Copyright in Newspaper Employment Ads

I have an issue that has been on my mind for some time. Across the United States, there are several publications that summarize job ads gathered from different newspapers and trade magazines. Some of the publications reproduce the ads outright, organizing them by occupation or state; others prepare text-only abstracts of the job ads, including information like the employer's name and address, a description of the position and so on. The latter group often supplement the listings they write with other information they have on file about the employers.

Recently, some of the newspapers have started including a clause in their advertising contracts granting themselves a copyright in the information in the employment ad. To my knowledge, the clause has yet to be litigated in an action against a third party.

My questions are: (1) Does the original newspaper have a copyright in the content of an employment ad it prints? and (2) If not, can the newspaper rely on its advertising contract to prevent third parties from making use of the information?

Anthony Meehan
<mci[_at_]mediacorp2.com> Received on Thu Oct 15 1998 - 15:50:19 GMT