I thought this was going to be a simple question, but I anticipated a few more things.
What is the most recent work* to enter the public domain?
*That is, entertaining media that someone other than the creators mother would care about.
Not counting Creative Commons licenses and other works specifically put into the public domain from day one, what is the most recent piece of work to enter the public domain “naturally” ?
What work has not been renewed / is not eligible for protection by the “creators life plus 50 (70?) years” clause?
What the watershed date to look for, and is that date a moving one?
There is a common assumption that Disney has single handedly changed copyright laws, what’s the SD here?
To me I think we are “past due” for “” new “” items to enter the public domain. Why do I feel this way?
At the moment, the “safe harbor” date for works being in the public domain is 1923. See this chart.
The extension granted a few years ago may well have benefited Disney, but it was primarily to bring the US into compliance with the Berne Convention, to which the US is a signatory.
Eventually the safe-harbor date will begin to advance again.
Copyright Term Extension Act
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act
Full title To amend the provisions of title 17, United States Code, with respect to the duration of copyright, and for other purposes.
Acronym CTEA
Enacted by the 105th United States Congress
Effective October 27, 1998
Citations
[snip]
Expansion of U.S. copyright law (assuming authors create their works 35 years prior to their death)
The Copyright Term Extension Act (CTEA) of 1998 extended copyright terms in the United States by 20 years. Since the Copyright Act of 1976, copyright would last for the life of the author plus 50 years, or 75 years for a work of corporate authorship. The Act extended these terms to life of the author plus 70 years and for works of corporate authorship to 120 years after creation or 95 years after publication, whichever endpoint is earlier.[1] Copyright protection for works published prior to January 1, 1978, was increased by 20 years to a total of 95 years from their publication date.
This law, also known as the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act, Sonny Bono Act, or as the Mickey Mouse Protection Act,[2] effectively “froze” the advancement date of the public domain in the United States for works covered by the older fixed term copyright rules. Under this Act, additional works made in 1923 or afterwards that were still protected by copyright in 1998 will not enter the public domain until 2019 or afterward (depending on the date of the product) unless the owner of the copyright releases them into the public domain prior to that.
Unlike copyright extension legislation in the European Union, the Sonny Bono Act did not revive copyrights that had already expired. The Act did extend the terms of protection set for works that were already copyrighted, and is retroactive in that sense. However, works created before January 1, 1978, but not published or registered for copyright until recently, are addressed in a special section (17 U.S.C.§303) and may remain protected until the end of 2047. The Act became Pub.L. 105-298 on October 27, 1998.
The Euoropean copyright extension was a royal thorn in the ass of Joyce scholarship of Ulysses, which would’ve been in the clear for citation and easy on-line reference.
Not to speak of the consummate assholery of Joyce’s grandson, the keeper of the Estate.
The city of Dublin itself, which is festive and full of public events and tourists every Bloomsday–June 16, (1904), the day the novel’s activity takes place–on the hundredth anniversary could not display any text in banners or have it spoken aloud in speeches by the mayor and others.
I don’t think thats what the OP meant. The answer would surely be any books, films or music that had a registered copyright date of Dec 31st 1922. I can’t find any book catalogs that you search by publication date like this.
If I’m figuring this right, anything published with a copyright notice in 1963 but NOT renewed 28 years later would have gone into the public domain in 1981. (Anything between 1928 and 1963 that was not renewed is now in the public domain.)
I have no cite, but sometiime when this issue came up here before I recall reading that a very large percentage of all published works were never renewed after their initial printings.
Isn’t there the school of thought that something is copyrighted, the moment it is created, regardless of anything noting it?
It just seems to me that the number of works, in terms of quantity and quality has come to a screeching halt. Not everything can be a classic, but certainly we are due for a “new” classic breaking free.
Mickey Mouse is a trademarked character of Disney, it will never enter the public domain as long as Disney wants to keep it. Specific media involving MM might enter the public domain. E.g. Steamboat Willie. But each time the copyright is close to expiring on that, Congress extends the length of copyright protection. So what will happen by 2023 is that another law will be passed like the Sonny Bono Act.
I think you’re wrong. The original title cards for Night of the Living Dead had the copyright notice so it was clear that it was not specifically put in the public domain from day one (if specifically means intentionally).
One theoretical answer would be anything publish on the last day before the new copyright law went into effect (making copyright notices unnecessary) without the proper notice. That would be the watershed moment. The rolling moment the OP asked about would be any older work needing renewal yesterday that was not renewed. This is a rolling date.
I looked on Project Gutenberg for things that I could read on my tablet computer. The most recent stuff I found was by H. Beam Piper. He committed suicide in 1964 and it looks like the copyright expired on most of his work except “Lord Kalvan of Otherwhen”. They had “Space Viking” which was published in 1963. I have his work in paperback, but it more comfortable to read on a tablet. The latest I found was “Skylark DuQuesne” by E. E. Smith which was published in 1966.
It all depends on Adolph Hitler: the change from 50 to 70 years in the Berne Convention (which cascaded to the US law) was partly so that the government of Bavaria could keep Mein Kampf under copyright.
The 1976 act extended copyright to all works and took effect on January 1, 1978.
Anything still under copyright continued to be copyrighted after that date. But a work that was in the public domain prior to that date did not get copyright protection.
Previously, the law required a renewal after 28 years. Thus anything copyrighted before 1950 and not renewed is in public domain. However, there were ways to mess up the copyrights (just ask the J. R. R. Tolkien estate*) so that a work went into public domain in the US in less time, most notably by leaving off a notice.
*The Lord of the Rings went into public domain because the UK publisher imported too many copies (there was a limit to how many you could import and still keep protection if you didn’t have it published in the US). Tolkien edited it and added all the maps and glossaries at the end, so this version was copyrighted. The status of the original Ace edition, though is theoretically in the public domain, though it would take years of legal action to be able to do anything with it.
Wasn’t there a work by a long-dead 19th century author that was recently published for the very first time under copyright? I seem to remember hearing that a never before published work by Louisa May Alcott was being released a few years ago. Her long-circulated book Little Women is pretty much a textbook example of public domain literature that anyone can do whatever they want with.
The U.S. signed the Berne Convention and was going to adopt their copyright lengths so that all the major nations of the world would have essentially the same provisions. This was inevitable. Not doing so would have meant a ridiculous amount of confusion internationally. It may have been to some peoples’ interest to do this as well, but there is no rational world in which this didn’t happen. It’s a bit more controversial that the EU changed the provisions because of Mein Kampf, but that’s how I read it.
Disney’s trademark on Mickey Mouse and the other characters is far - far - more important than early copyrights. So other people can sell Plane Crazy and Steamboat Willy without paying them royalties. Big honking deal. That wouldn’t affect their earnings by a tenth of a tenth of a tenth of a percent. The Mouse and all of Disney is utterly secure.
I know it feels good having a big corporate villain to scapegoat, but the facts don’t support you.
robert_columbia, unpublished works are treated differently in copyright law. A newly found unpublished work, published for the first time today, takes on today’s copyright protection. However, anything that was published in those days is in the public domain.
You’re total ignorance of the law does not make the law wrong or stupid, or mean that “anyone can do whatever they want”. It means only that you don’t know what you’re talking about.
To clarify the difference between trademark and copyright: If the law doesn’t change before then, then the earliest Mickey Mouse cartoons will fall into the public domain in about a decade. After that time, it will be legal for anyone to make copies of those works and give them away or sell them, without Disney having any say in the matter. Before then, Disney does have a say in the matter (and that say will generally be “no”). Meanwhile, though, Disney also owns the trademark on the likeness of Mickey Mouse. They will continue to hold that trademark until and unless they stop defending it, which probably isn’t going to happen any time soon. If, by some crazy fluke, they did stop defending it, then their trademark would lapse, and other people could start doing their own things with the Mickey Mouse character, such as making new movies with him. As long as they continue defending their trademark, though, it will never be legal for others to make new Mickey movies without Disney’s consent, even after the existing movies go public domain.
One author impacted by the 1923 public domain date is Agatha Christie. She wrote her first book (The Mysterious Affair at Styles, which introduced Poirot) in 1920, The Secret Adversary, which introduced Tommy and Tuppence) in 1922, and *Murder on the Links *in 1923. These books can be found in numerous editions and free in electronic form. All of Christie’s other works were published after 1923 and are therefore still under copyright. So given Christie’s continuing popularity, Murder on the Links, another Poirot story, is probably one of the most popular and widely read books among those that were last to enter the public domain.