Tim Wu on Tolerated Use
Columbia Law professor Tim Wu has posted an article that he intends to publish in a law review on tolerated use of secondary and derivative works that complement (without substituting) for the original. In my opinion, this article has clearly been inspired by the Lexicon trial. In his opening, Wu refers to fan websites as "marketing." that in
( Read more... )
This is my favorite quote from the article:
A case like Seinfeld is so confused because, at risk of repeating myself, it is absurd to ask whether products that remotely in the same market or genre are copies of each other. It is like asking whether the Superbowl is a copy of “War and Peace,” or whether the LSAT is a copy of Star Wars - the question is nonsense to begin with. It serves as an example of what Felix Cohen once described as law’s tendency to create “pseudo problems, devoid of meaning.”
Exactly. I don't like the Seinfeld case either, because it is saying that a Trivia Book is the same thing as watching the show, and that's just silly. If I want to laugh about Kramer or George, I watch the DVDs. I don't think "where is my infringing trivia book?"
The Lexicon is not plagiarism because it is not an "exact copy" of the HP books. No one would read the Lexicon instead of the books, but there's no doubt that the Lexicon "enhances" the experience by cross-referencing, which is the main people use it. It's a reference tool, and that's all it's supposed to be.
Reply
Leave a comment