Legal Question in Technology Law in California

Re: Selling information?

It's hard to give you a really for-sure answer without full particulars on the product and the circumstances under which it is given away free, but in the broadest sense if something is given away with no strings attached, and it is given to you, and someone else is willing to pay you for it, there is nothing per se illegal about making the sale.

The trouble is, in real life things that appear to be given away often have strings attached, including copyright and trademark strings. Or, the apparent donor may be giving you only a license to use the thing (or the information) but not an unfettered ownership interest.

For example, gas stations used to give away maps. You may not be old enough to remember this. I'm sure the oil company law departments would have found a way to crack down on an entrepreneur that cleaned out the rack of Maine maps at all the stations in Maine and tried to sell them in California.