Copyright Ruling On Publishing Calculated Results: Common Sense Breaks Out

bfwebster writes "During the past few years, I served as an IT expert witness in BanxCorp v. Costco et al., in which BanxCorp sued Costco and Capital One for citing (with credit) its web-published national averages for CD and money market rates in their advertising. Judge Kenneth M. Karas issued his summary judgment opinion last fall, finding that BanxCorp's published averages are 'uncopyrightable facts' due to the simple calculation involved and the lack of ongoing human judgment in what banks were involved. Here is my summary of his findings, along with a link to the actual ruling."

Average

[James McGuigan]

Its a rather average ruling

Re:Average

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't be mean.

In light of this ruling

[kjshark]

I withdraw my application to copyright arithmetic.

Re:Average

[interkin3tic]

It's pretty normal for slashdot.

Re:Average

[Maxo-Texas]

I hate it when you guys are in this mode.

Re:Judgment shouldn't matter

[NoOneInParticular]

I think you've got a fair point. In this view, I would say that many accounting reports of the last few decades should be considered creative in nature and therefore copyrightable. It seems the banks agree.