Wired and the Wall Street Journal have reported that Google has accused Bing, Microsoft’s Internet search engine, of copying Google’s search results. Google reports that Microsoft initially denied this claim; later, Wired revealed that Microsoft was dismissive of Google’s complaints. The two companies have long been at odds over which service provides better results for users; when Microsoft launched the new search engine, the confusing name “Bing” (as well as inconsistent results) prompted some wags to claim the name stood for “But It’s Not Google.”
The question of “copying” search results is more than an accusation that Microsoft isn’t playing fair; it also raises a copyright issue. Arguably, Google’s search method – indexing the vast expanse of the Internet – might be a copyright violation, as it takes data from individual copyright owners and displays it in results (the tiny snippet you see in the results list), possibly infringing upon the owner’s display rights. However, this might fall under the fair use defense. Paid Content has a helpful analysis of the copyright questions in this dispute, observing that Google’s ordering of its search results can likely receive copyright protection. Microsoft’s use of those results, however, was just one variable in its code, so a copyright claim on this specific element of Google’s data may not succeed.
Also, Dan Burk has a good article on the copyrightability of the results of automated processes here: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=999433