Perhaps more useful to the American western classical music community may be an understanding of what does not constitute creative choice in a court of law. In his analysis of Feist, Warner concludes that ‘[t]he absence of creativity is manifested in a routine selection, coordination, and arrangement produced by an automatic mechanical procedure.’ If this understanding of the Feist ruling were to become legal trend in the United States, the filling in of missing bass figures would be less likely to qualify as creative work in an American court. Yi Hong Sim. Copyrighting critical editions: the law versus the musical public. M.A. in Music History: University of Wisconsin-Madison, 2011, pp.50-51.
Narrative
The articles on the decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in Feist v. Rural (1991) have the potential to be significant for information policy, at a global level, as they give a simple, compelling, and practically implementable interpretation of a highly significant copyright judgment.