Commons:Deletion requests/File:DARWEESH V. TRUMP 1- complaint.pdf
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This deletion discussion is now closed. Please do not make any edits to this archive. You can read the deletion policy or ask a question at the Village pump. If the circumstances surrounding this file have changed in a notable manner, you may re-nominate this file or ask for it to be undeleted.
Non-free court filing; filing a document in court does not annul the copyright on the document, just as publishing a work on a public website does not enter it into the public domain. The filing was also authored by a private attorney, not the U.S. government, so {{PD-USGov}} doesn't apply. RJaguar3 (talk) 21:35, 5 February 2017 (UTC)
- There is no copyright on court filings, they become part of the public domain when they are filed with the clerk of the court. You are just flat out wrong here. Allowing copyright on legal filings would create quite a mess. It would seem like there's a very strong public interest claim on why it should be fair for anyone to redistribute such documents (whether for profit or not). No court has ever taken up a case of someone claiming a copyright to a filed in court and it is implicit under the principle of stare decisis and if everything filed were copyrighted, this fundamental feature of our courts would be undermined. -- Jasonanaggie (talk) 21:51, 5 February 2017 (UTC)
- Do you have an authority supporting your proposition that party-written court filings "become part of the public domain when they are filed with the clerk of the court"? Public availability from the clerk of court is distinct from public domain status. I agree that republication of party-filed court documents is likely fair use, but fair use is not allowed on Commons. The stare decisis point is misplaced: judicial opinions and edicts, whether by a federal judge or a state judge, are not subject to copyright under U.S. law., under §313.6(C)(2) of the Copyright Office Compendium ("As a matter of longstanding public policy, the U.S. Copyright Office will not register a government edict that has been issued by any state, local, or territorial government, including legislative enactments, judicial decisions, administrative rulings, public ordinances, or similar types of official legal materials." (emphasis added)). RJaguar3 (talk) 22:59, 5 February 2017 (UTC)
- I found the pertainant case law for this matter. This was a confusing one for the Supreme Court as well due to its implications. In Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service Co., the court found that one cannot copyright facts only original creativity. And, Sandra Day O'Connor pointed out that a mere synthesis of a certain number of facts doesn't create a new creative thought, this is of prime import to judicial filings; since one in court is pleading the facts to the court and filing briefs which synthesizes the facts of previous cases in relation to the instant case's facts, legal filings are not copyrightable, since nothing of a creative nature was produced in the process it is a mere compilation of facts. -- Jasonanaggie (talk) 02:03, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- @Jasonanaggie: You're misunderstanding Feist. The case involved a phone book with the names of all the telephone company's subscribers, in alphabetical order. As Feist itself notes (499 U.S. 340, 348), "Factual compilations, on the other hand, may possess the requisite originality. The compilation author typically chooses which facts to include, in what order to place them, and how to arrange the collected data so that they may be used effectively by readers. These choices as to selection and arrangement, so long as they are made independently by the compiler and entail a minimal degree of creativity, are sufficiently original that Congress may protect such compilations through the copyright laws." Most legal briefs or filings (like the complaint at issue here) easily meet this originality requirement. RJaguar3 (talk) 05:38, 12 February 2017 (UTC)
- I found the pertainant case law for this matter. This was a confusing one for the Supreme Court as well due to its implications. In Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service Co., the court found that one cannot copyright facts only original creativity. And, Sandra Day O'Connor pointed out that a mere synthesis of a certain number of facts doesn't create a new creative thought, this is of prime import to judicial filings; since one in court is pleading the facts to the court and filing briefs which synthesizes the facts of previous cases in relation to the instant case's facts, legal filings are not copyrightable, since nothing of a creative nature was produced in the process it is a mere compilation of facts. -- Jasonanaggie (talk) 02:03, 6 February 2017 (UTC)
- Do you have an authority supporting your proposition that party-written court filings "become part of the public domain when they are filed with the clerk of the court"? Public availability from the clerk of court is distinct from public domain status. I agree that republication of party-filed court documents is likely fair use, but fair use is not allowed on Commons. The stare decisis point is misplaced: judicial opinions and edicts, whether by a federal judge or a state judge, are not subject to copyright under U.S. law., under §313.6(C)(2) of the Copyright Office Compendium ("As a matter of longstanding public policy, the U.S. Copyright Office will not register a government edict that has been issued by any state, local, or territorial government, including legislative enactments, judicial decisions, administrative rulings, public ordinances, or similar types of official legal materials." (emphasis added)). RJaguar3 (talk) 22:59, 5 February 2017 (UTC)
- There is no copyright on court filings, they become part of the public domain when they are filed with the clerk of the court. You are just flat out wrong here. Allowing copyright on legal filings would create quite a mess. It would seem like there's a very strong public interest claim on why it should be fair for anyone to redistribute such documents (whether for profit or not). No court has ever taken up a case of someone claiming a copyright to a filed in court and it is implicit under the principle of stare decisis and if everything filed were copyrighted, this fundamental feature of our courts would be undermined. -- Jasonanaggie (talk) 21:51, 5 February 2017 (UTC)
This is eligible for copyright and I see no ground for the claim that all court filings are in the public domain. This is very much in doubt. --AFBorchert (talk) 22:21, 11 February 2017 (UTC)
Deleted: per nomination. --Jcb (talk) 01:59, 18 February 2017 (UTC)