On 5/27/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray(a)gmail.com> wrote:
A trivially small quotation has been held to be not
fair use (well,
not fair dealing) - the ruling was, I believe, that if you take the
only bit of any actual interest and quote that you're damaging the
ability to sell the book. I'd have to dig around a bit to find the
case, but I believe it was a politicians memoirs being quoted in a
newspaper.
UK law?
In any case like this, the work and amount being quoted is only part
of the equation; the use being made and the character of the work in
which it's being used are important as well.
I suspect in this case a large part of it was the attempt by one
newspaper to scoop the exclusive of another?
-Matt