[WikiEN-l] Have we ever had a reader complaint of a lack of spoiler tags?

[Anthony]

On 5/25/07, Matthew Brown <morven at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 5/24/07, Anthony <wikimail at inbox.org> wrote:
> > The Seinfeld Aptitude Test, which presented trivia questions and answers
> > about the Seinfeld television series, lost a fair use argument in
> federal
> > court (see Castle Rock Entertainment vs. Carol Publishing Group).
> >
> > How detailed is too detailed in the context of an encyclopedia?  Like
> all
> > other fair use questions only 9 people can say for sure.
>
> Although technically I suspect that the PLOT was not the issue, since
> plot is generally not copyrightable.  Rather, it would be details
> outside of plot.


I don't think you'll find a court that has ever ruled that a plot is not
copyrightable.  The general storyline (boy meets girl, boy falls in love
with girl, whatever) might not be copyrightable, but the plot itself is the
very essence of what makes a creative fiction work.

I'm not really sure what you mean about "details outside of plot".  Here are
some examples from the Seinfeld case:

1. To impress a woman, George passes himself off as:
a) a gynecologist; b) a geologist; c) a marine biologist; d) a meteorologist

11. What candy does Kramer snack on while observing a surgical procedure
from an operating-room balcony?

12. Who said, "I don't go for those nonrefundable deals . . . I can't commit
to a woman . . . I'm not committing to an airline."? a) Jerry; b) George; c)
Kramer
I'd call those plot details, though I suppose you could get into a
semantical argument with me over whether or not Seinfeld has a "plot" in the
first place (the defendants in the case actually argue this as part of their
defense).

While like every legal question, you can only really answer it by
> going to court and seeing who wins, I suspect some things can be
> determined. One would be that a trivia game is subject to different
> fair use judgment than an encyclopedia.


Yes, of course, and a for-profit encyclopedia like Britannica is subject to
different fair use judgment than an online non-profit one like Wikipedia.

I'd personally say that any plot summary that would be detailed enough
> to cause fair use issues for a commercial print encyclopedia is too
> detailed for Wikipedia.  It's supposed to be a very brief summary, not
> a retelling of the story in thirty paragraphs.  In checking out
> spoiler warnings, I've found some obsessively over-large "summaries"
> out there ...


I'm not saying it all goes over the line, but I think Brittanica would have
a tough time justifying some of the plot details of Wikipedia's Simpsons
coverage, for instance.