Is OCRed text automatically copyright?
<p>If someone puts out an OCR of a scan of a Public Domain work, is that OCR under copyright? On one hand, one may consider that "creative work", on the other hand, the "creative work" (the resultant text) is in Public Domain!</p>

<p>For copyright to subsist in a work, it must be "original". <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/102" rel="noreferrer">17 USC 102</a>:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Copyright protection subsists, in accordance with this title, in original works of authorship...</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Or, in Canada, <a href="http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/c-42/page-3.html#h-5" rel="noreferrer">Copyright Act §5</a>:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>Subject to this Act, copyright shall subsist in Canada, for the term hereinafter mentioned, in every original literary, dramatic, musical and artistic work...</p>
</blockquote>

<p>In the US, the test for "originality" is given in Feist Pubs., Inc. v. Rural Tel. Svc. Co., Inc. 499 U.S. 340 (1991):</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>The constitutional requirement necessitates independent creation plus a modicum of creativity.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>In Canada, the test for "originality" is given in CCH Canadian Ltd. v. Law Society of Upper Canada, [2004] 1 S.C.R. 339, 2004 SCC 13:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>[A]n original work must be the product of an author’s exercise of skill and judgment. The exercise of skill and judgment required to produce the work must not be so trivial that it could be characterized as a purely mechanical exercise.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>The OCR process exhibits no modicum of creativity and is not an exercise of skill and judgement. It can be characterized as a purely mechanical exercise.</p>

<p>Merely OCR-ing text does not create an original work in which copyright can subsist.</p>

copyright