Situation Management Services (SMS) provides consulting services to domestic and international clients. In providing these services, SMS developed copyrighted training materials consisting of several hundred pages of instruction regarding techniques for effective communication and negotiation within the workplace. SMS sued ASP Consulting, Inc., a competitor that had been formed by former SMS employees, alleging that ASP had infringed its copyright by copying and using its training materials.

The trial court found that the training materials were not copyrightable material because, in its view, the materials were “filled with generalizations, platitudes, and observations of the obvious,” that they contain “not-so-stunning revelations,” and teach “at their creative zenith . common-sense communication skills.” The trial court concluded that SMS works were “dominated by un-protectable material. These works exemplify the sorts of training programs that serve as fodder for sardonic workplace humor that has given rise to the popular television show The Office and the movie Office Space. They are aggressively vapid ..”

Did the trial court apply the correct standard in evaluating the originality of SMS’s material? If SMS challenges this outcome on appeal, how should the appellate court rule, and why?