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Public Domain Citation Book, Baby Blue, Renamed To Indigo Book, Following Harvard Law Review Threats

from the too-bad dept

We’ve been covering the ridiculous saga of the Harvard Law Review Association and its pricey legal threats to Carl Malamud for daring to publish a public domain set of legal citations. As a bit of background, legal citations tend to follow a standard found in the Bluebook, which is put out by the Harvard Law Review Association (which, confusingly, is actually made up of four top law schools). Many have criticized the Bluebook heavily, including appeals court judge Richard Posner who has ripped into the Bluebook, and suggested a much simpler form of legal citations, leading (in part) to something called the Maroonbook, from the University of Chicago Law Review. And, yet, the Bluebook has still mostly remained atop the heap, generating a ton of money for the law schools that back it. A few years ago, the Bluebook ran into some intellectual property issues, when Professor Frank Bennett sought to build support for the Bluebook into his open source citation tool, Zotero, and the Harvard Law Review Association obnoxiously said no, claiming copyright over citations (which seems… questionable).

After all of this, law professor Chris Sprigman and public records warrior Carl Malamud realized that an earlier version of the Bluebook had fallen into the public domain. They then announced they would use that public domain version as a base, and then build their own competing citation manual, called Baby Blue. On Christmas Eve, Harvard Law Review was so freaked out by some tweets by Malamud implying that Baby Blue was ready to release, that it had a high priced lawyer dash off a threat letter warning him not to release the book.

He did so anyway, and tons of law students (including those at Harvard Law), signed onto letters in support of Baby Blue. But, in the end, legal fights are draining — mentally, physically… and monetarily. And thus, Malamud and Sprigman have somewhat thrown in the towel, noting that since the Harvard Law Review Association seems so worked up about the use of the word “blue,” they will rename their book as the Indigo Book. You can see it here.

You and I have discussed this several times. Professor Sprigman and I believe strongly that there is absolutely zero chance of confusion, dilution, or any other harm that trademark aims to prevent in our use of the title Baby Blue. Nobody would mistake the work we?ve created with The Bluebook. This is not a trademark issue.

Nevertheless, Professor Sprigman and I, as we have repeatedly told you and your paid outside counsel, have absolutely no interest in litigation on this issue. We will defend ourselves in court if necessary, but we feel this would be a waste of your time and would quickly become a stain on the reputation of the Harvard Law Review. That you would not drop the threat of litigation in our prior conversations has baffled me, and the current renewed threats are very disturbing.

Even though your legal threats are baseless and, frankly, amount to little more than an attempt to bully into submission lawful competition, Professor Sprigman and I have decided to change the name, taking into account your preferences. In particular, you demanded that the word ?Blue? not be present in the title or the subtitle. The Indigo Book is now on our web site. I trust this will put an end to this.

It’s always at least a little bit disappointing when people feel compelled to change their plans due to what appear to be baseless legal threats, and it’s unclear what the Harvard Law Review Association will think of the Indigo Book, but one hopes that the folks at the HLRA have at least started to realize how ridiculous they look in all of this.

Filed Under: baby blue, bluebook, carl malamud, chris sprigman, legal citations
Companies: harvard, harvard law review association

Law Students Line Up Behind 'Baby Blue' — Will Harvard Law Review Sue?

Back in 2014, we wrote about a crazy story, where the Harvard Law Review was claiming copyright over legal citation standards. It’s true that the Harvard Law Review Association has published the famous “Bluebook” of legal citation standards for many years, but the idea that such citations are copyrightable is crazy. In response to this, law professor Chris Sprigman and open records guru Carl Malamud alerted the world of their intention to publish “Baby Blue” — a competing legal citations publication. They noted that the 10th edition of the Bluebook, which as published in 1958, had clearly fallen into the public domain, and they were going to use that as the starting point for their competing product. Late in December, we pointed out that Harvard Law Review freaked out after its expensive Ropes & Gray lawyers saw a few tweets from Malamud suggesting Baby Blue was almost ready for publication. On Christmas Eve, a pricey lawyer sent off a nastygram, threatening a copyright infringement lawsuit if Baby Blue were published.

It took another month and a half or so, but Baby Blue is now available — and it appears that law students are lining up behind it, rather than the Bluebook. A bunch of folks at Yale Law School and NYU Law School have come out in support of Baby Blue. It appears other law schools are jumping on board as well — including Harvard Law School, Stanford and more.

Meanwhile, law professor David Post has provided a bit of free legal advice for the Harvard Law Review:

Here?s a bit of free legal advice: If you want to assert copyright protection over something, don?t call it ?A Uniform System of Citation? ? because systems are, by definition, unprotected by copyright. Section 102(b) of the Copyright Act couldn?t be clearer:

> In no case does copyright protection for an original work of authorship extend to any idea, procedure, process, system, [or] method of operation, ? regardless of the form in which it is described, explained, illustrated, or embodied in such work.

And now… everyone gets to wait and see what the Harvard Law Review Association decides to do.

Filed Under: baby blue, bluebook, carl malamud, chris sprigman, citations, copyright, legal citations, public domain
Companies: harvard, harvard law review, harvard law review association, nyu, stanford, yale

Harvard Law Review Freaks Out, Sends Christmas Eve Threat Over Public Domain Citation Guide

from the don't-you-guys-have-something-better-to-do? dept

In the fall of 2014, we wrote about a plan by public documents guru Carl Malamud and law professor Chris Sprigman, to create a public domain book for legal citations (stay with me, this isn’t as boring as it sounds!). For decades, the “standard” for legal citations has been “the Bluebook” put out by Harvard Law Review, and technically owned by four top law schools. Harvard Law Review insists that this standard of how people can cite stuff in legal documents is covered by copyright. This seems nuts for a variety of reasons. A citation standard is just an method for how to cite stuff. That shouldn’t be copyrightable. But the issue has created ridiculous flare-ups over the years, with the fight between the Bluebook and the open source citation tool Zotero representing just one ridiculous example.

In looking over all of this, Sprigman and Malamud realized that the folks behind the Bluebook had failed to renew the copyright properly on the 10th edition of the book, which was published in 1958, meaning that that version of the book was in the public domain. The current version is the 19th edition, but there is plenty of overlap from that earlier version. Given that, Malamud and Sprigman announced plans to make an alternative to the Bluebook called Baby Blue, which would make use of the public domain material from 1958 (and, I’d assume, some of their own updates — including, perhaps, citations that it appears the Bluebook copied from others).

There hadn’t been much said publicly in the 14 months or so since that announcement, but last week, Malamud started tweeting out some evidence that the book was nearing completion:

Laying BB 20 and Baby Blue neck to neck. Drinking whiskey while wrestling the future of legal citation to ground. pic.twitter.com/F2IRR4gL9y

— Carl Malamud (@carlmalamud) December 22, 2015

He even discussed what public domain (of course) image he might use for the cover. I like the following option the best:

Judges selected this 1869 chromolithograph as ?Baby Blue of the Year 2015? https://t.co/b2qz0NNnhh L. Prang & Co. pic.twitter.com/yDkEnzkUuP

— Carl Malamud (@carlmalamud) December 23, 2015

Apparently, this sent the Harvard Law Review into a bit of a tizzy, and they made their lawyers at the big, respectable law firm of Ropes & Gray come into the office on Christmas Eve to dash off this ridiculous threat letter to Malamud and Sprigman, demanding that they not move forward with releasing Baby Blue.

First, they ignore all the facts concerning how an earlier version fell into the public domain (and the ridiculousness of claiming copyright on citations) and again allege it will be infringing:

I write concerning Mr. Malamud?s recent Twitter postings, including several in the last few days, disclosing your imminent release of an ?implementation of the Bluebook?s Uniform System of Citation? called ?BabyBlue,? possibly as soon as December 31, 2015. Based on the description of ?BabyBlue? in these and other postings, Prof. Sprigman?s November 25, 2015 interview in the NYU Journal of Intellectual Property & Entertainment Law, and earlier correspondence from each of you, we believe that ?BabyBlue? may include content identical or substantially similar to content or other aspects of The Bluebook that constitute original works of authorship protected by copyright, and which are covered by various United States copyright registrations.

For the reasons set forth in our previous letters to Mr. Malamud dated July 2013 and May 2014 (copies of which are attached), my client has been and remains concerned that the publication and promotion of such a work may infringe the Reviews? copyright rights in The Bluebook and The Bluebook Online, and may cause substantial, irreparable harm to the Reviews and their rights and interests in those works.

And then they go on, in even more of a huff, claiming that the name BabyBlue would be trademark infringement, and warn them that they cannot make use of the word “blue” anywhere. Apparently, Harvard Law Review thinks it owns the word “blue” when applied to legal citations.

On a related issue, it appears from the NYU interview and the Twitter postings ? including a photograph attached to one posting ? that you intend to use the title ?BabyBlue,? and the subtitle ?A free, Creative Commons-licensed implementation of the Uniform System of Citation? in the version of your work released to the public. In addition, the pages shown in that photo include several explicit references to The Bluebook.

Please be advised that the Reviews are the collective owners of the registered trademarks THE BLUEBOOK (U.S. Reg. No. 3,756,727), THE BLUEBOOK ONLINE (U.S. Reg. No. 3,748,511), and THE BLUEBOOK A UNIFORM SYSTEM OF CITATION (U.S. Reg. No. 3,886,986) (collectively, the ?BLUEBOOK Marks?). Given these rights, it is our client?s position that the title ?BabyBlue,? or any title consisting of or comprising the word ?Blue,? when used on or in connection with your work, would so resemble the BLUEBOOK Marks as to be likely, to cause confusion, mistake, and/or deception (including over whether ?BabyBlue? was associated with or sponsored or approved by the Reviews), to the considerable detriment of the Reviews and in violation of their rights under the federal Lanham Act and state law. The same is true for the subtitle, which includes a portion of one of the registered BLUEBOOK Marks, and which suggests that ?BabyBlue? is a ?licensed implementation? of The Bluebook (which it is not). Likewise, several references to The Bluebook shown in the photo could reinforce the false and misleading impression that your work was associated with or approved by the Reviews.

Accordingly, and to avoid any risk of consumer confusion, my client respectfully demands that you agree (i) not to use the title or name ?BabyBlue,? or any other title or name including the word ?blue,? for your work, and (ii) not to include any other statement, phrase, word, term, name, symbol, device, subtitle, statement, or image in your work, or in the advertising or promotion of that work, that may be likely to cause confusion, mistake, or deception as to the source of ?BabyBlue? or as to its affiliation, connection, or association with, or sponsorship or approval by, the Reviews.

Touchy, touchy. Harvard Law Review seems really, really worried that they might face some public domain competition, huh?

Filed Under: baby blue, bluebook, carl malamud, chris sprigman, copyright, crybabies, culture, harvard law review, public domain
Companies: harvard