User:Seraphim System/sandbox/law

Thin copyright is a standard for nonliteral copyright infringement that requires that a defendant's work be "virtually identical" to a copyrighted expression or to "bodily appropriate" the expression. This doctrine addresses copyright infringement in cases where there are "no literal similarities between the works at issue". The idea/expression dichotomy generally does not allow for ideas to be copyrighted.

The Altai test has been influential in cases involving copyright claims of non-literal elements of computer software. The decision excludes from copyright protection the following: choices made by the programmer in the interests of efficiency, external constraints like the hardware the program is written for, and customary programming practices. Subsequent decisions have broadened the exclusions. The plaintiff argued that "thin" copyright protection for computer programs would have a detrimental effect on investment incentives, but this was rejected by the Second Circuit.

Improper Appropriation
The Second Circuit case Arnstein v. Porter created a two-factor test for nonliteral copyright infringement. The first requirement is that the defendant copies the copyrighted work and the second is that the copying rises to the level of "improper appropriation". In the event that a defendant disputes the copying required by the first prong of the test, the burden is on the plaintiff to prove this. Factors that influence this analysis include whether the defendant had access to the work and whether the similarties between the works are sufficient to indicate copying. The Court wrote that the similarities must be "so striking as to preclude the possibility that plaintiff and defendant independently arrived at the same result". The court is less clear about the meaning of "improper appropriation".

Compilation protection
Under Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service Co. factual compilations are entitled to only thin copyright protection. Feist resolved a longstanding open question about whether these types of compilations of facts could be copyrighted. Examples of factual compilations include databases and telephone books.

Prior to Feist a "sweat of the brow" test was applied in the Seventh, Eighth, and Tenth Circuit courts. Under this standard a collection of facts could be copyrighted if it was merely an "industrious collection". After the 1976 Copyright Act introduced the language of original selection, coordination or arrangement there was a circuit split and the Second, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth, and Eleventh Ciruits developed originality tests. In Feist, the United States Supreme Court rejected the "sweat of the brow" test, instead holding that a factual compilation is copyrightable only if the selection and arrangement of facts meets the "modicum of originality" threshold requirement. From previous cases infringement for factual compilations has required "bodily appropriation of the original expression".