Newsletter
FAIR USE OF COPYRIGHT MA-TERIAL IN NEWS REPORTING
In copyright practice, the question of how far an author may reasonably cite another person's work in the creation of his own work is a fre-quent source of dispute. According to a 1995 Supreme Court judgment, citation means the use of another person's work in one's own work; the parts cited from the other person's work must be clearly distinguishable from one's own creation, otherwise such use is plagiarism, not citation. Works that may be cited are not limited to textual works: other works, such as photographic works, pictorial or graphic works, or artistic works, may all be cited to a reasonable extent.
The Supreme Court recently passed judgment in a case in which a Liberty Times reporter was accused of copyright infringement for rephoto-graphing from the Min Sheng Daily News a photograph in which the Min Sheng Daily News held copyright, and publishing it in support of an article reporting on the matters to which the photograph related. In its judgment, the Su-preme Court found that the text and photographs authored by the Liberty Times reporter were clearly distinguishable, and that the cited photo-graph was credited as having been rephotogra-phed from the Min Sheng Daily News; it was also made entirely clear in the article that the content relating to the person depicted in the photograph was reproduced from another publication. Fur-thermore, in view of the nature of the work, there was a need to reproduce the photograph in order to assist readers in understanding the matters reported. Therefore the court held that the Lib-erty Times' report and its reproduction of the Min Sheng Daily News' copyright photograph is a fair use under Article 65 of the Copyright Act, and was not an infringement of copyright.