Mark Cuban, the owner of dallas mavericks, asks this question.
Here is a question for all you legal scholars out there. Is a tweet copyrightable ? Is a tweet copyrighted by default when its published ? Can there possibly be a fair use exception for something that is only 140 characters or less ?
I got to thinking about this when I tweeted about an NBA game. I tweeted to the people who follow me. While I never asked that they not distribute it to other tweeters, i did not give anyone permission to republish my tweets in a commercial newspaper, magazine or website.
So when an ESPN.com or any other outlet republishes a tweet, have they violated copyright law ?
Is twittering the process of publishing in 140 characters or less, or is it a private communications to those that follow you ? Even if you dont block outsiders from seeing it ?
You could also extend this to Facebook. Do you own your status update ? Is it a private communications between you and friends, or is a published work ? If a newspaper or website wants to publish your status update, do they need permission first ?
I would think for copyright purposes a tweet would be same as a blog post. It is copyrightable and can be quoted without taking the permission of the tweeter.
I would think that is a correct assumption for a few reasons.
!) Twitter and “tweeting” is defined by the industry as microblogging, firstly just from that sense of wording, it implies inherent purposeful authorship of the content. Twitter is just a form of blogging, just a little at a time, so your remark about it being like a blog post I feel is definitely valid.
2) “fair use” law really doesn’t have a lot to do with the *length* of material as it does in the *meaning/purpose*, so inherently, without context, two words can’t really have much meaning and thus aren’t really subject to consideration (which maybe where the length argument could come in). BUT, even with only 140 characters, actual meaning, value and purpose can be created, and unless those 140 characters are totally being repurposed and reinvented, they are absolutely subject to the same rights as a 2500 word news article. Which in editorial contexts can absolutely be cited. Besides “Imagination is more important than knowledge,” is only 44 characters long.
Comment by Adam Dexter — March 30, 2009 @ 6:05 pm