Using Phone Book Listings to Create Your Own Database
I would like to know if such thing is legal. Here is an example:
I would like to copy list of businesses from a local phone book (not yellowpages but an ethnic group local phone book) and include them in my website's online database. Would that be legal? I think these information are publicly available so that should not be a problem, but am I right?
Thank you for any help.
Difficulty of Collecting Data
You are hitting on the rationale that data compilers use for trying to get special protections for their compilations - they expend work putting the facts together, and then other people can create their own works from the non-copyrightable facts without paying royalties. But at present, that's what the law allows.