Once again Beckett is doing what they can to damage the
hobby for collectors with a recent lawsuit filed against the card organization web site
Zistle claiming copyright infringement under the 1976
Copyright Act. Beckett is seeking actual damages, which they claim to be
$5,000 plus attorney fees. Additionally they seek a
temporary and permanent restraint from further infringement on their
copyrighted works. I have included a <
LINK> for the actual case
documents that Beckett filed.
The heart of the issue is that Beckett claims that
Zistle is copying their checklists to update the Zistle database. At this point
Josh and Ashley, the founders of Zistle, have not responded because the case is
still pending. While Beckett filed the case and included certificates showing
their copyright registration certificates they have not provided any proof of
the copyright infringement covered under the certificates.
I am not a lawyer and I am
a member of both Beckett and Zistle’s communities, but I think this is just the
big dog trying to keep control of the backyard. Zistle’s database is updated by
the site’s members and I am sure that some people have done a straight copy and
paste from Beckett’s checklists but the question remains is how is a simple written list
copyrighted?
I was reading up on the story on
Cardboard Connection
and Paul Lesko supplied a similar case from 1991,
Feist Publications, Inc. v. Rural Telephone Service Co., which
dealt with phone books and the U.S. Supreme Court established that information
without a minimum of creativity cannot be copyrighted.
When you consider that Beckett lists the cards in the
set, and yes they do add codes like “RC” and “ERR.”, it is still information
without creativity. The nitty gritty of it is that Beckett’s checklist is no
different than a phone book listing, a song list, a batter’s lineup or a list
of courses available at a local university. Sure the design of the booklet that
the information is listed in may be copyrighted but the list itself is just
information.
I hope this case goes away, I use Zistle almost daily to keep my card collection organized and track my wants/needs and trades. I would be extremely disappointed to see Zistle shut down over checklists.
