Copyright Aid

Hi

I'd prefer to avoid being specific because the artist is known for being litigious, but: suppose a song lyric contained a specific list of location and place names, and suppose I created a graphic map identifying those places in which it was clear that they were linked by their inclusion in the song, would that constitute a breach of copyright?

For context I've already done this in the form of a poster and given it to a relative as a gift, and wanted to print a couple more, but thought I needed to check where I stood, first. I don't intend (at least immediately) to use the idea commercially.

Hi North of Here and welcome to the forum,

Assuming these are names of real places then they are facts which were not created by the song writer and so cannot be subject to copyright. On that basis you would not be infringing anything by displaying the locations on a map, provided that you didn't reference any of the other lyrics.

A situation where the song writer has created new fictional place names would present a different problem since they would have exercised their own creativity, so probably invoking copyright. I would generally suggest that you avoid reproducing such made-up names.