INS v. AP

Citation: International News Service v. Associated Press, 248 U.S. 215 (1918).

This case involved two wire services, the Associated Press (“AP”) and International News Service (“INS”), that transmitted news stories by wire to member newspapers. INS took factual stories from AP bulletins and send them by wire to INS papers. INS would also take factual stories from east coast AP papers and wire them to INS papers on the west coast that had yet to publish because of time differentials. The Supreme Court held that INS’s conduct was a common-law misappropriation of AP’s property.


 * [The] defendant in appropriating [new stories] and selling it as its own [was] endeavoring to reap where it has not sewn. . . . . Stripped of all disguises, the process amounts to an unauthorized interference with the normal operating of complainant’s business at the point where the profit is to be reaped.

This case established the “hot news” misappropriation doctrine, under which someone who takes uncopyrighted (and uncopyrightable) facts could be enjoined under a misappropriation theory. Based on legislative history of the 1976 Copyright Act, it is generally agreed that a “hot-news” INS-like claim survives preemption.

This doctrine, while confirmed, was substantially restricted by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in National Basketball Ass’n v. Motorola, Inc., 105 F.3d 841 (2d Cir. 1997).