Copyright of Facts

[InfoNuovo at cs.com]

Great!

I certainly have no idea about the technicalities of your example.  I would
think that we are now looking at the same sort of thing that governs
creation of dramatic works from novels, and vice versa.  Also, continuing of
story lines and such in works of another.

You've opened my eyes to something that I think is key - the practice that
develops around copyright and the use of works of others, how that differs
from the technicalities of copyright and its application.  For open-source
development and licensing, the practice aspect seems crucial.

1. Technicalities.  In your example of a samurai fighting game, the game in
which the story line and elements are intertwined in the implementation is
certainly more vulnerable if there is found to be infringement or even an
allegation of infringement that must be cured quickly.   The game which has
a data-driven engine with separable story lines is certainly easier to use
in curing an IP problem with one of the scenarios.
   I find it very easy to believe that a court would hear the complaint in
this matter and litigation could be very difficult to sidestep.  And
settlement could be costly.  Notice that we don't care here which technical
aspect of copyright or other IP protection is involved.  It doesn't take
much to realize that there is likely some cause of action in the scenario
you provide.

2. Practice.  Out of this discussion, it seems to me that a valuable way of
looking at the copyright system as it has evolved over the years is to
notice that it encourages practices by which people prudently seek licenses
and permissions to ensure that their employment of the works of others is
unencumbered.  That is, litigation is not intended to be the first recourse.
I say it is clearly not in most people's self-interest to be an involved
party in some breakthrough court decision in the IP area.  And when there is
a dispute, my sense is that the preference of the courts is for settlement
by agreement of the parties.  (The presence of statutory penalties just adds
more encouragement for permissions, I'd say.)
   It seems to me that the suggestions Brad Templeton gives for the
etiquette of permissions in the use of e-mails, mail-list submissions,
newsgroup postings, as well as web-page citation and linking are all useful
in this regard.
    I've had an author of a book request permission to mention a work of mine
in his bibliography, and in other cases I was pleased to discover that I had
been acknowledged in some way in the work of another.  I have also sought
and received permissions from others.  I've never been in the awkward
situation of being denied such permission, so I can't speak to that.  Oops,
not true.  I refrained from citing something because a party involved asked
me not to, even though I was pretty sure there was no IP issue.  That was
recent and it involved people collaborating from different cultures.  In
this case it was important to me that the sensibilities of my Japanese
colleagues be honored.
    I also created some CP/M-80 software that I essentially put out as binary
freeware.  Later, another fellow redistributed this software privately for a
fee, along with documentation that he'd developed.  I had no idea about
this.  And I wasn't particularly helpful when, after-the-fact, he called me
for technical support because of some problems his customers had run into in
areas of my work that were incomplete.
    My point is that even when actionable IP rights infringement seems
unlikely, there is a certain civility and accommodation that supports the
open space in which we are able to contribute and also enjoy the
contributions of others.  I see this as consistent with the spirit of modern
copyright law as well as the constitutional objective.  In a way, the GPL as
employed in the GNU project fosters a particular community of practice that
seems beautifully consistent with the values and ideals of Richard Stall man
in creating the playpen in which he wanted to practice computing with
others.
    And I don't think we can ever rely on precision crafting of a license
statement to remove the need for civil behavior in dealing with the IP
concerns of others and of ourselves.  Ultimately, it all comes down to trust
and being trustworthy.  All that messy gray cloudy uncertain risky-feeling
stuff.

Thank you for your thought-provoking inquiry.

-- Dennis

------------------
Dennis E. Hamilton
InfoNuovo
mailto:infonuovo at email.com
tel. +1-206-779-9430 (gsm)
fax. +1-425-793-0283
http://www.infonuovo.com

-----Original Message-----
From: anicolao at iname.net [mailto:anicolao at iname.net]On Behalf Of Alex
Nicolaou
Sent: Wednesday, November 17, 1999 23:33
To: InfoNuovo at cs.com
Cc: Alex Nicolaou; Bruce Perens; johnston at vectaport.com;
license-discuss at opensource.org
Subject: Re: Copyright of Facts


InfoNuovo at cs.com wrote:

>   2.3 You suggested that the map data might be licensed under GPL.  OK, so
> the compilation of data is copyrighted.  Isn't this first and foremost a
> straightforward question under topic (1)?   An obvious derivative work
would
> be more data compilation, wouldn't it?  I think it hinges on what of the
map
> data is copyrighted subject matter, GPL or no.

In order to remove the ambiguity, let's suppose that the data are a
GPL'ed storyline about a samurai's life. Since the data are a story, it
is clearly a creative work and can be copylefted. If someone builds a
samurai fighting game intertwined with this story (re-used, and not
re-written), do the data cause the program to need to be licensed under
the GPL? Does it make a difference if any of several storylines can be
plugged into the program?

alex