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I. COPYRIGHT: CASES AND MATERIALS
language which can be understood by the readers can be original: so the manner in which the
language of the Bible was explained by [the teacher] can be original.
In the present instance, where does the originality lie? It does not lie in the story. It lies in the
way the story has been explained. Assuming that the language of the child is different it is still
the telling of the same story in the same way. It does not in so doing change the original nature
of the story nor add anything which is original. The child has copied what she has been told albeit
that she has put some or all of it into her own language.
- A compilation involving original selection or arrangement may
have copyright
Article 10.2 of TRIPs reads:
Compilations of data or other material, whether in machine readable
or other form, which by reason of their selection or arrangement of
their contents constitute intellectual creationsshall be protected as
such. Such protection, which shall not extend to the data or material
itself, shall be without prejudice to any copyright subsisting in the data
or material itself. [Emphasis added]
Consider the following leading United States case (followed by many of the
post-1991 U.S. decisions, noted above, in other fields of activity) on how far a
compilation – here, an ordinary “white pages” telephone directory – has
copyright.
Feist Publications Inc. v. Rural Telephone Service Co. Inc., 499 U.S. 340
(U.S.: Supreme Court, 1991)
[Rural compiled a white pages telephone book from information given to it by
subscribers when they applied for a telephone. Rural was obliged by law to
produce such a phone book annually. Feist wanted to publish a telephone
directory for a large region (47,000 listings) that included Rural’s subscribers
(7,700 listings). Feist used about 1,300 of Rural’s listings in defiance of Rural’s
expressed wishes, claiming that Rural’s work was unoriginal.]
JUSTICE O’CONNOR for the Court:
This case concerns the interaction of two well-established propositions. The first is that facts are
not copyrightable; the other, that compilations of facts generally are. ... There is an undeniable
tension between these two propositions. Many compilations consist of nothing but raw data –
i.e., wholly factual information not accompanied by any original written expression. On what
basis may one claim a copyright in such a work? Common sense tells us that 100
uncopyrightable facts do not magically change their status when gathered together in one place.
Yet copyright law seems to contemplate that compilations that consist exclusively of facts are
potentially within its scope.
The key to resolving the tension lies in understanding why facts are not copyrightable. The sine
qua nonof copyright is originality. To qualify for copyright protection, a work must be original
to the author. ... Original, as the term is used in copyright, means only that the work was
independently created by the author (as opposed to copied from other works), and that it
possesses at least some minimal degree of creativity. ... To be sure, the requisite level of
