Are license terms copyrightable?
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Are license terms copyrightable?
If someone wrote a license for terms of use, and another person decided they
wanted to use those same terms in their profession, could the first party sue the
second for copyright infringement?
Asked on July 5, 2018 under Business Law, Connecticut
Answers:
SJZ, Member, New York Bar / FreeAdvice Contributing Attorney
Answered 5 years ago | Contributor
The license form can be copyrighted, but as a general matter, individual terms cannot be: that is because there are so many licenses and similar agreements already out there, that any individual term has almost certainly appeared before, and you cannot copyright what is not original to you. Also, you can only copyright a specific "expression" of something (the precise arrangement of words) not an idea, so in theory, if you came up with a wholly new term, you could copyright it, such as "In the event that the party of the first part shall elect to exercise its right to receive lunch meat instead of payments in cash," but could not copyright the idea of trading money for lunch meat--someone could just write the same idea in a different way. So the form as a whole--the way it is arranged; the way one term flows into another and the order of the terms, the exact wording use, etc.--can be be copyrighted, but not the individual terms or concepts incorported into the document.
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