International News Service v. Associated Press, 248 U.S. 215 (1918)
Please note: this case begins in mid-page. It therefore shares a citation with the last page of the previous case. If you are attempting to follow a link to the last page of 248 U.S. 205, click here.
International News Service v. Associated Press
No. 221
Argued May 2, 3, 1918
Decided December 23, 1918
248 U.S. 215
CERTIORARI TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT
Syllabus
An incorporated association of proprietors and representatives of many newspapers, engaged in gathering news and distributing it to its members for publication, is a proper party to represent them in a suit to protect their interests in news so collected against the illegal acts of a rival organization. Equity Rule 38. P. 233.
The right to object to the nonjoinder of parties may be treated as waived if not made specifically in the courts below. Equity Rules 43, 44. P. 233.
A news article in a newspaper may be copyrighted under the Act of March 4, 1909, but news, as such, is not copyrightable. P. 234
As against the public, any special interest of the producer of uncopyrighted news matter is lost upon the first publication. Id.
But one who gathers news at pains and expense, for the purpose of lucrative publication, may be said to have a quasi-property in the results of his enterprise as against a rival in the same business, and the appropriation of those results at the expense and to the damage of the one and for the profit of the other is unfair competition against which equity will afford relief. P. 236.
An incorporated association of newspaper publishers gathered news at pains and expense, and, without applying for copyright, telegraphed it daily to its members throughout the country for their exclusive use in publication, they paying assessments therefor; a rival corporation, serving other newspapers for pecuniary returns, made a practice of obtaining this news through early publications in newspapers and on bulletins of the first company’s members, and of sending it by telegraph, either as so taken or in rewritten form, to its own customers, thus enabling them to compete with the newspapers of the first company in the prompt publication of news obtained for the benefit of the latter by their exclusive agency and at their expense. Held that the first company and its members, as against the second company, had an equitable quasi-property in the news, even after the early publications; that the use made of it by the second company not as a mere basis for independent investigation, but by substantial appropriation for its own gain and at the expense and to the damage of their enterprise, amounted to unfair competition which should be enjoined irrespective of the false pretense involved in rewriting articles and in distributing the news without mentioning the source, for this, while accentuating the wrong, was not of its essence. Pp. 237 et seq.,242.
Upon the pleadings and proofs in this case, held that complainant was not debarred from relief upon the ground of unclean hands by the fact that, following a practice engaged in by the defendant also and by news agencies generally, it had used the defendant’s news items, when published, as "tips" for investigations, the results of which it sold. P. 242.
245 F. 244 affirmed.
The case is stated in the opinion.