Copyright aspects of hyperlinking and framing

Framing

Framing is the juxtaposition of two separate web pages within the same page, usually with a separate frame with navigational elements. Framing is a method of presentation in a Web page that breaks the screen up into multiple non-overlapping windows. Each window contains a display from a separate HTML file, for example, a Web page from a different Web site that is fetched by automatically hyperlinking to it. While the usage of frames as a common web design element has been deprecated for several years (replaced by the usage of div elements), some sites, like Google Images and Google Translate, use frames as a way to help navigate non-Google pages from a framed Google interface.

Incorporating copyrighted web content by usage of framing has led to contentious litigation. Frames can be used for web pages belonging to the original site, or to load pages from other sites into a customized arrangement of frames that provide a generalized interface without actually requiring the viewer to browse the linked site from that site's URLs and interfaces.

Proprietors of copyright in framed pages have at times contended that framing their Web pages constituted copyright infringement of their copyrights. The problem with basing the theory of copyright infringement on a reproduction (17 U.S.C. § 106(1)) or distribution (17 U.S.C. § 106(3)) of copies by the accused infringer is that the latter does not directly reproduce or distribute any copy of the original Web page. Rather, the accused infringer simply establishes a pointer that the user's browser follows to the proprietor's server and Web page.

For a pedagogically exaggerated example of the kind of framing that has incensed proprietors of copyright in Web pages, see Hypothetical Illustration of Irritating Framing, which "frames" a page titled Is Framing Copyright Infringement?. On the theory that a picture is worth 1000 words, the viewer is invited to compare the referenced pages to understand what framing is and why it annoys proprietors of framed pages.[4]


History of copyright litigation in field
In large part, linking and framing are not held to be copyright infringement under US and German copyright law, even though the underlying Web pages are protected under copyright law. Because the copyright-protected content is stored on a server other than that of the linking or framing person (it is stored on the plaintiff's server), there is typically no infringing "copy" made by the defendant linking or framing person (as may be essential), on which to base liability


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