zlacker

In that vein, surely MD5 hashes should also be copyrighted, as they are derived from a work.

>>madaxe+(OP)
Not really, since one of the major characteristics is being able to recover the copyrighted work from the encoded version.

Since md5 hashes don't share this property, they're not "in that vein".

>>Xelyne+qy
If an encrypted file for which there is no key is treatable as derivative by law, then so should be an md5 hash. Both require vast brute force to extract/establish the original data, but both could be said to contain a derived representation of the work in question.