Baseball statistics: history or property?

[runningshoes]

CBC Distribution and Marketing wants a judge to stop Major League Baseball from requiring a license to use statistics. The company says baseball statistics become historical facts as soon as the game is over, so it shouldn't have to pay for the right to use them.

Of course, while some leagues are just for fun, others award large cash prizes, and operating them has become a multimillion-dollar industry.

Obviously, MLB wants its cut of the money.

What do you think?

[RBi]

Free..

If the guys from SportsCenter can talk about them, and we can read about them in the daily newspaper...

Then they should be free..

Plus... Free is always better..

Who gets this money anyways? and what exactly is being paid for? the players created the numbers, we are just looking at number..
hmz..

[Ubiquitous]

This case is a little complicated in that MLB is actually arguing that these sites and businesses don't have the right to use the players and the teams names to make money. A previous case involving motorola found that statistics could not be copyrighted. So MLB is trying a different course of action.

[runningshoes]

I'm wondering: If we have to pay more for our fantasy leagues, will MLB ratings drop? I don't mean just TV. I can only conclude this would end up cutting into MLB's profits.

[runningshoes]

This case is a little complicated in that MLB is actually arguing that these sites and businesses don't have the right to use the players and the teams names to make money. A previous case involving motorola found that statistics could not be copyrighted. So MLB is trying a different course of action.

Well, where do we draw the line?

Newspapers, magazines and television all use team names and stats to make money and I don't see MLB dragging their buts into court.

[Ubiquitous]

Free..

If the guys from SportsCenter can talk about them, and we can read about them in the daily newspaper...

Then they should be free..

Plus... Free is always better..

Who gets this money anyways? and what exactly is being paid for? the players created the numbers, we are just looking at number..
hmz..

except a lot of these fantasy sites charge your for access to these numbers and names.

[Ubiquitous]

Well, where do we draw the line?

Newspapers, magazines and television all use team names and stats to make money and I don't see MLB dragging their buts into court.

Well a lot of them do in fact subscribe to some kind of service which does in fact have access to the data. I have a feeling they all do or if they don't they like STATS inc have people at the games recording the stats which has been found legal to do.

[runningshoes]

Well a lot of them do in fact subscribe to some kind of service which does in fact have access to the data. I have a feeling they all do or if they don't they like STATS inc have people at the games recording the stats which has been found legal to do.

I know, but that's probably more for convenience than anything else. There's nothing stopping me from attending a game and then doing a write up for a major newspaper using only what I observe.

There are a lot of grey areas in this.

[Ubiquitous]

Right there is nothing stopping you to attend a game and talk about it. Even charge people to read what you have to say. But if you have video or audio broadcasts of the game you are violating copyright.

What is being talked about now is the compiling of stats while never attending a game. The taking of information that oneself did not actually gather but taking it from someone who has the copyright to that data without their permission.

[Sweet Lou]

Right there is nothing stopping you to attend a game and talk about it. Even charge people to read what you have to say. But if you have video or audio broadcasts of the game you are violating copyright.

What is being talked about now is the compiling of stats while never attending a game. The taking of information that oneself did not actually gather but taking it from someone who has the copyright to that data without their permission.

This is a bunch of crap. Next thing, they won't allow us to say the names or stats of the players without paying Sheesh, don't they make enough already? Can't they just let some people have some fun? Those fantasy games encourage INTEREST in the game! If they don't watch it, they are gonna shoot themselves in the foot.
rant over.

[Ubiquitous]

I think MLB would never have charged anybody if these people hadn't started charging us. A lot of fantasy sites have been charging people money to use their stats and they have been doing this for years. If you want to yell at anybody you should yell at these fantasy sites for charging us. Thats what caused it all.

[Sweet Lou]

I think MLB would never have charged anybody if these people hadn't started charging us. A lot of fantasy sites have been charging people money to use their stats and they have been doing this for years. If you want to yell at anybody you should yell at these fantasy sites for charging us. Thats what caused it all.

The Fantasy sites provide a service: The service of gathering stats EVERYDAY, along with news, probables, schedules, etc. Try playing fantasy baseball and gathering all that info yourself everyday. Unless you don't have a job, or the need to eat and pay rent, you would not be able to play. So, it's the service they provide, not the stats themselves, that we pay for. And MLB needs to get over it.

[leecemark]

--MLB doesn't want to stop or reduce the availability of fantasy baseball. They just want to regulate and, more importantly, get their cut of what is turning into a very big business. Stats will still be readily availble at no cost to anybody who wants them for their own use, just not for those reselling that info.

[Ubiquitous]

The Fantasy sites provide a service: The service of gathering stats EVERYDAY, along with news, probables, schedules, etc. Try playing fantasy baseball and gathering all that info yourself everyday. Unless you don't have a job, or the need to eat and pay rent, you would not be able to play. So, it's the service they provide, not the stats themselves, that we pay for. And MLB needs to get over it.

Yes the service of gathering the data and then giving them to you. Without those stats they have no service. Its like if somebody were to take snippets of a stephen king book that were scattered in thousands of book reviews and gather them all up to form one complete book and then sell that book to you. Would you think that is right.

Or it would be like attending a book reading copying down what the person said and then selling that as a book. Would you think that is right?

[Ubiquitous]

On a side note, I used to play fantasy baseball. Even paid for it. Won my league the only two years I played it. Haven't played it since, got to burnt out. Devoted to much time to it, but was fun while I participated.