Comic Artists Claim Copyright On Metallic Suits And The Three Point Landing

from the idea-v-expression dept

Oh boy. Another day, another copyright case in which plaintiffs don't seem to understand the basic concept of the idea v. expression dichotomy in copyright law. Once again: you cannot copyright an idea. You can only copyright a particular expression of your idea. And, yes, the line between the two has sometimes been blurred, but it doesn't change the basics. Marc Randazza now alerts us to a nutty case in which two comic artist brothers -- who at least for a time were employed by Marvel Comics -- are now suing Marvel comics for supposedly infringing on the brothers' copyright on... superheroes in armored suits and the three point landing. I'm not joking. The brothers, Ben and Ray Lai, created a comic book series called Radix in 2001, and started a company, Horizon Comics, which holds the copyright on Radix. At some later date, the brothers went to work for Marvel. They now claim that they invented both the idea of a superhero wearing body armor and the (now cliché'd) three point landing action -- and that's proof that Marvel infringed on their copyright:

It was not until after the Lai brothers' submitted their work in Radix to Marvel that Marvel began depicting Iron Man wearing the Suits. The Suits are substantially similar to the armor depicted in the Radix Materials years earlier. Neither the Lai brothers nor Plaintiff authorized any of the Defendants to exploit the Radix Materials in these or any other ways.

The depiction of Iron Man in the Iron Man Materials infringes Plaintiff’s rights in its copyrighted Radix Materials.

For example, Defendants' poster promoting Iron Man 3 (“Poster”) is a copy of a promotional piece of art for the Radix comic. An image of the Poster, alongside promotional art from Radix created years earlier, is attached as Exhibit B. The Iron Man character, including the Suit, as depicted in the Poster is the same or substantially similar to the character as he appears throughout the Iron Man Materials.

Here's "Exhibit B" in case you were wondering: Marc Randazza -- with whom I often disagree with on copyright issues -- notes just how ridiculous this is and points out that the claims here make no sense:

Neither mechanized body armor nor the three-point landing are new to the comic world. For armor, characters of note may include Master Chief from Halo, Batman, Transformers, and perhaps the Pacific Rim comic release that coincided with the movie in 2013. Horizon seeking to profiteer here would mean that they could, I suppose, seek redress against DC for Superman’s occasional adaptation of the pose, or other places in the Anime realm including characters from Kuogane Pukapuka Tai and Naruto (which has been around since 1997). Although one may think to consider that three-point landings of note include Black Widow and Spiderman, both Marvel characters begs the question does Marvel favor the three-point stance, and did this fancy come about after Lais’ involvement?

Either way, the three-point stance and the armored wardrobe cannot so simply be claimed by the Lai brothers. We should reflect on this as an example of how not to use our lawyering super powers to crush the comic realm into copyright compliance. Copyright indeed should, though it doesn't always, cover creative and novel characters in comics, books, and movies, though we must draw the line at common tropes used to further artistic invention.

The Three Point Landing is such a cliché at this point that I hardly think it could be deemed copyrightable. See, e.g., Herzog v. Castle Rock Entertainment, 193 F.3d 1241 (11th Cir. 1999) (holding that plaintiff failed to establish substantial similarity between two films portraying detectives investigating murder in small town. The court reasoned "scenes a faire, 'sequences of events which necessarily follow from a common theme,' are not protectable.")

And for further support, he posts this little video highlighting the cliché that has become the "three point landing" We have to get past this stupid concept that every possible idea is "ownable" and that using common clichés and tropes requires payment (or even direct acknowledgement for merely homage). That's not how culture has ever worked and to pretend that's how copyright law is supposed to work only leads to problems.

Filed Under: ben lai, copyright, expression, idea, iron man, metallic suits, radix, ray lai, three point landing
Companies: disney, horizon comics, marvel

Designer Issues Takedown, Cease And Desist Over Periodic Table Of HTML5 Elements

from the not-really-yours-to-take-down,-is-it? dept

Anyone can have an idea. Multiple people can independently have the same idea. It's the expression that counts, but Alara Mills, the creator of one version of a periodic table of HTML5 elements, seems to think she should be able to curb other expressions of this idea.

Today I received a DMCA takedown request against my personal website over a trivial GitHub project that involves a periodic table layout and information about HTML5 elements.

The takedown request was preceded by an "impersonal email" from Alara Mills -- a cease and desist letter loaded with all sorts of scary claims about thousands of dollars being potentially at stake.

“You neither asked for nor received permission to use the Work… nor to make or distribute copies of it. Therefore, you have infringed my rights under 17 U.S.C. Section 101 et seq. and could be liable for statutory damages as high as $150,000 as set forth in Section 504(c)(2) therein.”

As Mike Riethmuller points out, he had never seen Alara Mills' version of this HTML5 table. His was inspired by another person's (Josh Duck) and was mainly just an exercise in CSS, rather than some sort of cottage industry designed to undercut the only thing Alara Mills offers at her website.

Here's a thumbnail version Alara Mills' HTML5 periodic table of elements, which we're posting to provide commentary on her copyright claims (since she appears to be very litigious about anyone doing anything -- we'd like to suggest she do some studying of fair use before complaining about this usage):

Because Mills is so protective of this product, there's no way to get a closer look at the arrangement of the elements to verify whether or not Riethmuller "copied" her layout.

Riethmuller's version, however, looks nothing like hers.

And, as he states in his post, it's clearly inspired by Josh Duck's:

Duck's version is no longer live because Alara Mills sued it out of existence. Mill's lawsuit claims that somehow Duck got ahold of an earlier version of her chart, which looks like this:

Duck's bears more resemblance to this than her finished product, but it's still not an exact copy. Besides, it's unclear what "copyrightable elements" Duck's could have possibly copied. The periodic table itself is not (and it's certainly not the creation of Alara Mills). The HTML 5 elements are not. The color arrangement, maybe? But those are different. The HTML5 logo is not. What little that might be protectable in Mills' effort is clearly not in Duck's. It is merely the same idea -- and ideas are not copyrightable.

And the link between Duck and Mills is extremely tenuous. Here's what Mills' lawsuit presents as "evidence" that Duck infringed on her table.

Mills emailed a copy of her prospectus to Kirk Kazanjian on July 12, 2010, which contained a derivative work of the HTML Table of Elements in order to receive initial feedback from him before pursuing book publishers. Kirk Kazanjian is a literary agent/former co-worker of Mills. Mills sells quick reference guides, wall-reference posters, and table posters displaying the HTML5 Elements Table™ graphic. A true and correct copy of the graphic submitted to Kirk Kazanjian in Mills’ email is attached hereto as Exhibit D.

[...]

On information and belief, Duck has been aware of Mills’ HTML5 Elements Table™ since July 2010, when Mills emailed a copy of the graphic to Kirk Kazajian.

On information and belief, Duck had access to Mills’ HTML5 Elements Table™

No further explanation is provided. The cease-and-desist that preceded the lawsuit is similarly vague. It simply makes an accusation but never explains how her legal representation (or Mills herself) arrived at this conclusion.

Ms. Mills submitted an earlier version of her chart within a book prospectus to a publisher in July 29, 2010, a copy of which is enclosed. This is the version that was possibly leaked to you in creation of your Periodic Table.

In other words, Mills found something on the internet that resembled something she thought was an entirely original idea, and the only conclusion she could come to was that somehow Duck must have gotten ahold of her submission. There are multiple more likely explanations for this -- chief among them being that things based on the periodic table will often resemble the periodic table as well as the hierarchy of coding terms being fairly rigid. These two elements mean that any independent creation utilizing both of these will bear heavy resemblance to another.

This was settled out of court. Duck agreed to remove the non-infringing chart in return for a dismissal with prejudice. The alternative would have been an expensive trip through the judicial system. Mills seems to feel that this acquiesence gives her the right to pursue creators of similar charts -- not similar to the version she sells -- but similar to the version she still maintains Duck "stole" from her.

Alara Mills, however, would rather not talk about it. After engaging with her for a bit on Twitter, she suddenly deleted most of her tweets to me.


Fortunately, the deleted tweets have been preserved


Now, Riethmuller has never seen this "leaked" version. He's only (possibly) seen Duck's. But he's building on a lot more than Duck. He's building on the same foundation Mills did. Only he's not claiming his chart is somehow sacrosanct.

The information about each element was shamelessly stolen from the Mozilla Developer Network (MDN) and the layout is thanks to Dmitri Mendeleev. But luckily MDN and Dmitri are all about the learning and they support the community; as such I have much love for them both.

These two entities clearly inspired Mills as well, but no one went after her for utilizing the work of others. Riethmuller clearly didn't use hers as a starting point, but she thinks she can lock down an unoriginal idea and keep anyone else from expressing a combination of periodic tables and HTML5 elements that hews a bit too closely to hers. She's wrong, of course, and Riethmuller has filed a counternotice against her DMCA takedown. As of now, his table is still live at Github.

Riethmuller recognizes his work is not "original," but also that it's no "copy" of Mills' work. Unlike Mills, he wants people to build on his efforts, not consider it an endpoint that must not be remade, altered or otherwise moved forward.

I’d love to remake this using flexbox and update it with newer HTML elements and more detailed content. I’d love people to be able to fork it and learn more about creating challenging layouts with css. Or develop something new from this concept.

Riethmuller also points out how truly pointless creation would be if all creators acted like Alara Mills.

Imagine if we all received copyright challenges over something as tenuous a particular layout and subject matter. This would mean there could only be one single column web development blog (and not only that it would be a book).

That's how over-protecting creative works kills creativity. No one has a monopoly on ideas. Expressions can be protected but something as ordinary as a re-imagining of the periodic table isn't exclusive to one person. There are hundreds of periodic table "remixes" already out there, but apparently an HTML5 elements version won't be one of them. Here's another table inspired by Josh Duck that has been killed off -- perhaps by another threat from Alara Mills.

Mills doesn't "own" this idea, nor does she have any right to push these creations off the internet. But that's what she's been doing. She still has yet to answer my question as to the unsubstantiated claim that Duck had access to an unreleased version and has apparently rescinded her offer to tell me her side of the story. It doesn't take much to get the ball rolling on copyright trolling. All it takes is for someone to believe that only they could have arrived at this creative destination and that all others are simply infringers.

This story, however, has somewhat of a happy ending. Mills reached out to Riethmuller late in the day (a few hours after the half-deleted Twitter conversation took place) and apologized to him and withdrew her legal threats. According to Riethmuller, she appears to finally have realized that her claims of ownership over HTML5 period tables are extremely weak and that ambushing creators who are wholly unaware of her previous iterations (not that those supposed "copies," like Duck's infringed on that design either) with cease-and-desist orders does nothing but turn people against her -- and copyright in general.

Filed Under: alara mills, copyright, expression, html 5, idea, inspiration, josh duck, legal threats, mike riethmuller, periodic table, periodic table of the elements, sharing

Deer Hunter Vs. Killshot: Why Specific Expression Matters More Than Similar Shooter-Genre Staples

from the not-like-the-other dept

I imagine it must be very, very annoying to be the creator of a video game and to feel as though some other company came along, cloned your work, and is now making money off of that clone. It's this annoyance factor that likely leads to so many legal proceedings over game "clones", even if so many of them fail because the it's the expression that matters in copyright suits, not a general or generic idea. Unique expressions are what matter. Even in totally misguided legal attempts, those involved usually have the good sense to go after games that directly copy graphics and such, not the general ideas behind the games.

Which is simply not the case when it comes to Glu Mobile's lawsuit against Hothead Games over the latter's production of Kill Shot and its supposed straight cloning of Deer Hunter.

Glu Mobile is suing mobile game studio Hothead Games for copying it popular Deer Hunter 2014 mobile game. Hothead’s Kill Shot isn’t about hunting deer at all. Rather, you’re a sniper that hunts enemy soldiers. Nevertheless, Glu alleges in a federal lawsuit filed in San Francisco today that Hothead’s title violated copyright and trade infringement laws.

“Kill Shot is effectively a complete ripoff of our game Deer Hunter 2014,” said Chris Akhavan, the president of publishing at San Francisco-based Glu Mobile, in an interview with GamesBeat. “The only difference is that in Kill Shot, you are shooting humans. In our game, you are shooting deer and other animals.”

It's not the only difference, though. Let's get this started by saying that the games do indeed have similarities. They are both shooters undertaken from the first person perspective with realistic guns and aiming sights that are used to shoot living things. But those living things are different, the settings are different, the concepts and themes are different, and even the models of the guns, while both realistic, are different. This is straight copying only insofar as the copying is of common and generic shooter-game concepts. Even the image Glu Mobile hand-picked to include in their filing demonstrates this.

Yes, similar, but not the same, and even the similarities are of the basic shooter-game style variety. Yes, you can scope in on targets, but the scopes are different and scopes don't equal copyright. Yes, there's bullet time animations, but that doesn't equal copyright either, or else everyone owes the Max Payne franchise a pretty penny. While similar, these games aren't really any more similar than, say, Doom and Duke Nukem 3D. Or any other first person shooter from the 90's, for that matter. And this is from the image in their filing. Videos of the games in action show the differences more starkly.

Again, similar, but they're both shooters, so what did you expect? Generic genre similarities don't rise to copyright or trademark claims. The trade dress claim in particular seems misguided, since the themes involved are quite different and none of the names of the games or companies even come close to being similar. This should end up as yet another lesson that similar generic concepts, such as sniping and zooming, don't translate to cloning as far as copyright is concerned. And, while the filing accuses a lot of copying, the reader is left with the feeling that there isn't a whole lot of weight there.

Glu alleges that Hothead Games, based in Vancouver, Canada, copied things like Deer Hunter 2014’s marketing, tutorial, user interface, controls, virtual economy, pricing of items, and even some of its flaws. Akhavan noted, for instance, that a miscategorized assault rifle in Deer Hunter 2014 was also miscategorized in Kill Shot. Glu’s tutorial has 21 steps, of which Glu says Hothead copied 18. Many player reviewers mistake Glu Mobile as the publisher of Kill Shot because of the similarities, Akhavan said.

Again, similar, but not the same. It seems clear that Kill Shot was inspired by the type of game genre of which Deer Hunter is a part, but basic interface and control schemes are not creative expression of a protected kind, and pointing to similar mistakes within the games when it comes to whether a weapon qualifies as an assault rifle is a stretch (trust me, it's an easy mistake to make and get yelled at by gun activists for). I can see why Glu Mobile might be annoyed, but I think their time would be better spent building on the massive success of their gaming franchise than in court suing a competitor.

Filed Under: clones, copying, copyright, deer hunter, expression, first person shooter, idea, kill shot, mobile games, video games
Companies: glu mobile, hothead games

Once Again, If Someone Has The Same Lame Story Idea You Had, It's Not Copyright Infringement

from the just-saying dept

Over the years, we've noted time and time again that people seem to think that if a book, movie or TV show comes out that has some basic similarities to a project they worked on, it simply must be copyright infringement. But, of course, copyright is supposed to apply to specific expression, rather than mere ideas. As we've noted, over the years, the line on this is unfortunately blurry, but for some cases, it's pretty clear that there's no infringement at all. Such is the case in a legal fight over a Disney movie (direct to video, of course) about a dog who helps Santa Claus. Three guys came up with a similar idea, which they wrote as a short story (it took three guys to come up with such an idea?) and then decided that the movie must have infringed on their copyright. It did not. I'll let THREsq's summary explain:

The court acknowledged that the short story and the Disney movies had some elements in common: they all feature a threat to Christmas and a talking dog; all feature a dog named Paws, Santa Paws or Puppy Paws; they all have magical icicles; etc. There also is some similar dialogue. However, "apart from these abstract similarities, the remaining elements of the plaintiffs' short story and defendants' movies are substantially dissimilar," the court notes. "Furthermore, most of the aforementioned similarities between plaintiffs' short story and defendants' works are not protected by copyright law."

While we can point to cases like this and say that the system is working, just the fact that such cases so often get filed shows a real problem. We've so built up this perception of copyright-over-all and "ownership society" that people really do think that anyone having the same idea as them must have infringed -- and are so sure of it that they're willing to go to court. That's a symptom of a much bigger problem with the system and the way people view it today.

Filed Under: copyright, expression, idea, stories

UK Court Says You Can Copyright The Basic Idea Of A Photograph

from the say-what-now? dept

We've talked a lot in the past about the "idea/expression dichotomy." This is an important concept in copyright law that says you can only copyright the specific expression, and not the idea. This is supposed to protect people from getting accused of copyright infringement for basically making something similar to what someone else made. Unfortunately, as we've been noting with dismay over the past few years, the idea that there's some bright line between "idea" and "expression" has been slowly fading away, and courts are, increasingly, effectively wiping out the distinction. In the US, we've seen this with the ridiculous case between a photographer, David LaChapelle, and the singer Rihanna, because some of her videos were clear homages to his photographs. The expression was entirely different, but the judge didn't think so, and Rihanna ended up having to pay up.

Over in the UK, though, we have an even more ridiculous ruling, as pointed out on Boing Boing, where a judge has ruled that a photograph using a similar idea, but totally different composition is infringement. You can see the two photographs here: As you can tell, the expression is totally different. Obviously, the idea is quite similar, but ideas aren't supposed to be protected. You can read the full ruling here, in which the court seems persuaded by the fact that the original photographer had to do some Photoshopping to the image. Now, it's true that European copyright laws are much more open to "sweat of the brow" arguments for copyright (which is not the case in the US), but even so, this ruling is ridiculous and troubling. The court even admits that the basic elements of the photograph (Big Ben, Parliament, London bus) are pretty common. It also admits that highlighting an object in color on a black and white background is pretty common. But it still finds that this is infringing.

I have not found this to be an easy question but I have decided that the defendants' work does reproduce a substantial part of the claimant's artistic work. In the end the issue turns on a qualitative assessment of the reproduced elements. The elements which have been reproduced are a substantial part of the claimant's work because, despite the absence of some important compositional elements, they still include the key combination of what I have called the visual contrast features with the basic composition of the scene itself. It is that combination which makes Mr Fielder's image visually interesting. It is not just another photograph of cliched London icons.

What troubles me here is that this seems to turn the judge into an art critic in order to determine how the different pieces are put together and what counts as expression vs. idea, and what parts are "copied." Perhaps even more troubling is the following sentence:

Mr Davis submitted that a finding of infringement in this case would give the claimant a monopoly which was unwarranted. He uses the word "monopoly" in a pejorative sense but it does not help. All intellectual property rights are a form of monopoly, properly circumscribed and controlled by the law. In any case I do not accept that a finding for the claimant in this case is unwarranted.

While he's right that all intellectual property rights are a form of monopoly, the question here is whether or not this is an appropriate monopoly. The reason Davis pointed out that this was a problem was because, as the court admitted earlier, the fact is that this would be creating a monopoly on commonly used photographic elements. That's the problem. Either way, it's yet another example of copyright law being used to lock up culture.

Filed Under: big ben, copyright, expression, idea, london bus, photograph, uk

Is There A Difference Between Inspiration And Copying?

from the I-think-so,-but... dept

We were just talking about the extremely fuzzy border between idea and expression, and how that leads to problems and the stifling of creativity. Well, how about a similar discussion between "inspiration" and copying? We hear this all the time. Whenever we show widely accepted pieces of art that are actually quite similar to something earlier, defenders of copyright insist that this is fine, because it was just "inspired" by the original, rather than a direct copy. But where's the border between inspiration and copying?

Take this case, which was first called to our attention by Stephan Kinsella, in which photographer Janine Gordon sued photographer Ryan McGinley claiming that 150 of McGinley's images were "substantially based" on her own photos. The site PetaPixel (linked above) has posted some of the "evidence," which should immediately make it clear how ridiculous this lawsuit is:


Honestly, it's difficult for me to even say that McGinley's are "inspired" by Gordon's, let alone copies. Yes, some of them cover similar subject matter, but is Gordon seriously claiming that only she has the right to show "a couple kissing passionately" if the "girl on the right has long silky straight brown hair and her eyes are closed"? Separately, in that one, she highlights that the girl has high cheekbones, but I don't quite see how the high cheekbones are part of Gordon's copyright at all. And the one of the guys jumping? She's really claiming a copyright on the fact that arms are curving, and the legs are in a v shape? I don't know if Gordon has looked at people's legs in a while, but they're all pretty much "in a v-shape" quite a lot.

Gordon is apparently seeking $30,000 per infringement, which is the maximum statutory rate... though, to be honest, I'm surprised she isn't going for the full $150,000 by claiming these are "willful" infringement. Either way, it's yet another example of how the state of "ownership culture" today leads people to think that they can lock up ideas, and anyone who does anything even remotely (perhaps very, very remotely) similar, somehow must owe them money.

It's a sad statement on the state of culture today.

Filed Under: copying, copyright, expression, idea, inspiration, janine gordon, photographs, ryan mcginley

What Idea/Expression Dichotomy? Microsoft Sued For Having Sorta Similar Commercials

from the oh-come-on dept

Copyright law is supposed to have an idea/expression dichotomy, in which the copyright only covers the specific expression, and not the idea. We're often told this when we worry about the expansion of copyright law being used to block out ideas. And yet, as we've explained in the past, it's not clear there's any real idea/expression dichotomy when it comes to copyright. That's because, if a judge doesn't like something, he or she will often come up with some convoluted explanation for how the "expression" covers the basic idea.

And, of course, once people begin to realize that there's no real idea/expression dichotomy, lawsuits begin to show up pushing the boundaries even further. Take for example, this lawsuit, in which a novelty gift firm called Cellrderm has sued Microsoft and its ad agency, CP&B, for "copying" some of its commercials. You can see the four commercial below, showing the (terribly produced) Cellrderm commercials, followed by the supposedly "infringing" Microsoft version: Cellerdrm, Bedroom ad:


Microsoft, Bedroom ad:


Cellerdrm, Urinal ad:


Microsoft, Urinal ad:
If you watch the ads, they may have (sorta, kinda) similar ideas, but the expression is way, way different in both cases. And yet... Cellrderm is trying to claim that it actually copies the expression:

The Microsoft Commercials copy both the sequence of events and the character interplay found in the Cellrderm Commercials.... The Microsoft Commercials also copy other copyrightable expression, including but not limited to clothing, gestures, character appearance, camera angles, and other visual elements from the Cellrderm Commercials.

Yes, you read that right. They're complaining that the clothing and gestures in these commercials was copyrightable. One hopes that a judge will tell Cellrderm to stick to gag gifts, and get out of the gag lawsuit business.

Filed Under: commercials, copyright, expression, idea
Companies: cellrderm, microsoft

Groupon... And The Difference Between Idea & Execution

from the all-about-the-execution dept

About a month ago, the folks at Planet Money did a nice podcast on the economics of Groupon. There's no doubt that there's a bit of a "coupon" bubble going on these days, with tons of companies crowding into the space, and (as the Podcast notes) a bunch of ex-Wall St. types jumping into the space with talk of creating derivatives on coupons/deals. At the same time, plenty of people have mocked Groupon and insisted that its model isn't sustainable and others can easily come in and kill Groupon. In fact, some of the Wall St. guys who stayed on Wall St. are saying that Groupon's value shouldn't be that high because anyone with a phone can copy them.

Lots of people are discussing Felix Salmon's excellent analysis of the economics of Groupon, which is really more about the fact that Groupon has dominated the space because it executes well. That is, it's not about the idea, it's about the execution. The fact that it has remained dominant despite so many copycats shows that just copying isn't enough. This doesn't mean that Groupon will always be the best at executing (in fact, I doubt it will be). But it's not so simple as just coming in and copying.

This is an issue that comes up all the time when we talk about business and intellectual property. People who haven't built up businesses like this assume that all you need is the idea -- and if an idea can be copied, then the company can't succeed. But that ignores just how important the execution element is. Salmon talks about how hard Groupon works to make sure its advertisers are happy with the results, to a level beyond most of its competitors. However, I think there's another element of Groupon's execution that hasn't received nearly enough attention: how enjoyable it makes the whole thing for consumers.

Groupon employs a bunch of writers who work hard to make sure all of the deals are compelling, enjoyable and fun. It always amazes me how much people underestimate the value of the quality of the writing in Groupon's offers. However, where it really struck me was a few months back, when I was researching some newer competitors to Groupon -- in particular, newspapers that were offering deals directly to compete with Groupon. In theory, newspapers should be able to absolutely destroy Groupon. If you're just standing on the mountain looking down, and seeing who has the advantages here, it's clearly the newspapers. Newspapers already rely on local advertising and deals, and have established long-term relationships in the market. On top of that, newspapers employ a ton of (mostly) high quality writers as well, so they should be able to create similarly compelling content.

And yet, when I was looking at various newspaper Groupon clones, what struck me was how boring and dull their offers were. Even if the deals themselves were comparable (and they often weren't), they just weren't that interesting or compelling to read. And that's because the newspapers -- like the Wall St. analyst above -- are engaging in cargo cult copying, where they think that all that matters is copying the superficial idea -- while missing the secret sauce that goes into the less obvious execution.

As a final aside, the quality of Groupon's content highlights another key point that we've raised many times before: how "infinite goods" like content make scarce goods more valuable. In this case, the "content" created by Groupon's writers (and, yes, this is also an example of how advertising is content) is valuable. But no one's selling the "content." What Groupon is doing is using that good content to make the scarcity of the deals more valuable, making more people willing to buy them.

In the end, I will admit that I have my doubts about the overall sustainability of Groupon itself, but it's not because "the idea" is easily copyable. I'm just not convinced that Groupon can continue to execute as well, and some aspects of what it's offering have some elements of a fad written all over them. But claiming that the company is overvalued because the "idea" is too easy makes little sense.

Filed Under: content, coupons, creation, deals, economics, execution, idea, innovation
Companies: groupon

Is Copying The Idea For A Magazine Cover Infringement?

from the idea-vs.-expression dept

We're always told by copyright system defenders that there's an "idea/expression dichotomy" in copyright law that prevents copyright from really getting in the way of free speech. This is supposed to mean that it's perfectly fine to copy the idea, so long as you don't copy the fixed expression of that idea. In practice, this gets a lot trickier, with courts seeming to find all sorts of copied "ideas" infringing, even if they don't copy specific expression. So where is the line?

The folks at Chicago Magazine are apparently quite upset and are calling in the lawyers after discovering that a magazine in a small Russian city, called Krasnodar, copied the idea for the cover of a recent issue of the local magazine. There's no doubt that the idea was copied: The guy behind the Russian magazine (who happens to be an American from Boston) seems perfectly willing to admit that he copied the idea, noting:

"This is a tempest in a teapot if I've ever seen one. All creative inspiration is derivative. Some more so than others."

Chicago Magazine seems to think it's a bit more serious, and claim that this is a violation of its copyright:

There is a difference between a work that is inspired by another and one that is copied. Copyright laws are written to enforce that difference, and our lawyers are sending Krasnodar magazine a stern note.

So, where is the line? As far as I can tell, the specific expression here is different. The idea is obviously copied, but the execution is different. Is it infringement? And, if so, where is that line between idea and expression?

Filed Under: chicago magazine, copyright, expression, idea, magazine covers