Re: Aphorisms and Copyright

Several responses to a variety of comments and queries:

1. A collection of uncopyrightable material is copyrightable as a collection. E.g., recipes and public domain poems. Same for well-known aphorisms - many which are ancient indeed. Just republishing public domain stuff in a collection does not, in the U.S. at least, give the republisher any copyright in the component parts. In such a situation the component parts may be copied from any source. I believe that in Europe, or parts of it, there is a copyright or related right in the layout - which protects against xeroxing and redistribution of straight xeroxed copies - but I did not understand that to extend to the public domain content itself. Is my understanding of European law on this point incorrect?
2. Length, per se, does not determine copyrightability, except for perhaps single words or two words. But there is no set bound on how few words makes it "short" and how many makes it copyrightable. Henny Youngman's famous: "Take my wife... PLEASE!" is only four words. Would this pass the test as a copyrightable joke? I would think so, though it wasn't so far as I know - not being registered and all that in the U.S. when it was first published.
3. I wonder what the standard is for jokes now. Until the change in U.S. law 20 years ago I'm sure most jokes were not copyrighted and were freely stolen by one comedian from another - until sufficient fame was achieved to make the theft obvious with social and business consequences... - but now jokes are written down or video-recorded and hence fixed before they become public domain. Anyone know whether this has been a source of much dispute since 1976?

Cheers,
Steve Jamar

--
Steven D. Jamar
Professor of Law
Director LRW Program
Howard University School of Law
2900 Van Ness Street NW
Washington, DC  20008

vox:  202-806-8017   fax:  202-806-8428
email:  sjamar[_at_]law.howard.edu

"Metaphysics is not reality.  Metaphysics is names about reality. 
Metaphysics is a restaurant where they give you a thirty-thousand page
menu and no food."

Robert M. Pirsig, Lila, p. 63 (1991).