Copyright of retyped public domain text
<p>In order to copyright something, you have to do an innovative change (photocopying doesn't count)</p>

<p>Does converting public domain images into text (through OCR or like wikisource) count as "innovative change" and put a copyright on the resultant text?</p>

<p>A thing needs to be <em>original</em> in order for it to get copyright protection.</p>

<p><a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/102" rel="noreferrer">17 USC §102</a>: "Copyright protection subsists [...] in original works of authorship"</p>

<p><a href="http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/c-42/page-3.html#h-5" rel="noreferrer">Copyright Act Section 5 (1)</a>: "copyright shall subsist in Canada [...] in every original literary, dramatic, musical and artistic work..."</p>

<p>In the US, originality requires "a modicum of creativity" (<a href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/499/340/" rel="noreferrer">Feist Pubs., Inc. v. Rural Tel. Svc. Co., Inc.</a> 
499 U.S. 340 (1991).</p>

<p>In Canada, originality requires an "exercise of skill and judgment" and that "not be so trivial that it could be characterized as a purely mechanical exercise" (<a href="http://www.canlii.org/en/ca/scc/doc/2004/2004scc13/2004scc13.html" rel="noreferrer">CCH Canadian Ltd. v. Law Society of Upper Canada</a>, [2004] 1 SCR 339).</p>

<p>Text transcribed from a public domain source would not be given copyright protection.</p>

copyright