Head notes of court decisions require skill and thought to summarize the key principles of law and facts in concise language. As such, they are entitled to copyright protection as original literary works. While historical works themselves are not copyrightable, any new knowledge extracted from them can be copyrighted. Titles of books and cartoons generally cannot be copyrighted, but can be protected by laws around passing off. Copyright subsists in letters as original works, with the author holding copyright over private letters and employers holding copyright over commercial or government letters written by employees.

1. Section 13

2. Head notes of Law Reports
• Head note contains in clear and concise
language the principle of law deduced from
the court decisions to which it is prefixed or
the facts and the circumstances.
• it requires skills and thoughts.
• These are original literary work, and are
entitled to copyright protection.

3. Historical work
• Historical work are not copyrightable.
• The knowledge built upon historical work can
however be extracted, such extraction of
knowledge can be copyrighted.

4. Titles of books, cartoons or other
literary matter, pseudonyms
• As a general rule, titles of books or literary
articles are not protected under copyright law,
it can only be protected by law of passing off.
• Pseudonym can be protected under the law of
passing off.
• There is no copyright in titles of cartoons.

5. Letters
• Copyright subsists in private letters,
commercial letters and government letters as
they are original works.
• The author of the letter is the owner of
copyright in the case of private letters.
• In the case of commercial or government
letters written by employees in the course of
employment, the copyright belongs to the
employer.