On 22-Jan-2010, at 22:02, Ian Stirling wrote: > Mo McRoberts wrote: > >> Of course, from an anti-piracy perspective, as soon as ONE person leaks the >> tables, all bets are off. As much as the BBC will claim the tables are its >> “intellectual property”, from what I know of copyright law > > it would be difficult to claim that they were © BBC; no other part of the > > various IP laws both applies here > > Database Right. > > This is - in the simplest explanation - copyright for databases.
A database right is certainly the nearest thing which _could_ apply, and the actual amendment to the CD&PA is typically vague in quite what should and shouldn’t be considered a database for the purposes of the Act; the only thing I’d want to rely on here (were I looking for protection for my decoding tables) would be case law. This would (I *believe*; IANAL) come down to the question of whether a single value within a Huffman lookup table constitutes an “independent work, datum or other material” in a way which differs from any other collection of numbers which a computer might hold (for example, the content of this e-mail would be covered by the letter of the law[0] in that respect). Mind you (§29): “Fair dealing with a database for the purposes of research or private study does not infringe any copyright in the database provided that the source is indicated” and (§50D): “(1) It is not an infringement of copyright in a database for a person who has a right to use the database or any part of the database, (whether under a licence to do any of the acts restricted by the copyright in the database or otherwise) to do, in the exercise of that right, anything which is necessary for the purposes of access to and use of the contents of the database or of that part of the database. (2) Where an act which would otherwise infringe copyright in a database is permitted under this section, it is irrelevant whether or not there exists any term or condition in any agreement which purports to prohibit or restrict the act” and (§296B): “Where under an agreement a person has a right to use a database or part of a database, any term or condition in the agreement shall be void in so far as it purports to prohibit or restrict the performance of any act which would but for section 50D infringe the copyright in the database” The most amusing of all is that a public library could take a copy and redistribute it (from Part III, 12.(1)): “The making of a copy of a database available for use, on terms that it will or may be returned, otherwise than for direct or indirect economic or commercial advantage, through an establishment which is accessible to the public shall not be taken for the purposes of this Part to constitute extraction or re-utilisation of the contents of the database.” In other words, claiming a database right is worthless as a trade-secret protection measure: it's designed to allow you to assert ownership and charge license fees for the collected work, but explicitly not to prevent access at all. M. -- mo mcroberts http://nevali.net iChat: [email protected] Jabber/GTalk: [email protected] Twitter: @nevali Run Leopard or Snow Leopard? Set Quick Look free with DropLook - http://labs.jazzio.com/DropLook/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/
