shred or destroy that one printed page. Continue this operation until the entire book is digitized. Now the printed (published) edition is totally destroyed and all that remains is ONE copy that the person is entitled to have--(having purchased the book!) right???

Keep in mind that (to my knowledge) there is no law against persons with "photographic memories" reading copyrighted materials. A computer that *neither prints or distributes* the
"knowledge" it contains is "like" this kind of rare *human* reader!

All this assumes that the whole story is not just a publicity stunt! The whole thing *might* be a rouse by French to sell his book(s?). If however, he did OCR copyrighted books, it would seem to me that the plaintiff would have to *prove* that French really did that! If French destroyed all his computer files *before* they are subpoenaed, the only evidence against him would be hearsay and conjectural.

Another possible violation no matter *how* this book was produced, *might* be a violation of publicity rights to a famous authors name? But that was *not* mentioned specifically in the article on copyright law. (Moral rights were not mentioned either btw).

Sorry the article does not contain any "meat" for you lawyers to sink your teeth into. But maybe someone else has other information to contribute from other sources. Perhaps if Scott French is lurking on this listserv, he can better describe exactly what he does that these lawyers are considering a (c) infringement.

Charles Keller (Non-lawyer)
keller[_at_]ra.msstate.edu Received on Thu Dec 15 1994 - 03:06:55 GMT