Page:The copyright act, 1911, annotated.djvu/42

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��CoPYKiGiiT Act, 191L

��§2 0)(i).

EXISTING LAW.

Taking selection and arrangement of material.

Identical result from original .sources.

Work with different aim and object.

��Use of law reports.

��Law digests.

��No custom of piracy among newspapers.

��The taking of an author's t^election and arrangement of material is an infringement, even although there is no appropriation of that author's actual collocation of woi'ds or sentences (h). When one author gives quotations and selections from nOn-copyright works, it is an infringement if another author apjjropriates those quotations and selections for his own book. He may go to the original sources indicated by the first author, but, having done so, must make his own selection and arrangement of quotations (c).

It is no excuse for piracy to say that with a, little labour the copyist could have produced identically the same result. The fact that the result may be identical is a reason for not making a new book, but it is no reason for copying another's book(r(').

Much more latitude is allowed to an author who is comjjiling a book which is in no sense a rival of the prior publication which he desires to make iise of. Assistance may be fairly taken if the object is to jiroduce a work of an entirely different character and scope, although the same assistance would be unfair and amount to an infringement if the object had been to produce a rival work upon the same lines {>'). The fact, however, that one work has a different aim and object from another does not justify a wholesale appropriation of material from the prior publication (,/). A copy- right owner is entitled to protection not only against piracy which may injure the existing market for his work, but also against piracy which may injure its potential value as a basis for other derivative works {g).

The rejirinting of reports of decided cases from a series of copy- right reijorts will constitute an infringement notwithstanding that they are taken in order to form, along with numerous other reports, a collection of the decisions upon some particular branch of the law, such as " Poor Law" or " Eegistration of Voters" (A).

A law digest compiled by taking verbatim the head notes from copyright law reports and arranging them under appropriate titles is an infringement of the copyright in such law reports (/).

The proprietors of newspapers and magazines have no greater right of appropriating copyright material than any other persons (/.•). In one case it was alleged that the custom of the newsi^aper trade

��(/>) Spirrsv. Jiiwn/ (1S.58), 31 L. T. (O. S.) 18; 6W. R. 352 ; Mofaf ^• /■,!„/> V. f,'>// .V .Vo//s (I'JD'J), 86 L.T. 465; Lamb v. Evans, [1893] I Ch. 218, 'l-l-l ; 2bn'milhr„ v. Snirsh Chnnder Deh (1890), Ind. L. R. 17 Calc. 951.

(c) Pike V. mcholas (1869), L. R. 5 Ch. 251.

[d) Matthewson v. ^tockdale (1806), I J. & H. 312; Walter \. Lane, [1900] A. C. 539 ; Kelhi v. Morris (1866), L. R. 1 Eq. 697; Morris\. Wright (1870), L. R. 5 Ch. 279 ; Baily v. Taylor (1829). 1 Russ. &M. 73.

{e) Wil/dns V. Aikin {18]0), 17 Ves. 422; Bradlmry v. Ilottni {\%Tl), L. R. 8 Ex. 1, 5 ; Roworth v. Wilkes (1807), 1 Camp. 94 ; Hurray v. M'Farquhnr (ITS.')), M. Diet. 8309.

(/) A/,v,/x V, I'.liHan (1884), 26 Ch. D. 374.

[g) Wciiilin-liij S,- Suns v. International Horse Ayencij, [1910] 2 Ch. 297.

(/ Su-eet V. Shaw (1839), 3 Jur. 217; Hodges v. Welsh (1840), 2 Ir. Eq. R. 266. See Saunders v. Smith (1838), 3 Myl. & Cr. 711.

(t) Siveetv. lienniiig (18-55), 16 C. B. 459.

(/.•) Maxwell v. Som'erton (1874), 22 W. R. 313 ; Wgatt v. Barnard (1814), 3 V. & B. 77.

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