Is a list of the most common English words copyrightable under US law? I am currently interested in doing some research performing various measurements and algorithms on the most common words in the English language. I have found a few good word lists online that would be suitable, but I am concerned that they may be subject to copyright and would like to be sure about their status before I use them. The lists are in the form of a simple text file with one word per line. I understand that collections of words such as dictionaries are subject to copyright because they contain a large amount of words and their definitions which can be considered to require original work and creativity, but what about just words without any definitions or additional information? I have seen this other Law Stack Exchange question, which mentions lists of words, but the author seems to have been interested in also using some short definitions, and I am not certain the answer refers to plain word lists. Is a list of common words copyrightable? If so, would it still be considered fair use to use the word list to generate data not related to the words themselves?
Depending on your jurisdiction, such lists may be protected, but not by copyright. For example, in Germany there was a court decision that scanning all the country’s phone books and selling them on CD constituted “unfair competition” and was illegal, while hiring 1000 typists who would manually type in all this information would not be. Databases are protected in many jurisdictions, and a list of the 1000 most commonly used English words could reasonably be called a database.
Person A has to have created the data to hold copyright; for most kinds of data this has no legal effect because facts are not protected by copyright. A mineable database probably does not have the necessary creative elements for copyright. An algorithm is not protected by copyright (it might be patented). Person C's program is copyrighted. The product created by D is probably copyrighted, depending on what degree of creativity is involved in their transformation. If the transformation is automatic then no, but if creative judgments are applied to the output of the program then maybe. Though the resulting product is another database of facts, and the facts cannot be protected. In terms of "using the model", only C and possibly B have any control. If it is necessary to validate the software using A's data and A has kept the data secret, C might negotiate with A to use the data, in order to complete his program, and that could give A some interest in the program.
First of all there is no such thing as &quot;fair use&quot; in the UK, that is a specifically US legal concept, and it does not apply in the UK. The UK has a legal concept that is somewhat similar, known as &quot;fair dealing&quot; but it is much more limited than the US concept of fair use. See this Wikipedia article and this page from the British Library In general Fair Dealing is an exception to copyright that permits use for: purposes of research or private study; purposes of criticism, review or quotation; purposes of reporting current events (this does not apply to photographs) None of those seem to apply to an image from a TV show or film modified to add two additional characters as if they had appeared in the original. Unless somehow this is being used for criticism of the original, but the question does not mention any such criticism. The Wikipedia article says: Under United Kingdom law, an infringer relying on fair dealing as a defence must show that their actions fall into a specific category of acceptable use, as opposed to the &quot;illustrative open list of purposes&quot; in US law.[4] The fair dealing exceptions had previously been formalised in case law as &quot;fair use&quot; forms, but this was eliminated by the Copyright Act 1911. The use as described in the question appears to be a case of copyright infringement by creating a derivative work. It does not seem to come under fair dealing in the UK, and might well not be a valid fair use under US law, either. Whether any profit is made by the infringer is not relevant. Whether the market for the original is harmed is relevant, but not decisive. However, when used for a small private circulation of less than 10 copies, it is unlikely that the copyright owner would sue, or indeed would ever learn of the existence of the infringement. if posted to the net, however, this is much less safe. Programs exist to make automated searches of the web or of images listed on search engines for images similar to a copyrighted work. If such a search finds a similar image, the copyright holder might choose to file an infringement suit. This is entirely up to the copyright holder. Such a suit might result in significant damages. It is not, however, likely to lead to criminal prosecution unless mass commercial infringement is discovered. One of the things copyright protects is the right to create, or authorize the creation of, derivative works. Thus it is never correct to say that something is &quot;mine because it is derivative&quot;. If the derivative work is made without permission, and the original is protected by copyright, than simply making the derivative work is a copyright infringement, jsut like making an unauthorized copy of the original. Fair use (in the US) or fair dealing (in the UK) is such an exception to copyright. Several of the EU nations have exceptions similar (but not identical) to the UK fair dealing. These are often called &quot;fair dealing&quot; when discussed in English. Most include exceptions for criticism and classroom instruction. None are as broad as the US fair use concept, to the best of my understanding. The only way to be fully lawful about this would be to contact the copyright holder and request permission for the derivative work, and get it. I cannot say if the holder would grant such permission, or on what terms. The holder has no duty to grant permission on any terms, or even to reply to a request. No reply must be treated the same as a reply of &quot;No!&quot;, I am afraid.
The main impediment is identifying exactly what "a law" is. When people talk (casually) about "the law", that can refer to statutes enacted by Congress, regulations set forth by administrative agencies to articulate specifics of those statutes, and Supreme Court rulings as to what "the law" is or says. The canonical example of "a law" is a statute passed by Congress. Under that understanding, you could point to the US Code and ask the question "how many", though you may have to also subtract things ruled unconstitutional by SCOTUS (they aren't removed from The Code, unless actually repealed by Congress). In the US code, there isn't an enumerable element "a law". Title 17 pertains to copyright; Title 18 pertains to crime. There isn't just one law about crime and one law about copyright. There are 12 chapters in Title 17; Chapter 1 has a couple dozen sections. Sections can get fairly minutely subdivided: there is no clear point at which you can say "this is one law, this is another". However, it is legally irrelevant how many there are – unless Congress passes a law that counts likes ("must repeal two laws for every new one passed"). The immediate product of congressional enactments is the US Code; the immediate product of administrative rule-making is the Code of Federal Regulations. Supreme Court decisions are also published in United States Reports, though I don't if there is an exhaustive online compendium of all rulings. Also note that things passed by Congress are "Laws" (some public, some private). Things in the US Code originate in such acts of Congree, but not every act of Congress affects the US Code, for example PL 118-81. When new subject matter is first introduced it is usually entirely contained in the corresponding law passed, but subsequently it can be amended, and an amendment to copyright law could be snuck into a bill generally about terrorism. I think that the stuff in the US Code corresponds to what most people think "a law" is, but it's better to look at the US Code as a single thing – "the law" – rather than try to count individual laws. If you are armed with access to all of these resources, you would also need to know where to find relevant law. Once you find all of the applicable text, you simply apply general legal principles to reach a conclusion, then hire a lawyer to determine where you went wrong, then hire another lawyer to determine where he went wrong. At least in difficult cases. Fortunately, although enacted bills often glue stuff together in crazy ways, when it is assembled into the US Code, it is organized more sensibly. Still, not all crimes are defined in title 18 (there 1re 52 other titles to search to find crimes).
No, it means you can't copy it. By default, the copyright to a work is owned by its creator, and nobody else is allowed to copy it, or create derived works, without their permission. That permission can be granted by a license. "License unknown" doesn't really tell us anything, but it certainly isn't clearly granting you permission. So you don't have permission to copy, and thus you cannot. You would have to seek permission from the copyright holder. See also If no licence is distributed with an application/source code, what license applies by default if any? (Some jurisdictions do allow for "fair use" exceptions, which allow you to copy a work without permission. You haven't said what jurisdiction you are in.)
Whether the use of excerpts from songs protected by copyright in the cover version of a different song is a &quot;fair use&quot; under US law is always a fact-driven question, and often there is no clear answer to fair use issues short of a lawsuit. One must remember that fair use is a specifically united-states legal concept, and that reproduction of such a cover version outside the US would not be protected by fair use, even if it was fair use under US law. Fair use is defined by 17 USC 107. That law spells out the four factors that must always be considered in any fair use claim. They are: (1) the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes; (2) the nature of the copyrighted work; (3) the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and (4) the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work. These have been explained and analyzed in several answers here on law.se, recently including this answer. In this case the commercial nature of the compilation probably causes factor (1) to lean against fair use. The creative character of the songs being used will cause factor (2) to lean slightly against fair use. That the use is for a charitable purpose might have a positive effect on factor (1), although it does not fit the &quot;educational&quot; purpose specifically mentioned in the law. I don't see how this would be in any way relevant to the other three factors, but it might influence the decisions of copyright owners. There is not enough information in the question to even approximate an analysis of the other two factors in this case. Note that the &quot;substantiality&quot; mentioned in factor (2) refers to how much of the source work is used, not how large a part of the resulting work it forms. Note also that there is a wide range of what has been acceptable here. In one famous case (Harper v Nation Enterprises) some 300 words of a 500 page book were found not to be fair use because they were held to be the &quot;heart of the work&quot;; in that case there was also a substantial market effect. One might want to consult a lawyer with expertise in copyright and music to get a better idea if the specific use seems likely to be a fair use. Alternatively, one could ask the copyright owners of the works of which excerpts are to be included if a license can be obtained. Some owners will in some cases provide licenses for a small fee or even for no fee if the source is properly acknowledged. Others will not. Licensing of one song by a given artist does not affect whether use of another song by the same artist is or is not fair use, but it might influence the willingness of that artist to license the second song on favorable terms.
Copyright in the US is usually a civil matter. Meaning that the copyright owner can sue (typically for money damages or injunctive relief) an infringer. The criminal laws that we have are aimed at the reproducer and/or distributor. In other words, chances are that you won't get in any criminal trouble for accessing academic articles of dubious origin. But never say never. RIP Aaron Schwartz.
Here is an example: The Author agrees to hold harmless and indemnify the Journal and The University against any legal claim or action or expense of any nature arising from any claim of infringement of copyrights or proprietary rights resulting from publication of the manuscript or claims of libel, obscenity, unlawfulness or invasion of privacy arising out of anything contained in the manuscript as furnished by the Author. Suppose Author infringes the copyright of Jones, by copying large parts of it into Author's work. Author is now in legal trouble because he illegally copied stuff into his manuscript, but Journal is also in big (bigger) legal trouble, because it made many copies of Jones' word and sold them. Jones will now sue everybody, mostly the Journal (since Journal has money, and Author doesn't). Thanks to the indemnity clause, when Journal gets sued, all of the costs (of litigation and judgment) have to be born by Author. The primary purpose is to protect Journal from suits by third parties. Nothing can keep you from getting sued, but such a clause (theoretically) means that the person whom your contracting with has to cover the cost of his wrong-doing (assuming that he is not a turnip). The term "hold harmless" is there to guarantee that Author can't decide to sue Journal for publishing a libelous or infringing article. The functions are similar, but not totally the same: this and references therein could be interesting reading, by way of more details. He argues against using both terms, and instead you should use only "indemnify". In this case, the court said "When two words are used in a contract, the rule of construction is that the words have different meanings", which caused the court to assign distinct meanings to the words (which are typically used as though they mean the same thing), which doesn't seem to have been the original intent.