Are biographies from Findagrave copyright protected? [closed]

Question

In some cases the information on Findagrave contains biographical information on the deceased.  Can this information be used in the Wikitree biographical section if the Findagrave is noted as a source or do you need to get the approval of the manager who maintains the Findagrave memorial?

Comments

All words written by someone else should be considered copyrighted, especially if it has been published online, regardless of the platform. (I am a published author so I am very sensitive to copyright issues).  J Crook has a good answer below on how she deals with it.

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Even if it's not copyrighted, Wikitree general policy is not to copy and paste from any source.

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Help:Copying_Text

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In a word, it is plagiarism :-)

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Find A Grave now owned by Ancestry,com,there number is 800 262 3787.

call them

Answer 1

That really depends on a lot of different factors.  Anything written before 1923 in the United States (the only country I know much about) is copyright free.  After that, it becomes way too complicated.  So an obituary published before 1923 is copyright-free.  If it was published after that, here is a handy chart that lets you know:  http://copyright.cornell.edu/resources/publicdomain.cfm

Basically, I would rewrite the salient facts available from biographies or obituaries I found on sites like Find-a-grave, making sure I'm not plagiarizing them by following the simple procedure of reading through the bio, then looking away, and summarizing it in my own words, then double-checking to make sure that I didn't plagiarize phrases.  But I think it's better to write biographies from information found during research since Find-a-grave is invariably unsourced.

Answer 2

Hi Jim,

I would not say they are copyrighted unless they are taken from an Obituary. Newspapers are copyrighted. And can only be used by the newspapers expressed permission. Sometimes what I do is instead of copying the biography I make a note in sources For Example *New York Times [Link to article goes here]

Best regards

Answer 3

Jim,

Information is not copyright protected, no matter where it comes from.  Copy/paste of other people's work is more than just information, though.  You can, however, use facts contained in the text of someone else's work as long as you put it in your own words and include the link to the Find a Grave page as your source citation.

I'm not sure if the terms of use of Find a Grave prohibit it and/or if they permit individuals who contribute the memorials there to copyright their own work (WikiTree permits us to copyright our work here if we care to, although I've never seen it done by anyone here).

Even if it is not legally prohibited, if you quote someone else's work here, you are expected to acknowledge the source in order to give credit to the author.

Comments

In the U.S., an original writing is copyrighted as soon as it is placed in fixed media (including a webpage) and notice is not required. Find A Grave acknowledges the contributors retain their copyrights.

Answer 4

Find A Grave Terms of Service are found at https://www.findagrave.com/terms.html.  The entire Find A Grave website is "protected by copyright as a collective work and/or compilation".  However, individual biographies are not:  "For User Provided Content, we are merely hosting and providing access."

However, do not confuse copyright infringement with plagiarism.  "Plagiarism is about the failure to properly attribute the authorship of copied material"  (https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130925/09523724654/difference-between-plagiarism-copyright-infringement.shtml).  It is an ethical issue, not a legal one.  Any material that is copied should be properly cited.

Like any other publicly available material on the internet, it is not required to get permission to quote portions with attribution.  Material that is copyrighted is subject to the 'fair use' rule.  It is considered poor form on Wikitree to simply copy and paste a long passage from another website.

Answer 5

If they died before 1923, try googling a distinctive series of words from the bio and many times you will find the original source, which the submitters often do not credit. If the source was published in the United States before 1923, copy away with proper citation of the original/ earliest source.

Comments

Since find-a-grave was created longgggg after 1923, bios written there do not fall outside of copyright.