On Tue, Aug 10, 2010 at 6:54 AM, Anthony <o...@inbox.org> wrote: > On Tue, Aug 10, 2010 at 7:16 AM, Jaak Laineste <jaak.laine...@gmail.com> > wrote: > > Map is a hand-written 2D picture of the world. It is definitely more a > > kind of art than a digital photo in flickr, there is more subjectivity > > and intelligence etc needed to make it. > > > > How can photos be copyrighted? Aren't photos just visual registrations > > of facts? Also there are many artistic paintings, books, movies etc, > > which try to be "purely factual", at least through the eyes of the > > author? > > > > I don't really see how someone can even have the idea (or argument) > > that map is just a database of facts. > > > > I'd suggest a simple technical test for "is X an art or fact". > > 1. ask two persons to create the X. > > 2. store it to a digital file, and make diff of the files. > > > > Only if you can get "no differences" then this was a pure fact. I am > > sure that mapping (like e.g. photography) will fail the test, even > > without trying it out. > > Agreed. That's basically the merger doctrine. Of course, the problem > with that here in the United States is Feist, and especially the lower > court cases which attempted to follow Feist. > > I asked before why isn't OSM copyrightable when maps are > copyrightable. And after some research I think I found the answer. > Under a certain line of reasoning following Feist, maps *aren't* > copyrightable, at least not to any significant extent. See ADC v. > Franklin Maps. > > Which doesn't make a whole lot of sense. Maps are one of the original > works for which copyright was designed. Not sure what's next. Maybe > software. Eventually only abstract art will be copyrighted ;). > > If you march your way down Wikipedia's list of US copyright case law [0], you'll notice that specific expansion of copyright was made for things like photographs, "applied art", and computer software.
[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_copyright_case_law#United_States
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