On 8/6/05, Ray Saintonge <saintonge(a)telus.net> wrote:
Michael Turley wrote:
Their choice of what articles to include is a very
significant part of
their
content.
How do you measure "significant"? If their articles average 1,000
words each we're talking about less than 1/10 of 1 percent.
It doesn't take much court watching to know that "significant" is not
decided by percentage. If you were to print and give away individual still
frames from a copyright movie, you'd be using an even lower percentage of
the work, yet you'd still lose a copyright infringement action. Disney does
quite good business selling individual stills from their movies. I don't
remember but they may have started doing so after successfully suing someone
else for doing it.
I don't think "significant" is something you can measure objectively. You
have to look at each case, the creativity involved in making the work, and
the specific purpose that the fair use claimant uses it under.
In this case, the fact that the other party is competing in the same product
market, and that we're using their work to improve our competing product
means we have to be even more cautious.
As you say, the courts don't try to restrict competition, but they do frown
on people trying to compete with a copyright holder by using the copyright
holder's own work. That is the very purpose of copyright.
I think the founders were right in granting limited copyright terms, but if
you think the current courts favor competition over copyright, please review
the consititutionality review of the recent copyright extension laws.
"Competition" and "common good" are not high on the current court
system's
list of goals.
--
Michael Turley
User:Unfocused