copyright
Can a trade show producer copyright an email leads list?
<p>We are vendors who have paid to have a booth a local trade show in Dallas. Trade show attendees register using contact info (Name, Phone, Email, etc). The registration info is used to generate a leads lists that will be distributed 3-days later to the vendors by the show producer via email. Upon registration, attendees are informed that they will be contacted by vendors using the contact info they provided. The attendees are also given the options to opt out if do not want to be contacted.</p>

<p>Upon distributing the leads list, the show producer states "<em>the email list is copyrighted and can not be shared.</em>"</p>

<p>Question: Can the show producer copyright an email list if they don't own nor created the email addresses? The email addresses were created and provided freely by the show attendees. Or what if I sell my business and I decide to sell the leads lists? Would there be a problem?</p>

<p>While I don't wish to share the list directly. When I do send out email blasts to the show attendees, I do plan to promote other vendors inside the contents of the email. I know that will not be a problem as I am not directly sharing the list with any other individual or business.</p>

<p>Thanks in advance! </p>

<p>This falls within the penumbra of <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/copyright/cases/499_US_340.htm">Feist v. Rural Telephone</a>. The principle articulated there is that facts are not subject to copyright protection, but the expression of facts can be. Quoting from the ruling, "no author may copyright his ideas or the facts he narrates...however, it is beyond dispute that compilations of facts are within the subject matter of copyright". The distinction between protected vs. not protected hinges on originality: "The sine qua non of copyright is originality. To qualify for copyright protection, a work must be original to the author". But it is not sufficient that the work is created by the "sweat of the brow" of an author: it must possess at least some minimal degree of creativity. Thus "[t]he writings which are to be protected are the fruits of intellectual labor, embodied in the form of books, prints, engravings, and the like".</p>

<p>As a concrete example, the ruling states "Census-takers, for example, do not 'create' the population figures that emerge from their efforts; in a sense, they copy these figures from the world around them...Census data therefore do not trigger copyright because these data are not 'original' in the constitutional sense." But, <em>compilations</em> of facts can be protected:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>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</p>
</blockquote>

<p>An email list requires nothing more than brow-sweat, and even then, not much. A cleverly annotated and arranged email list would involve substantial creativity and would be subject to protection.</p>

<p>That does not mean that you didn't sign some agreement that prohibits you from copying or using the list, but it isn't a matter of copyright.</p>

<p>It is highly unlikely that the data in the list is subject to any form of copyright - facts are not subject to copyright and a list of names and addresses is strictly factual. The particular compilation (layout, font choice, colour etc.) is subject to copyright so distributing a photocopy may be problematic.</p>

<p>Notwithstanding, the list may be subject to a confidentiality clause in your contract with the organiser but this is different from copyright protection.</p>
