Wikipedia:Copyright problems/2006 February 4

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[edit] 2006-02-04

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Under US case law, e.g. Eckes v. Card Prices Update, lists of items that are created entirely or primarily as a result of editorial opinion are subject to copyright protection. This explicitly excludes lists which are derived solely from facts, statistics, or polling data, as only opinion based lists are considered by the courts to have the requisite creativity required for copyright protection under US law.

Consequently, the inclusion of the entirety of such a list solely for the purposes of adding it to Wikipedia will generally constitute a copyright infringment. Excerpts of such lists can be used in Wikipedia under the doctrine of fair use when they are associated with meaningful discussion of the contents of the list, but under typical circumstances, one should never reproduce the entirety of such a list.

The following is a list of lists that appear to be copyright problems.

[edit] Problem lists
1. Has anyone bothered to ask Rolling Stone if they mind? It is worth asking. They might be magnanimous, so adhering to Wikipedia's principle of Assuming Good Faith, would be to at least give Rolling Stone the opportunity to grant us permission. I'd be prepared to write on my own behalf, but I think it better if someone more senior than me do so on behalf of Wikipedia.
2. Please do not delete the list or links to the list without first noting the rankings on the individual album pages. The list is copyrighted, but the fact of a ranking is not copyrighted, only the compilation as a list. Hu 20:03, 17 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Rolling Stone's List of the 100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time
1. Has anyone bothered to ask Rolling Stone if they mind? It is worth asking. They might be magnanimous, so adhering to Wikipedia's principle of Assuming Good Faith, would be to at least give Rolling Stone the opportunity to grant us permission.
2. Please do not delete the list or links to the list without first noting the rankings on the individual guitarists pages. The list is copyrighted, but the fact of a ranking is not copyrighted, only the compilation as a list. Hu 20:03, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Here's another:

  • World's Most Livable Cities Pilatus 17:44, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
    • This is a proposterous thing to claim. The list is widely reported in the press, and referenced in other Wikipedia articles. How come you jump up and down as soon as the more significant Economist (EIU) list is added to the existing, less recognised Mercer Human Resource Management list? --Couttsie 18:05, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
      • Raul's 4th Law, anyone? Can we stop the indignant name-calling and start addressing the concerns regarding lists "created entirely or primarily as a result of editorial opinion", because this is one of those lists. Pilatus 18:14, 7 February 2006 (UTC)
  • I agree with the deletion of all these lists as copyright violations, they are creative editorial works--nixie 04:37, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

I am including these as a group, since they are covered by the same principle and Dragons flight has gone to the trouble of collecting them together. As copyrighted lists, these are inappropriate for Wikipedia. Undoubtedly, some people will want to argue that this is important information that we need to be able to preserve. The answer to that is that the information should be preserved in articles about the subjects listed. Anyone to whom this is important has the benefit of at least seven days, while the lists remain here, to ensure that any omissions in that regard are rectified. That's mostly why I'm going through this procedure, rather than simply deleting the lists now. --Michael Snow 06:26, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

  • I fail to see how including these lists is problematic. For example, with A&E's biography of the millenium, it merely mentions names. It doesn't provide any of the reasons why A&E chose the person, it doesn't take any ideas from A&E. In other words, it's just names, which can't be copyrighted. As to citing the case law that lists comprised of editorial opinion are protected, what about rankings compiled for Hall of Fame voting in baseball? They are editorial opinion (i.e. the opinion of the people who voted), but comprised of polling data. So how do we rule on those? If a newspaper endorses a political candidate, then clearly it has made some sort of list of which candidates are best based on editorial opinion. Should we not be able to include that? And I could obviously go on ad absurdum. You now begin to see the problem with eliminating every list. These lists should stay as preserving important historical information. 70.49.126.200 05:46, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
    • To add to what the previous user stated, if you apply that logic to these lists, you might as well apply it to awards and other editorial opinions (i.e. lists of Academy Award/Golden Globe winners/nominees). While I think some of these lists aren't appropriate or notable (the Blender lists for example), others provide background to the claims made in articles and are fair use. If a work of art (song, album, film, etc.) states that it was awarded so-and-so or featured on so-and-so's list of greatest {songs, albums, films}, having a link to that list adds both verifiability and a way to view that award in its context. Volatile 15:38, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
  • I'm afriad Michael Snow is probably correct—at least under U.S. copyright law, the lists are most likely copyrightable. While there is at least some argument under Feist v. Rural that they are not, I think it's pretty clear that the requisite amount of creativity is present in most if not all of the mentioned lists. - Jersyko talk 21:03, 6 February 2006 (UTC)
  • If these lists are going to be deleted, and there's a legal opinion from a licensed practicing attorney, then some of the articles which have value should be left without the list in them, but with a brief description of the list, and a valid external pointer and link to the list at the original publisher's site. That way the information is not lost and the many other Wikipedia articles which point to the original Wikipedia articles in question are not left with dead article pointers. 03:26, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

Aren't you forgetting the list of Academy, Golden Globe, etc. winners. They're based on opinions after all. Can you really count the Vatican and Clarke lists? I'll admit that the legality of the Clarke one is arguable, seeing as how it was actually published in a book, but the Vatican one is more a confirmation of spirtually significant works by a non-profit body; compare to List_of_films_preserved_in_the_United_States_National_Film_Registry. 4.248.249.149 06:07, 10 February 2006 (UTC)

  • Might a fair use argument be made to retain the subset of lists that we do not have articles for (for example, the red links in List of Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time? In any event, for those lists deemed significant, we should have articles for the entries. John (Jwy) 18:38, 10 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Is the observer (and other lists published outside the US) covered by this scaremongering? Can we keep the enumerated lists is we alphabetize them and qualified with a title such as "bands included in so and so's list of important bands"?--Pypex 23:16, 12 February 2006 (UTC)

I believe what is being implied by the legally informed editors, is that we can cite the ranking of each person or item in the article concerning him/her/it , even if we can't publish the entire list. That preserves the information without having it in one place. --Blainster 17:23, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

  • Here's an idea. What if we created categories for each of the lists and put the included items from each list in each category, sorted by their rank in the list (if applicable). So, for example, the Citizen Kane article would have "[[Category:AFI Top 100 Films|001]]" in its source. Powers 15:31, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

Here's another problem list (sad to say, one that I've made a number of edits to)...

  • Regarding Academy Awards lists, read the definition up top. Oscars, et al. are not based on editorial opinion, but on (more or less) democratic vote. Also, in these cases (and there may be others on this page) a list of Oscar noms and winners, for example, is implied public domain. In fact, it is public domain, as the Oscars are publicly shown. These Awards lists are not opinions but statements of fact, e.g.: "These five women were nominated for 'Best Actress in 20xx'; This person won." Now, if someone published a list of, say, The Top Twenty 'Best Actress' Oscar Nominees Who Actually Deserved to Win, that would be a different story. 4.233.143.167 18:24, 11 April 2006 (UTC)