Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Orchestra Salaries


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Posted by Jim Andrada on May 09, 2003 at 14:02:40:

In Reply to: Re: Re: Re: Re: Orchestra Salaries posted by Rick Denney on May 09, 2003 at 13:28:18:

Rick, I may be incorrect but I think copyright can't be applied to factual information.

For example, I can read a restaurant guide (copyrighted) that mentions a wonderful sushi restaurant that was literally "discovered" by the author and nobody outside of Japan had ever heard of until the review was published.

I believe there's nothing to prevent me from typing up the name and address of the restaurant and the price of the entrees (factual information) and sending it to 3 million close friends via this BBS (don't we wish!)

But, if I wanted to copy the review itself and slip it into a restaurant guide that I was preparing, I'll bet I would be in a different situation.

Anyhow, that's my non expert understanding.

I think if you want to protect factual information you have to use a mechanism other than copyright to do so. And I think if push came to shove you'd also have to show some damages that ensued as a result of making the hitherto secret information public. So even if I somehow found out your secret wages and published them it isn't all that clear what you could recover - after all, maybe when it became public how poorly you were being paid the resulting hue and cry from an outraged public might motivate your employer to raise your salary! And now, suitably compensated, you'd produce so much great work that your employer would outstrip Microsoft and everybody would be a winner. (Yeah, sure - don't hold your breath, right?)


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