Can you copyright a fact

The case for non-fiction is complicated. Basically and when in doubt, footnote everything you find in a unique source. Things that are commonly known (ie. something that is general knowledge and might be found in any book on the subject) do no need to be footnoted. If your sources disagree, you'll have to decide which one you think makes the most sense based on the evidence, use that one, and footnote it. If it is an important point your footnote or your text can explain why you chose one interpretation over another.

Several very famous authors of historical non-fiction were hit with serious plagiarism suits in recent years for not citing properly. It is something to take seriously.

Two basic rules:

1. Cite everything

2. Look for primary sources

If you're writing non-fiction, you need to check style guides on when to cite, and when not to, and how; MLA and APA are better for this than Chicago, but even Chicago does discuss proper citation a little.

In addition to footnoting, you can always endnote.

It might help for you to check out some other non-fictions where the author has to choose among conflicting facts (or theories, even) and articulate why he has chosen one over the others, or why he prefers maybe a melding of two, etc. I've come across this several times in researching the Second Punic War. People get REALLY worked up over which route Hannibal took through the Alps...

You need to read the Supreme Court decision yourself and quote it from that, and cite it. And if Jones had made any interesting interpretations you wish to include, you can quote or paraphrase them and cite them too. Medievalist is correct: you need to go back to the primary sources when at all possible.

The only thing I would say about MLA vs. APA vs. ChicagoManual is that if you are writing history, Chicago is the stye usually used. Check the others for the when and why, but if you use Chicago for the how it is unlikely you'll have to change it.

You can discuss useful books in your introduction, but that is not a substitute for properly citing them in a footnote or endnote.

Look for primary sources and footnote the quotable facts. For those other questionables, throw the source into the bibliography. That way, if someone up and challenges your citations, you may still claim the source was represented without having more pages of notes than text.

At least, that's good for nonfiction.

For fiction? Well, wasn't all this represented in that lawsuit against Dan Brown by the supposedly non-fiction writers Leigh and Baigent?

J!

Facts

Facts cannot be copyrighted. No information of any kind is covered by copyright. Copyright only covers the specific phrases used to convey facts or any information, and then only the the phrases are not considered generic.

But citing sources is always a good idea, else no one will know whether to believe the information you relay.

Proper citation is more an issue of plagiarism than of infringement of copyright.
Sorry, popmuze, I know this must be depressing!
I think the journalists can get away with being loosey goosey precisely because they are journalists. Their obligation to protect their sources requires them to conceal what historians are required to reveal. And finally, to show how serious this can get, here's an article about one very famous author of popular non-fiction who was accused of using sources without citing them:

http://hnn.us/articles/590.html

So if Paris Hilton had lived in Pico Mundo "It's Hot" would still be public domain.

I'd say you need to include a citation for the first one, about the pianos. And it should ideally be from the original source for this statistic.

The second one may not need a citation. If several books mention Vesta Tilley was a female impersonator in the Zeiglield follies, that that begins to come under acceptable general knowledge. If you include unique or more specific information, then you should cite your source. If only one person has ever uncovered the lost career of beloved Vesta, then you should cite your source.

Yep, I agree with the primary sources thing.

I first got interested in my subject by reading secondary sources. Then as I found more primary sources, I saw that the secondary ones had over-simplified, narrated, glossed over, and otherwise summarized things in a way that I probably would not have. Sometimes they skipped an event altogether and gave an explanation for the outcome that was kind of right and would probably suit a non-scholar, but didn't really take all the facts into account. Like saying a group of natives rose up in revolt after a woman got raped ... a good enough reason on its own, but it leaves out the fact that as many as two dozen natives also had their hands & noses cut off for trivial 'offenses' against people who were robbing them blind, occupying them as a military force, and otherwise making their overall survival questionable. Well, yeah, the rape set it off, but it was more like the proverbial straw & camel's back.

I have found reading primary sources to be like asking ten people individually how a fight started. They all have different info, all saw different things, but generally paint a larger picture altogether with a few fuzzy parts. You yourself will be a secondary source, painting those fuzzy parts as you interpret them....

The best secondary sources are ones where they are very accurate to events, and you can't tell exactly which book they read to get their info. I've read at least one secondary source where it was painfully obvious he only consulted ONE primary source & based all his conclusions on that. You should read multiple, and synthesize it, if possible.



wee

If he doesn't cite his sources, he is not authoritative. Or at least: his authority is a product of effective rhetoric, not of verifiable research.

As for the second point, there's really no such thing as a text in the public domain for the purposes of citation (such that you don't need to cite it if you quote it). Eg. Pride and Prejudice may be out of copyright (just guessing) but if you quote from it you still need to cite the page numbers and edition and publisher and date of the version you took your quotation from. And if you quote smething quoted by someone else, you need to cite both your source for the quotation, and your source's source. Which is why you should go back to the original.

popmuze said:

I think this may answer my question over on the non-fiction board about details.
But if one very authoritative author doesn't provide his sources, then I'm stuck.
Or what if another one quotes an entire transcript of an event. Is that transcript in the public domain or do I need to acknowledge this author's particular diligence in quoting the whole thing.

Click to expand...

Not unless you quote it word-for-word. Otherwise you put it in your own words & cite your sources at the end. You really only need specific notations for direct quotes or if you want to make a really bold/unusual statement & have it backed up.



wee