Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service Co.

Feist v. Rural
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued January 9, 1991 Decided March 27, 1991
Full case name	Feist Publications, Incorporated v. Rural Telephone Service Company, Incorporated
Citations	499 U.S. 340 (more) 111 S. Ct. 1282; 113 L. Ed. 2d 358; 1991 U.S. LEXIS 1856; 59 U.S.L.W. 4251; 18 U.S.P.Q.2d (BNA) 1275; Copy. L. Rep. (CCH) ¶ 26,702; 68 Rad. Reg. 2d (P & F) 1513; 18 Media L. Rep. 1889; 121 P.U.R.4th 1; 91 Cal. Daily Op. Service 2217; 91 Daily Journal DAR 3580
Case history
Prior	Summary judgment for plaintiff, 663 F. Supp. 214 (D. Kan. 1987); affirmed, 916 F.2d 718 (10th Cir. 1990); affirmed, full opinion at 1990 U.S. App. LEXIS 25881 (10th Cir. 1990); cert. granted, 498 U.S. 808 (1990).
Holding
The white pages of a telephone book did not satisfy the minimum originality required by the Constitution to be eligible for copyright protection, and effort and expenditure of resources are not protected by copyright. Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed.
Court membership
Chief Justice William Rehnquist Associate Justices Byron White · Thurgood Marshall Harry Blackmun · John P. Stevens Sandra Day O'Connor · Antonin Scalia Anthony Kennedy · David Souter
Case opinions
Majority	O'Connor, joined by Rehnquist, White, Marshall, Stevens, Scalia, Kennedy, Souter
Concurrence	Blackmun
Laws applied
U.S. Const. Art. I § 8

Feist Publications, Inc., v. Rural Telephone Service Co., 499 U.S. 340 (1991), was a landmark decision by the Supreme Court of the United States establishing that information alone without a minimum of original creativity cannot be protected by copyright.^[1] In the case appealed, Feist had copied information from Rural's telephone listings to include in its own, after Rural had refused to license the information. Rural sued for copyright infringement. The Court ruled that information contained in Rural's phone directory was not copyrightable and that therefore no infringement existed.