British Horseracing Board v William Hill Organisation Ltd, 2004 ECR I-10415
Citation: British Horseracing Board v William Hill Organisation Ltd, 2004 ECR I-10415
Rule of thumb: Are you allowed to use small clips from a person’s video? Yes, taking small clips from an existing person’s video/book and then re-utilising it in a different market is not a breach of copyright law.
Judgment:
The Court in this case held that where one person uses another person’s content and the level of content is very low/‘immaterial’, or ‘re-utilised’ in a different market from the original content creator, then this is deemed to be ‘fair use’, ‘... The materials displayed on William Hills internet sites, which derive from the BHB database, represent only a very small proportion of that database... those materials do not constitute a substantial part, evaluated qualitatively, of the contents of that database... the intrinsic value of the data affected.... does not constitute a relevant criterion for assessing whether the part in question is substantial, evaluated qualitatively. The fact that the data extracted and reutilised by William Hill are vital to the organisation of the horse races... is... irrelevant to the assessment of substantial part of’. at 74 and 78
Warning: This is not professional legal advice. This is not professional legal education advice. Please obtain professional guidance before embarking on any legal course of action. This is just an interpretation of a Judgment by persons of legal insight & varying levels of legal specialism, experience & expertise. Please read the Judgment yourself and form your own interpretation of it with professional assistance.