Australian courts decide "No Copyright in Newspaper Headlines"
It is interesting to read through the notes on this recent decision by the Federal Court of Australia. It's worth reading the entire post on Mallesons' site or even the judgement here on AUSTLII.
It looks like the traditional news media are losing ground on their ambit claims to own everything ;)
As Mallesons so neatly summarise it:
"The Federal Court of Australia today decided that copyright did not subsist in newspaper headlines. See Fairfax Media Publications Pty Ltd v. Reed International Books Australia Pty Ltd [2010] FCA 984. This is the first time anywhere in the world that a common law court has fully considered and decided this issue."
and
"Businesses that abstract and summarise the works of others will be able to continue to use the title or headline of the original source when citing the original source."
