Public domain

Last updated

Public domain icon, which is in the public domain itself Cc-public domain mark.svg
Public domain icon, which is in the public domain itself

The public domain (PD) consists of all the creative work to which no exclusive intellectual property rights apply. Those rights may have expired, [1] been forfeited, [2] expressly waived, or may be inapplicable. [3] Because no one holds the exclusive rights, anyone can legally use or reference those works without permission. [3] [4]

Contents

As examples, the works of William Shakespeare, Ludwig van Beethoven, Miguel de Cervantes, Zoroaster, Lao Zi, Confucius, Aristotle, L. Frank Baum, Leonardo da Vinci and Georges Méliès are in the public domain either by virtue of their having been created before copyright existed, or by their copyright term having expired. [1] Some works are not covered by a country's copyright laws, and are therefore in the public domain; for example, in the United States, items excluded from copyright include the formulae of Newtonian physics and cooking recipes. [5] Other works are actively dedicated by their authors to the public domain (see waiver); examples include reference implementations of cryptographic algorithms, [6] and the image-processing software ImageJ (created by the National Institutes of Health). [7] The term public domain is not normally applied to situations where the creator of a work retains residual rights, in which case use of the work is referred to as "under license" or "with permission".

As rights vary by country and jurisdiction, a work may be subject to rights in one country and be in the public domain in another. Some rights depend on registrations on a country-by-country basis, and the absence of registration in a particular country, if required, gives rise to public-domain status for a work in that country. The term public domain may also be interchangeably used with other imprecise or undefined terms such as the public sphere or commons , including concepts such as the "commons of the mind", the "intellectual commons", and the "information commons". [8]

History

Although the term domain did not come into use until the mid-18th century, the concept can be traced back to the ancient Roman law, "as a preset system included in the property right system". [9] The Romans had a large proprietary rights system where they defined "many things that cannot be privately owned" [9] as res nullius , res communes , res publicae and res universitatis. [10] The term res nullius was defined as things not yet appropriated. [11] The term res communes was defined as "things that could be commonly enjoyed by mankind, such as air, sunlight and ocean." [9] The term res publicae referred to things that were shared by all citizens, and the term res universitatis meant things that were owned by the municipalities of Rome. [9] When looking at it from a historical perspective, one could say the construction of the idea of "public domain" sprouted from the concepts of res communes, res publicae, and res universitatis in early Roman law. [9]

When the first early copyright law was originally established in Britain with the Statute of Anne in 1710, public domain did not appear. However, similar concepts were developed by British and French jurists in the 18th century. Instead of "public domain", they used terms such as publici juris or propriété publique to describe works that were not covered by copyright law. [12]

The phrase "fall in the public domain" can be traced to mid-19th-century France to describe the end of copyright term. The French poet Alfred de Vigny equated the expiration of copyright with a work falling "into the sink hole of public domain" [13] and if the public domain receives any attention from intellectual property lawyers it is still treated as little more than that which is left when intellectual property rights, such as copyright, patents, and trademarks, expire or are abandoned. [8] In this historical context Paul Torremans describes copyright as a, "little coral reef of private right jutting up from the ocean of the public domain." [14] Copyright law differs by country, and the American legal scholar Pamela Samuelson has described the public domain as being "different sizes at different times in different countries". [15]

Definition

Newton's own copy of his Principia, with hand-written corrections for the second edition NewtonsPrincipia.jpg
Newton's own copy of his Principia , with hand-written corrections for the second edition

Definitions of the boundaries of the public domain in relation to copyright, or intellectual property more generally, regard the public domain as a negative space; that is, it consists of works that are no longer in copyright term or were never protected by copyright law. [16] According to James Boyle this definition underlines common usage of the term public domain and equates the public domain to public property and works in copyright to private property. However, the usage of the term public domain can be more granular, including for example uses of works in copyright permitted by copyright exceptions. Such a definition regards work in copyright as private property subject to fair use rights and limitation on ownership. [1] A conceptual definition comes from Lange, who focused on what the public domain should be: "it should be a place of sanctuary for individual creative expression, a sanctuary conferring affirmative protection against the forces of private appropriation that threatened such expression". [16] Patterson and Lindberg described the public domain not as a "territory", but rather as a concept: "[T]here are certain materials – the air we breathe, sunlight, rain, space, life, creations, thoughts, feelings, ideas, words, numbers – not subject to private ownership. The materials that compose our cultural heritage must be free for all living to use no less than matter necessary for biological survival." [17] The term public domain may also be interchangeably used with other imprecise or undefined terms such as the public sphere or commons , including concepts such as the "commons of the mind", the "intellectual commons", and the "information commons". [8]

Public domain by medium

Books

A public-domain book is a book with no copyright, a book that was created without a license, or a book where its copyrights expired [18] or have been forfeited.[ clarification needed ] [19]

In most countries the term of protection of copyright expires on the first day of January, 70 years after the death of the latest living author. The longest copyright term is in Mexico, which has life plus 100 years for all deaths since July 1928. [20]

A notable exception is the United States, where every book and tale published before 1929 is in the public domain; US copyrights last for 95 years for books originally published between 1929 and 1978 if the copyright was properly registered and maintained. [21]

For example: the works of Jane Austen, Lewis Carroll, Machado de Assis, Olavo Bilac and Edgar Allan Poe are in the public domain worldwide as they all died over 100 years ago. [22]

Project Gutenberg, the Internet Archive and Wikisource make tens of thousands of public domain books available online as ebooks. [23] [24] [25]

Music

People have been creating music for millennia. The first musical notation system, the Music of Mesopotamia system, was created 4,000 years ago. Guido of Arezzo introduced Latin musical notation in the 10th century. [26] This laid the foundation for the preservation of global music in the public domain, a distinction formalized alongside copyright systems in the 17th century. Musicians copyrighted their publications of musical notation as literary writings, but performing copyrighted pieces and creating derivative works were not restricted by early copyright laws. Copying was widespread, in compliance with the law, but expansions of those laws intended to benefit literary works and responding to commercial music recording technology's reproducibility have led to stricter rules. Relatively recently, a normative view that copying in music is not desirable and lazy has become popular among professional musicians.[ original research? ]

US copyright laws distinguish between musical compositions and sound recordings, the former of which refers to melody, notation or lyrics created by a composer or lyricist, including sheet music, and the latter referring to a recording performed by an artist, including a CD, LP, or digital sound file. [27] Musical compositions fall under the same general rules as other works, and anything published before 1925 is considered public domain. Sound recordings, on the other hand, are subject to different rules and are not eligible for public domain status until 2021–2067, depending on the date and location of publishing, unless explicitly released beforehand. [21]

The Musopen project records music in the public domain for the purposes of making the music available to the general public in a high-quality audio format. Online musical archives preserve collections of classical music recorded by Musopen and offer them for download/distribution as a public service.

Films

The 1968 horror film Night of the Living Dead is public domain in the United States because its theatrical distributor failed to place a copyright indication on the prints, as would have been required to obtain a copyright at that time.

A public-domain film is a film that was never under copyright, was released to public domain by its author, or whose copyright has expired. All films in the United States before January 1st, 1929 have been entered in the Public Domain.

Images, graffiti

In 2016, the Reiss-Engelhorn-Museen, a German art museum, sued Wikimedia Commons over photographs uploaded to the database depicting pieces of art in the museum. The museum claimed that the photos were taken by their staff, and that photography within the museum by visitors was prohibited. Therefore, photos taken by the museum, even of material that itself had fallen into the public domain, were protected by copyright law and would need to be removed from the Wikimedia image repository. The court ruled that the photographs taken by the museum would be protected under the German Copyright Act, stating that since the photographer needed to make practical decisions about the photograph that it was protected material. The Wikimedia volunteer was ordered to remove the images from the site, as the museum's policy had been violated when the photos were taken. [28]

Some authors have claimed that Wikipedia has introduced "a semantic confusion between the public space and the public domain in the sense of copyright". [29]

Value

Pamela Samuelson has identified eight "values" that can arise from information and works in the public domain. [30]

Possible values include:

  1. Building blocks for the creation of new knowledge, examples include data, facts, ideas, theories, and scientific principle.
  2. Access to cultural heritage through information resources such as ancient Greek texts and Mozart's symphonies.
  3. Promoting education, through the spread of information, ideas, and scientific principles.
  4. Enabling follow-on innovation, through for example expired patents and copyright.
  5. Enabling low cost access to information without the need to locate the owner or negotiate rights clearance and pay royalties, through for example expired copyrighted works or patents, and non-original data compilation. [31]
  6. Promoting public health and safety, through information and scientific principles.
  7. Promoting the democratic process and values, through news, laws, regulation, and judicial opinion.
  8. Enabling competitive imitation, through for example expired patents and copyright, or publicly disclosed technologies that do not qualify for patent protection. [30] : 22 

Relationship with derivative works

Derivative works include translations, musical arrangements, and dramatizations of a work, as well as other forms of transformation or adaptation. [32] Copyrighted works may not be used for derivative works without permission from the copyright owner, [33] while public domain works can be freely used for derivative works without permission. [34] [35] Artworks that are public domain may also be reproduced photographically or artistically or used as the basis of new, interpretive works. [36] Works derived from public domain works can be copyrighted. [37]

Once works enter into the public domain, derivative works such as adaptations in book and film may increase noticeably, as happened with Frances Hodgson Burnett's novel The Secret Garden , which became public domain in the US in 1977 and most of the rest of the world in 1995. [38] By 1999, the plays of Shakespeare, all public domain, had been used in more than 420 feature-length films. [39] [40] In addition to straightforward adaptation, they have been used as the launching point for transformative retellings such as Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead and Troma Entertainment's Tromeo and Juliet . [41] [42] [43] Marcel Duchamp's L.H.O.O.Q. is a derivative of Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa , one of thousands of derivative works based on the public domain painting. [34] The 2018 film A Star is Born is a remake of the 1937 film of the same name, which is in the public domain due to an unrenewed copyright. [44]

In some countries, certain works may never fully lapse into the public domain. In the United Kingdom, for example, there is a perpetual crown copyright for the Authorized King James Version of the Bible. [45]

While the copyright has expired for the Peter Pan works by J. M. Barrie (the play Peter Pan, or the Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up and the novel Peter and Wendy ) in the United Kingdom, it was granted a special exception under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (Schedule 6) [46] that requires royalties to be paid for commercial performances, publications and broadcasts of the story of Peter Pan within the UK, as long as Great Ormond Street Hospital (to whom Barrie gave the copyright) continues to exist.

In a paying public domain regime, works that have entered the public domain after their copyright has expired, or traditional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions that have never been subject to copyright, are still subject to royalties payable to the state or to an authors' association. The user does not have to seek permission to copy, present or perform the work, but does have to pay the fee. Typically the royalties are directed to support of living artists. [47]

Public domain mark

Creative Commons' Public Domain Mark Cc-public domain mark white.svg
Creative Commons' Public Domain Mark

In 2010, The Creative Commons proposed the Public Domain Mark (PDM) as symbol to indicate that a work is free of known copyright restrictions and therefore in the public domain. [48] [49] The public domain mark is a combination of the copyright symbol, which acts as copyright notice, with the international 'no' symbol. The Europeana databases use it, and for instance on the Wikimedia Commons in February 2016 2.9 million works (~10% of all works) are listed with the mark. [50]

Application to copyrightable works

The underlying idea that is expressed or manifested in the creation of a work generally cannot be the subject of copyright law (see idea–expression divide). Mathematical formulae will therefore generally form part of the public domain, to the extent that their expression in the form of software is not covered by copyright.[ citation needed ]

Works created before the existence of copyright and patent laws also form part of the public domain. For example, the Bible and the inventions of Archimedes are in the public domain. However, translations or new formulations of these works may be copyrighted in themselves.[ citation needed ]

Determination of whether a copyright has expired depends on an examination of the copyright in its source country.

In most countries that are signatories to the Berne Convention, copyright term is based on the life of the author, and extends to 50 or 70 years beyond the death of the author. (See List of countries' copyright lengths.)

In the United States, determining whether a work has entered the public domain or is still under copyright depends upon what the law or regulation was at creation, and whether new regulations have grandfathered in certain older works. Because copyright terms shifted over the course of the 20th century from a fixed-term based on first publication, with a possible renewal term, to a term extending to 50, then 70, years after the death of the author. The claim that "pre-1929 works are in the public domain" is correct only for published works; unpublished works are under federal copyright for at least the life of the author plus 70 years.[ citation needed ]

Legal traditions differ on whether a work in the public domain can have its copyright restored. In the European Union, the Copyright Duration Directive was applied retroactively, restoring and extending the terms of copyright on material previously in the public domain. Term extensions by the US and Australia generally have not removed works from the public domain, but rather delayed the addition of works to it. However, the United States moved away from that tradition with the Uruguay Round Agreements Act, which removed from the public domain many foreign-sourced works that had previously not been in copyright in the US for failure to comply with US-based formalities requirements. Consequently, in the US, foreign-sourced works and US-sourced works are now treated differently, with foreign-sourced works remaining under copyright regardless of compliance with formalities, while domestically sourced works may be in the public domain if they failed to comply with then-existing formalities requirements—a situation described as odd by some scholars, and unfair by some US-based rightsholders. [51]

Government works

Works of various governments around the world may be excluded from copyright law and may therefore be considered to be in the public domain in their respective countries. [52] They may also be in the public domain in other countries as well. The legal scholar Melville Nimmer has written that "it is axiomatic that material in the public domain is not protected by copyright, even when incorporated into a copyrighted work". [53]

Dedicating works to the public domain

Before 1 March 1989, in the US, works could be easily given into the public domain by just releasing it without an explicit copyright notice. With the Berne Convention Implementation Act of 1988 (and the earlier Copyright Act of 1976, which went into effect in 1978), all works were by default copyright protected and needed to be actively given into public domain by a waiver statement/anti-copyright can call notice. [54] [55] Not all legal systems have processes for reliably donating works to the public domain, e.g. civil law of continental Europe.[ citation needed ] This may even "effectively prohibit any attempt by copyright owners to surrender rights automatically conferred by law, particularly moral rights". [56]

Public-domain-like licenses

An alternative is for copyright holders to issue a license which irrevocably grants as many rights as possible to the general public. Real public domain makes licenses unnecessary, as no owner/author is required to grant permission ("Permission culture"). There are multiple licenses which aim to release works into the public domain. In 2000 the WTFPL was released as a public domain like software license. [57] Creative Commons (created in 2002 by Lawrence Lessig, Hal Abelson, and Eric Eldred) has introduced several public-domain-like licenses, called Creative Commons licenses. These give authors of works (that would qualify for copyright) the ability to decide which protections they would like to place on their material. As copyright is the default license for new material, Creative Commons licenses offer authors a variety of options to designate their work under whichever license they wish, as long as this does not violate standing copyright law. [58] For example, a CC BY license allows for re-users to distribute, remix, adapt, and build upon material, while also agreeing to provide attribution to the author in any of these cases. [59] In 2009 the Creative Commons released the CC0, which was created for compatibility with law domains which have no concept of dedicating into public domain. This is achieved by a public domain waiver statement and a fallback all-permissive license, in case the waiver is not possible. [60] [61] Unlike in the US, where author's moral rights are generally not specifically regulated, in some countries where moral rights are protected separately in law it is not possible to waive those rights, but only the rights related to the exploitation of the work. A solution to this issue (as found in the Creative Commons Zero dedication) is to interpret the license by setting "three different layers of action. First, the right holder waives any copyright and related rights that can be waived in accordance with the applicable law. Secondly, if there are rights that the right holder cannot waive under applicable law, they are licensed in a way that mirrors as closely as possible the legal effect of a waiver. And finally, if there are any rights that the right holders cannot waive or license, they affirm that they will not exercise them and they will not assert any claim with respect to the use of the work, once again within the limits of applicable law. (...) In countries where moral rights exist but where they can be waived or not asserted, they are waived if asserted (e.g. the UK). In countries where they cannot be waived they will remain into full effect in accordance to the applicable law (think of France, Spain or Italy where moral rights cannot be waived)." [62] The same occurs in Switzerland.

The Unlicense, published around 2010, has a focus on an anti-copyright message. The Unlicense offers a public domain waiver text with a fallback public domain-like license inspired by permissive licenses but without attribution. [63] [64] Another option is the Zero Clause BSD license, released in 2006 and aimed at software. [65]

In October 2014, the Open Knowledge Foundation recommends the Creative Commons CC0 license to dedicate content to the public domain, [66] [67] and the Open Data Commons Public Domain Dedication and License (PDDL) for data. [68]

Patents

In most countries, the term of rights for patents is 20 years, after which the invention becomes part of the public domain. In the United States, the contents of patents are considered valid and enforceable for 20 years from the date of filing within the United States or 20 years from the earliest date of filing if under 35 USC 120, 121, or 365(c). [69] However, the text and any illustration within a patent, provided the illustrations are essentially line drawings and do not in any substantive way reflect the "personality" of the person drawing them, are not subject to copyright protection. [70] This is separate from the patent rights just mentioned.

Trademarks

A trademark registration may remain in force indefinitely, or expire without specific regard to its age. For a trademark registration to remain valid, the owner must continue to use it. In some circumstances, such as disuse, failure to assert trademark rights, or common usage by the public without regard for its intended use, it could become generic, and therefore part of the public domain.

Because trademarks are registered with governments, some countries or trademark registries may recognize a mark, while others may have determined that it is generic and not allowable as a trademark in that registry. For example, the drug acetylsalicylic acid (2-acetoxybenzoic acid) is better known as aspirin in the United States—a generic term. In Canada, however, Aspirin, with an uppercase A, is still a trademark of the German company Bayer, while aspirin, with a lowercase "a", is not. Bayer lost the trademark in the United States, the UK and France after World War I, as part of the Treaty of Versailles. So many copycat products entered the marketplace during the war that it was deemed generic just three years later.[ citation needed ]

Informal uses of trademarks are not covered by trademark protection. For example, Hormel, producer of the canned meat product Spam, does not object to informal use of the word "spam" in reference to unsolicited commercial email. [71] However, it has fought attempts by other companies to register names including the word 'spam' as a trademark in relation to computer products, despite that Hormel's trademark is only registered in reference to food products (a trademark claim is made within a particular field). Such defences have failed in the United Kingdom. [72]

Public Domain Day

An English logo of the 2023/2024 Public Domain Day Logo PDD 2024.svg
An English logo of the 2023/2024 Public Domain Day

Public Domain Day is an observance of when copyrighted works expire and works enter into the public domain. [73] This legal transition of copyright works into the public domain usually happens every year on 1 January based on the individual copyright laws of each country. [73]

Visual created for Public Domain Day. Features Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa, as it is famously part of the public domain Mona Lisa Public Domain.jpg
Visual created for Public Domain Day. Features Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa , as it is famously part of the public domain

The observance of a "Public Domain Day" was initially informal; the earliest known mention was in 2004 by Wallace McLean (a Canadian public domain activist), [74] with support for the idea echoed by Lawrence Lessig. [75] As of 1 January 2010, [76] there is as Public Domain Day website lists the authors whose works are entering the public domain. There are activities in countries around the world by various organizations all under the banner Public Domain Day, this can help people around the world celebrate works written a while ago.

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Copyright</span> Legal concept regulating rights of a creative work

A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive legal right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educational, or musical form. Copyright is intended to protect the original expression of an idea in the form of a creative work, but not the idea itself. A copyright is subject to limitations based on public interest considerations, such as the fair use doctrine in the United States and fair dealings doctrine in the United Kingdom.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Intellectual property</span> Ownership of creative expressions and processes

Intellectual property (IP) is a category of property that includes intangible creations of the human intellect. There are many types of intellectual property, and some countries recognize more than others. The best-known types are patents, copyrights, trademarks, and trade secrets. The modern concept of intellectual property developed in England in the 17th and 18th centuries. The term "intellectual property" began to be used in the 19th century, though it was not until the late 20th century that intellectual property became commonplace in most of the world's legal systems.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Open-source license</span> Software license allowing source code to be used, modified, and shared

Open-source licenses are software licenses that allow content to be used, modified, and shared. They facilitate free and open-source software (FOSS) development. Intellectual property (IP) laws restrict the modification and sharing of creative works. Free and open-source licenses use these existing legal structures for an inverse purpose. They grant the recipient the rights to use the software, examine the source code, modify it, and distribute the modifications. These criteria are outlined in the Open Source Definition.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Criticism of copyright</span> Dissenting views of copyright law

Criticism of copyright, or anti-copyright sentiment, is a dissenting view of the current state of copyright law or copyright as a concept. Critics often discuss philosophical, economical, or social rationales of such laws and the laws' implementations, the benefits of which they claim do not justify the policy's costs to society. They advocate for changing the current system, though different groups have different ideas of what that change should be. Some call for remission of the policies to a previous state—copyright once covered few categories of things and had shorter term limits—or they may seek to expand concepts like fair use that allow permissionless copying. Others seek the abolition of copyright itself.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Creative Commons license</span> Copyright license for free use of a work

A Creative Commons (CC) license is one of several public copyright licenses that enable the free distribution of an otherwise copyrighted "work". A CC license is used when an author wants to give other people the right to share, use, and build upon a work that the author has created. CC provides an author flexibility and protects the people who use or redistribute an author's work from concerns of copyright infringement as long as they abide by the conditions that are specified in the license by which the author distributes the work.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of copyright</span>

The history of copyright starts with early privileges and monopolies granted to printers of books. The British Statute of Anne 1710, full title "An Act for the Encouragement of Learning, by vesting the Copies of Printed Books in the Authors or purchasers of such Copies, during the Times therein mentioned", was the first copyright statute. Initially copyright law only applied to the copying of books. Over time other uses such as translations and derivative works were made subject to copyright and copyright now covers a wide range of works, including maps, performances, paintings, photographs, sound recordings, motion pictures and computer programs.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Copyright law of Canada</span> Canadian statutes controlling copyright

The copyright law of Canada governs the legally enforceable rights to creative and artistic works under the laws of Canada. Canada passed its first colonial copyright statute in 1832 but was subject to imperial copyright law established by Britain until 1921. Current copyright law was established by the Copyright Act of Canada which was first passed in 1921 and substantially amended in 1988, 1997, and 2012. All powers to legislate copyright law are in the jurisdiction of the Parliament of Canada by virtue of section 91(23) of the Constitution Act, 1867.

Intellectual property rights (IPRs) have been acknowledged and protected in China since 1980. China has acceded to the major international conventions on protection of rights to intellectual property. Domestically, protection of intellectual property law has also been established by government legislation, administrative regulations, and decrees in the areas of trademark, copyright, and patent.

Perpetual copyright, also known as indefinite copyright, is copyright that lasts indefinitely. Perpetual copyright arises either when a copyright has no finite term from outset, or when a copyright's original finite term is perpetually extended. The first of these two scenarios is highly uncommon, as the current laws of all countries with copyright statutes set a standard limit on the duration, based either on the date of creation/publication, or on the date of the creator's death. Exceptions have sometimes been made, however, for unpublished works. Usually, special legislation is required, granting a perpetual copyright to a specific work.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Public-domain software</span> Software in the public domain

Public-domain software is software that has been placed in the public domain, in other words, software for which there is absolutely no ownership such as copyright, trademark, or patent. Software in the public domain can be modified, distributed, or sold even without any attribution by anyone; this is unlike the common case of software under exclusive copyright, where licenses grant limited usage rights.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Public-domain-equivalent license</span> License that waives all copyright

Public-domain-equivalent license are licenses that grant public-domain-like rights and/or act as waivers. They are used to make copyrighted works usable by anyone without conditions, while avoiding the complexities of attribution or license compatibility that occur with other licenses.

Public domain music is music to which no exclusive intellectual property rights apply.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Trademark</span> Trade identifier of products or services

A trademark is a form of intellectual property that consists of a word, phrase, symbol, design, or a combination that identifies a product or service from a particular source and distinguishes it from others. Trademarks can also extend to non-tradditional marks like drawings, symbols, 3D shapes like product designs or packaging, sounds, scents, or specific colors used to create a unique identity. For example, Pepsi® is a registered trademark associated with soft drinks, and the distinctive shape of the Coca-Cola® bottle is a registered trademark protecting Coca-Cola's packaging design.

The philosophy of copyright considers philosophical issues linked to copyright policy, and other jurisprudential problems that arise in legal systems' interpretation and application of copyright law.

Under the law of the United Kingdom, a copyright is an intangible property right subsisting in certain qualifying subject matter. Copyright law is governed by the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, as amended from time to time. As a result of increasing legal integration and harmonisation throughout the European Union a complete picture of the law can only be acquired through recourse to EU jurisprudence, although this is likely to change by the expiration of the Brexit transition period on 31 December 2020, the UK has left the EU on 31 January 2020. On 12 September 2018, the European Parliament approved new copyright rules to help secure the rights of writers and musicians.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Limitations and exceptions to copyright</span> Provisions which allow for copyrighted works to be used without a license from the copyright owner

Limitations and exceptions to copyright are provisions, in local copyright law or the Berne Convention, which allow for copyrighted works to be used without a license from the copyright owner.

The copyright term is the length of time copyright subsists in a work before it passes into the public domain. In most of the world, this length of time is the life of the author plus either 50 or 70 years.

A free license or open license is a license that allows copyrighted work to be reused, modified, and redistributed. These uses are normally prohibited by copyright, patent or other Intellectual property (IP) laws. The term broadly covers free content licenses and open-source licenses, also known as free software licenses.

A public license or public copyright license is a license by which a copyright holder as licensor can grant additional copyright permissions to any and all persons in the general public as licensees. By applying a public license to a work, provided that the licensees obey the terms and conditions of the license, copyright holders give permission for others to copy or change their work in ways that would otherwise infringe copyright law.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Unlicense</span> Anti-copyright license

The Unlicense is a public domain equivalent license for software which provides a public domain waiver with a fall-back public-domain-like license, similar to the CC Zero for cultural works. It includes language used in earlier software projects and has a focus on an anti-copyright message.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Boyle, James (2008). The Public Domain: Enclosing the Commons of the Mind. CSPD. p. 38. ISBN   978-0-300-13740-8. Archived from the original on 14 February 2015.
  2. ↑ Graber, Christoph B.; Nenova, Mira B. (2008). Intellectual Property and Traditional Cultural Expressions in a Digital Environment. Edward Elgar Publishing. p. 173. ISBN   978-1-84720-921-4. Archived from the original on 20 December 2014. Retrieved 27 October 2016.
  3. 1 2 "Works Unprotected by Copyright Law". bitlaw.com. Archived from the original on 2 March 2016.
  4. ↑ Editor, Copyrightlaws com (7 March 2023). "What Is the Public Domain?". Copyrightlaws.com: Copyright courses and education in plain English. Retrieved 9 October 2024.{{cite web}}: |last= has generic name (help)
  5. ↑ "Copyright Protection Not Available for Names, Titles, or Short Phrases" (PDF). copyright.gov. Archived from the original (PDF) on 5 April 2016. Listings of ingredients, as in recipes, labels, or formulas. When a recipe or formula is accompanied by an explanation or directions, the text directions may be copyrightable, but the recipe or formula itself remains uncopyrightable.
  6. ↑ "SERPENT - A Candidate Block Cipher for the Advanced Encryption Standard". 1999. Archived from the original on 13 January 2013. Serpent is now completely in the public domain, and we impose no restrictions on its use. This was announced on 21 August at the First AES Candidate Conference.
  7. ↑
  8. 1 2 3 Ronan, Deazley (2006). Rethinking copyright: history, theory, language. Edward Elgar Publishing. p. 103. ISBN   978-1-84542-282-0. Archived from the original on 19 November 2011.
  9. 1 2 3 4 5 Huang, H. (2009). "On public domain in copyright law". Frontiers of Law in China. 4 (2): 178–195. doi:10.1007/s11463-009-0011-6. S2CID   153766621.
  10. ↑ Foures-Diop, Anne-Sophie (2011). "Revue juridique de l'Ouest, 2011-1: Les choses communes (Première partie)". Revue Juridique de l'Ouest. 24 (1). Ecole de Avocats du Grand Quest de Rennes: 59–112. doi:10.3406/juro.2011.4336.
  11. ↑ Rose, Carol M. (2003). "Romans, Roads, and Romantic Creators: Traditions of Public Property in the Information Age". Law and Contemporary Problems. 66 (1/2). Duke University School of Law: 89–110. ISSN   0023-9186. JSTOR   20059173.
  12. ↑ Torremans, Paul (2007). Copyright law: a handbook of contemporary research. Edward Elgar Publishing. pp. 134–135. ISBN   978-1-84542-487-9.
  13. ↑ Torremans, Paul (2007). Copyright law: a handbook of contemporary research. Edward Elgar Publishing. p. 154. ISBN   978-1-84542-487-9.
  14. ↑ Torremans, Paul (2007). Copyright law: a handbook of contemporary research. Edward Elgar Publishing. p. 137. ISBN   978-1-84542-487-9.
  15. ↑ Ronan, Deazley (2006). Rethinking copyright: history, theory, language. Edward Elgar Publishing. p. 102. ISBN   978-1-84542-282-0. Archived from the original on 19 November 2011.
  16. 1 2 Ronan, Deazley (2006). Rethinking copyright: history, theory, language. Edward Elgar Publishing. p. 104. ISBN   978-1-84542-282-0. Archived from the original on 19 November 2011.
  17. ↑ Ronan, Deazley (2006). Rethinking copyright: history, theory, language. Edward Elgar Publishing. p. 105. ISBN   978-1-84542-282-0. Archived from the original on 19 November 2011.
  18. ↑ Boyle, James (1 January 2008). The Public Domain: Enclosing the Commons of the Mind . Yale University Press. ISBN   978-0-300-13740-8 . Retrieved 30 December 2016– via Internet Archive. public domain.
  19. ↑ Graber, Christoph Beat; Nenova, Mira Burri (1 January 2008). Intellectual Property and Traditional Cultural Expressions in a Digital Environment. Edward Elgar Publishing. ISBN   978-1-84844-391-4 . Retrieved 30 December 2016– via Google Books.
  20. ↑ Kopel, Matthew. "LibGuides: Copyright Services: Copyright Term and the Public Domain". guides.library.cornell.edu. Retrieved 9 October 2024.
  21. 1 2 "Copyright Term and the Public Domain in the United States". Cornell University. Retrieved 15 October 2018.
  22. ↑ "Public domain | Definition, Meaning, Examples, Years, & Copyright | Britannica". www.britannica.com. Retrieved 9 October 2024.
  23. ↑ Preston, Sherry (9 October 2023). "Cover to Cover: Access thousands of books on Project Gutenberg". Star-Herald. Retrieved 5 July 2024.
  24. ↑ Robertson, Adi (31 March 2020). "The National Emergency Library is offering free ebooks — but is it lending or piracy?". The Verge. Retrieved 5 July 2024.
  25. ↑ "What is Wikisource?". The University of Edinburgh. 26 August 2021. Retrieved 5 July 2024.
  26. ↑ Otten, J. "The Catholic Encyclopedia". New Advent. Robert Appleton Company. Retrieved 6 January 2022.
  27. ↑ "Copyright Registration of Musical Compositions and Sound Recordings" (PDF). United States Copyright Office. Retrieved 15 October 2018.
  28. ↑ Michel, Stefan (1 June 2019). "Digitisation of art in the public domain–museum urges Wikimedia to take down reproductions of out-of-protection artworks". Journal of Intellectual Property Law & Practice. 14 (6): 427–429. doi:10.1093/jiplp/jpz042. ISSN   1747-1532.
  29. ↑ Rosnay, Mélanie Dulong de; Langlais, Pierre-Carl (16 February 2017). "Public artworks and the freedom of panorama controversy: a case of Wikimedia influence". Internet Policy Review. 6 (1). doi: 10.14763/2017.1.447 . hdl: 10419/214035 . ISSN   2197-6775. Archived from the original on 18 January 2018.
  30. 1 2 Guibault, Lucy; Hugenholtz, Bernt (2006). The future of the public domain: identifying the commons in information law. Kluwer Law International. ISBN   978-9-0411-24357. Archived from the original on 18 December 2014.
  31. ↑ March Perry; Thomas Margoni (2010). "From music tracks to Google maps: who owns Computer Generated Works?". SSRN   1647584.
  32. ↑ Stern, Richard H. (2001). "L.H.O.O.Q. Internet related Derivative Works". Supplemental material Computer Law 484. The George Washington University Law School. Archived from the original on 19 August 2018. Retrieved 23 May 2010.
  33. ↑ Leaffer, Marshall A. (1995). Understanding copyright law. Legal text series; Contemporary Casebook Series (2nd ed.). M. Bender. p.  46. ISBN   0-256-16448-7.
  34. 1 2 Introduction to intellectual property: theory and practice. World Intellectual Property Organisation, Kluwer Law International. 1997. p. 313. ISBN   978-90-411-0938-5. Archived from the original on 6 April 2015.
  35. ↑ Fishman, Stephen (September 2008). The copyright handbook: what every writer needs to know . Nolo. p. 178. ISBN   978-1-4133-0893-8 . Retrieved 1 June 2010.
  36. ↑ Fishman, Stephen (2008). Public domain: how to find and use copyright-free writings, music, art and more . Nolo. pp. 124–125. ISBN   978-1-4133-0858-7.
  37. ↑ Stim, Rich (4 April 2013). "Public Domain Trouble Spots". Stanford Copyright and Fair Use Center. Public Domain Works That Are Modified. Archived from the original on 18 May 2016.
  38. ↑ Lundin, Anne H. (2 August 2004). Constructing the canon of children's literature: beyond library walls and ivory towers. Routledge. p. 138. ISBN   978-0-8153-3841-3 . Retrieved 1 June 2010.
  39. ↑ Young, Mark (ed.). The Guinness Book of Records 1999. Bantam Books. p. 358.
  40. ↑ Voigts-Virchow, Eckartm (2004). Janespotting and Beyond: British Heritage Retrovisions Since the Mid-1990s. Gunter Narr Verlag. p. 92.
  41. ↑ Homan, Sidney (2004). Directing Shakespeare: a scholar onstage. Ohio University Press. p. 101. ISBN   978-0-8214-1550-4 . Retrieved 1 June 2010.
  42. ↑ Kossak, Saskia (2005). "Frame my face to all occasions": Shakespeare's Richard III on screen. Braumüller. p. 17. ISBN   978-3-7003-1492-9 . Retrieved 1 June 2010.
  43. ↑ Cartmell, Deborah; Whelehan, Imelda (2007). The Cambridge companion to literature on screen. Cambridge University Press. p. 69. ISBN   978-0-521-61486-3 . Retrieved 1 June 2010.
  44. ↑ Lenker, Maureen Lee (10 July 2022). "Everything you need to know about the 1937 version of 'A Star Is Born'". Entertainment Weekly . Retrieved 12 August 2020.
  45. ↑ Metzger, Bruce M. (2006). The Oxford companion to the Bible. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press. pp.  618. ISBN   978-0-1950-46458.
  46. ↑ "Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 (c. 48)". Office of Public Sector Information. 1988. p. 28. Archived from the original on 1 June 2008. Retrieved 2 September 2008.
  47. ↑ WIPO Secretariat (24 November 2010), Note on the Meanings of the Term "Public Domain" in the Intellectual Property System with special reference to the Protection of Traditional Knowledge and Traditional Cultural Expressions/Expressions of Folklore, Intergovernmental Committee on Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore: Seventeenth Session, retrieved 28 November 2018
  48. ↑ "Creative Commons announces the Public Domain Mark". The H Open. The H. 12 October 2010. Archived from the original on 16 October 2010. Retrieved 12 October 2010.
  49. ↑ Peters, Diane (11 October 2010). "Improving Access to the Public Domain: the Public Domain Mark". Creative Commons. Archived from the original on 14 October 2010. Retrieved 12 October 2010.
  50. ↑ Category:CC-PD-Mark Archived 12 March 2016 at the Wayback Machine in February 2016
  51. ↑ Karjala, Dennis (2008). "Judicial Oversight of Copyright Legislation". Northern Kentucky Law Review. 35: 253.
  52. ↑ "Copyright Office Basics" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 25 February 2009.
  53. ↑ Nimmer, Melville B., and David Nimmer (1997). Nimmer on Copyright , section 13.03(F)(4). Albany: Matthew Bender.
  54. ↑ "Copyright Term and the Public Domain in the United States". Cornell University Copyright Information Center. Archived from the original on 26 September 2010. Retrieved 30 December 2016.
  55. ↑ "Copyright Notice", U.S. Copyright Office Circular 3, 2008. Archived 26 September 2012 at the Wayback Machine .
  56. ↑ "About CC0 — "No Rights Reserved"". Creative Commons. Archived from the original on 28 April 2013. Retrieved 23 April 2013.
  57. ↑ "do What The Fuck you want to Public License Version 1.0". anonscm - Debian. March 2000. Archived from the original on 2 June 2013.
  58. ↑ Boyle, J. (2008). "A Creative Commons". The Public Domain: Enclosing the Commons of the Mind. Yale University Press. pp. 179–204. ISBN   978-0-300-14275-4. JSTOR   j.ctt1npvzg.12.
  59. ↑ "About CC Licenses". Creative Commons. Retrieved 23 November 2020.
  60. ↑ "11/17: Lulan Artisans Textile Competition". 17 June 2009. Archived from the original on 31 December 2016. Retrieved 30 December 2016.
  61. ↑ Kreutzer, Till (2011). "Validity of the Creative Commons Zero 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedication and its usability for bibliographic metadata from the perspective of German Copyright Law" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 25 May 2017.
  62. ↑ Labastida, Ignasi; Margoni, Thomas (2020). "Licensing FAIR Data for Reuse". Data Intelligence. 2 (1–2): 199–207. doi:10.1162/dint_a_00042. hdl: 2445/150542 . ISSN   2641-435X.
  63. ↑ "The Unlicense: A License for No License". ostatic.com. 24 February 2016. Archived from the original on 24 March 2016.
  64. ↑ "Unlicense Yourself: Set Your Code Free". Unlicense.org. 4 January 2010. Archived from the original on 8 July 2018.
  65. ↑ "BSD 0-Clause License (0BSD) Explained in Plain English" . Retrieved 12 February 2020.
  66. ↑ "Conformant Licenses". opendefinition.com. Archived from the original on 1 March 2016.
  67. ↑ Vollmer, Timothy; Vézina, Brigitte; Miyara, Jocelyn; Benedict, Connor; Wetzler, Jennryn; Hollich, Shanna; Murray, Corrine (27 December 2013). "Creative Commons 4.0 BY and BY-SA licenses approved conformant with the Open Definition". Creative Commons. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016.
  68. ↑ "Open Data Commons Public Domain Dedication and License (PDDL)". Open Data Commons: legal tools for open data.
  69. ↑ Manual of Patent Examining Procedure available at "MPEP". Archived from the original on 18 April 2015. Retrieved 26 April 2015.
  70. ↑ Officer, Office of the Chief Communications. "Terms of Use for USPTO Websites". Archived from the original on 25 September 2009. Retrieved 30 December 2016.
  71. ↑ "SPAM® Brand and the Internet". Hormel Foods. Archived from the original on 13 October 2009.
  72. ↑ McCarthy, Kieren (31 January 2005). "Hormel Spam trademark case canned". The Register. Archived from the original on 7 July 2008. Retrieved 2 September 2008.
  73. 1 2 Richmond, Shane (1 January 2010). "Happy Public Domain Day! Here's to many more". Telegraph Blogs. Archived from the original on 15 May 2012. Retrieved 24 December 2011.
  74. ↑ McLean, Wallace J. (1 January 2004). "Happy Public Domain Day!". American University. Archived from the original on 3 June 2017. Retrieved 9 March 2016.
  75. ↑ Lessig, Lawrence (1 January 2004). "Public domain day - in Canada (Lessig Blog)". Lessig.org. Archived from the original on 7 November 2011. Retrieved 25 December 2011.
  76. ↑ "Public Domain Day 2010". MetaFilter . Archived from the original on 14 October 2012.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.