Rapid Rebuttals

The FA Premier League assert their right to ownership of the fixture list claiming it is an original creative work.

• The copyright act excludes people from asserting ownership over computer generated output! However, they still insisted to us over the 'phone that it was produced by hand. By their own admission, it is produced under contract by SEMA Group -  a large computer consultancy!
• Their original law suit against the Pools companies succeeded because at the time producing fixture list was labour intensive and there were 92 league clubs. There are now only 20 Premier League clubs and the computer program to produce such a list would take less than a day to write.
• During complaints about the Worthington Cup Final clashing with the Manchester United vs. Arsenal game, the FAPL said:
  "Fixtures are randomly selected at the start of the season and if we started fixing big games to avoid match Z or match Y, then we would take away the randomness of the fixture selection policy."
  So by their own admission the fixture list is selected randomly? Where's the creativity in that?
• Copyrighting facts is not allowable in many countries... including the United States where many fans web sites are hosted.
• A recent case between William Hill and the British Horse Racing Board implied that it was legitimate to ring the venue for information about events and use it.

Finally the FA Premier League Legal department won't let us publish their letters. however, we think they are flouting the law which states:

Copyright, Designs And Patents Act 1988
Section 30 Criticism, review and news reporting
Subsection (2) Fair dealing with a work (other than a photograph) for the purpose of reporting current events does not infringe any copyright in the work provided that (...) it is accompanied by a sufficient acknowledgement.

So bollox to them!