Is Database Protected Under Copyright? A Legal Analysis
Keywords:
Database, copyright, lawAbstract
Databases are an essential element of the
continuous advances in human knowledge and productivity. Databases, particularly computer databases touch every one’s life either directly or indirectly. Many people use computer databases at work and obtain benefits from it. All those benefits are the product of labour, skill and creativity as well as
monetary investment by the database producer. On that reason, database producers expect revenues for the creation. Without adequate protection for databases, the producers will not have enough incentive to produce them. The process of creating a database is extremely costly and complex. A single database can require millions of dollars in development costs. In addition to compiling the data, a producer must solve many
complex marketing, programming and information science problems. Lack of adequate protection would encourage free riding activities. The database producers waste their efforts because end users as well as competitors in the industry can quickly copy the final product. Thus, the objective of this paper is to analyse the difference between categories of database and
to what extent it is protected under the copyright legal regime.
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