--- Pat Asher <pasher@ee.net> wrote: > I did find this at the Customer service link: > "While it's true that the original documents are > "public domain," we have > painstakingly processed the records through our > proprietary enhancement > systems. It is through this synthesizing process > that we have generated a > new product, which is fully protected by U.S. and > International copyright law." > Pat's right -- "sweat of the brow" and/or "industrious collection" are accorded no copyright protections at all. HeritageQuest is trying to convince you not to take 'their' scans, but if they are exact scans of the public records rather than a real database or extraction of those records, they have no rights at all as far as my reading of the copyright law goes. Copyright requires originality and there is no originality in scanning public domain documents. Kathi Jones-Hudson MD Tombstone Transcription Project Manager http://www.rootsweb.com/~cemetery/maryland/maryland.html __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com

Kathi Jones-Hudson said: >HeritageQuest is trying to convince you not to take 'their' scans, but if >they are exact scans of the public records rather than a real database or >extraction of those records, they have no rights at all as far as my >reading of the copyright law goes. The point of HeritageQuest's copyright claim is that the images are *not* exact scans of the public records but rather have "enhancements" which do indeed involve artistry and original work and are therefore subject to copyright. You can see an example here, for instance: http://www.archivecdbooksusa.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=SCANSAMPLE The image on the left is a "slavish copy" as the term is used in Bridgeman Art Library, Ltd. v. Corel Corporation, among others, and is doubtless not protected by copyright. But the product distributed by the Archive CD Books Project (and as similarly claimed by HeritageQuest) is the one on the right which has been subject to a proprietary "cleaning" process, including the removal of defects, enhancement of faded areas, etc. The result is a custom representation of the original work, one which reflects artistry and is not merely a "slavish copy." The modifications of the image (or "enhancments" as HeritageQuest calls them) go FAR beyond the minimal level of added originality that is required in order for reproductions of public domain material to be protected by copyright, according to Eastern America Trio Products v. Tang Electronic Corporation, among others. Note that I'm talking about copyright protection of a single image, not just a collection, independent of the process (possibly also patentable), and in addition to whatever usage license may be attached to it. So while Joan and others who say "you can't copyright an image of public domain material" may be right in the case of a "slavish copy," such sweeping statements are misleading and irresponsible because that is NOT what most digitizing companies make available to the public. The "enhancements" claimed by HeritageQuest may not be as dramatic as the example above and they may not be apparent at all without the benefit of comparison to the original image -- but that doesn't invalidate their copyright. Like the photograph of the tombstone, you are entitled to find the original material yourself and make your own copy/representation of it -- but you are not entitled to copy someone else's image merely on the grounds that the _subject_matter_ is in the public domain. Those who do so (or sanction others doing so), do it at the peril of the rest of the genealogical community because it drives out of business the many hard-working folks who take great pains to make clean, readable images available to you. Bob Velke President Archive CD Books USA www.ArchiveCDBooksUSA.com -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.1.375 / Virus Database: 268.2.1/278 - Release Date: 3/9/2006

NO, the point of HeritageQuest makes is their images are released under a licence which prohibits certain action. It is a contract condition not a copyright issue. Bob Velke wrote: > > > The point of HeritageQuest's copyright claim is that the images are > *not* exact scans of the public records but rather have "enhancements" > which do indeed involve artistry and original work and are therefore > subject to copyright. > > -- Wakefield, West Yorkshire, England. http://freespace.virgin.net/guy.etchells The site that gives you facts not promises! http://anguline.co.uk/ An organisation dedicated to bring rare books on CD, at an affordable price, to the local history researcher and to the family history researcher.

On the page referred to, it specifically says "The result is usually comparable to the day that the book was published!" If that's the case, there is no originality, in my opinion, no matter how much sweat-of-the-brow goes into it. The image that was started with looks like a copy of a copy of a copy... If one scans the original, instead of a copy from an older generation copy machine, with today's modern computers and software, the image on the right is what you will get. Again, no originality, and almost no sweat-of-the-brow. As well, it should be noted that the claim of copyright (questionable) could only be applied to the cleaned up image, not to the content of the page that was cleaned up. Mike Goad Copy Right, Copy Sense http://www.pddoc.com/copyright Bob Velke said: You can see an example here, for instance: http://www.archivecdbooksusa.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=SCANSAMPLE The image on the left is a "slavish copy" as the term is used in Bridgeman Art Library, Ltd. v. Corel Corporation, among others, and is doubtless not protected by copyright. But the product distributed by the Archive CD Books Project (and as similarly claimed by HeritageQuest) is the one on the right which has been subject to a proprietary "cleaning" process, including the removal of defects, enhancement of faded areas, etc. The result is a custom representation of the original work, one which reflects artistry and is not merely a "slavish copy." The modifications of the image (or "enhancments" as HeritageQuest calls them) go FAR beyond the minimal level of added originality that is required in order for reproductions of public domain material to be protected by copyright, according to Eastern America Trio Products v. Tang Electronic Corporation, among others.

Mike said: >On the page referred to, it specifically says "The result is usually >comparable to the day that the book was published!" > >If that's the case, there is no originality, in my opinion, no matter how >much sweat-of-the-brow goes into it. There's been no claim that merely sweat-of-the-brow earns copyright protection. It is the creative elements of the image that does that. >If one scans the original, instead of a copy from an older generation copy >machine, with today's modern computers and software, the image on the >right is what you will get. You're mistaken. You will get something which looks to you like the image on the right. But if we each take a photograph of a tombstone, then both images are protected by a copyright, even if some people think that they look identical. They _aren't_ identical and each employed its own creative process, resulting in a product that is protected by copyright. Neither was a "slavish copy" of the other nor of the original, even though all three happen to be of the same subject matter. Again, you're confusing the content (or subject matter) with the presentation (or image of it). Neither the content nor the presentation of the original book is copyrighted since the work in is the public domain. The content is not copyrightable at all -- so you can transcribe it, etc. But a newly created presentation of the same content IS copyrightable if someone employed a creative process to transform it from the original source material. If the source material in the example were a pristine copy of the public domain document and didn't require any post-processing to get it in that condition, then, you're right, the finished product could rightly be called a "slavish copy" and would not be protected by copyright. But it isn't. As demonstrated, the source material is a copy in much worse condition and it took a lot of creative post-processing to get it in the finished condition. The fact that you might have been able to find a pristine copy of the same content, you might have scanned it, and you might think it resembles my finished product is irrelevant. First, because you didn't <g>. And second because they aren't the same creative presentation, even if the content appears to you to be identical. Bob Velke President Archive CD Books USA www.ArchiveCDBooksUSA.com -- No virus found in this outgoing message. Checked by AVG Anti-Virus. Version: 7.1.375 / Virus Database: 268.2.1/279 - Release Date: 3/10/2006