This is an area where US law differs importantly from other countries. US
law protects compilations of facts only to the extent that the selection
of the facts is creative expression (and does not protect the facts
themselves). Many other jurisdictions (eg European Union) also offer
A relevant book on this important (and evolving) topic is
Math You Can't Use: Patents, Copyright, and Software
by Ben Klemens (2006)
__
R-help@stat.math.ethz.ch mailing list
https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help
PLEASE do read the posting guide
These links from the US copyright office seem relevant:
Copyright Registration for Automated Databases
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ65.html
and
Furthermore, copyright protection does not extend to works consisting
entirely of information that is common property containing no original
On Sat, 12 May 2007, hadley wickham wrote:
This is a little bit off-topic, but I was wondering if anyone has any
informed opinion on whether data (ie. a dataset) is copyrightable?
Yes, informed (we discussed this with legally qualified authorities when
MASS was first published with
hadley wickham wrote:
Dear all,
This is a little bit off-topic, but I was wondering if anyone has any
informed opinion on whether data (ie. a dataset) is copyrightable?
Hadley
In general not, I believe. E.g., I didn't have to ask formal permission
to use data from Altman's book in mine
Dear Hadley:
P.s. Ben Klemens (2006) Math you can't use (Brookings) cites cases
where people have been successfully sued for copyright infringement for
using a theorem they independently discovered. That's pretty scary to
me and seems totally unreasonable, but apparently the law at
