{"id":43,"date":"2015-11-12T16:10:24","date_gmt":"2015-11-13T00:10:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lis.iwaruna.com\/copyright-toolkit\/?p=43"},"modified":"2017-01-13T15:43:17","modified_gmt":"2017-01-13T23:43:17","slug":"how-to-determine-copyright-public-domain-status","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/lis.iwaruna.com\/copyright-toolkit\/how-to-determine-copyright-public-domain-status\/","title":{"rendered":"How to determine copyright &#038; public domain status"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><em>Last modified 12 November 2015.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Determining a work&#8217;s copyright or public domain status can be a challenge. Here are resources to help.<br \/>\n<!--more-->It&#8217;s fairly easily for a work to be protected by copyright; it need only satisfy four requirements (Hirtle et al., 2009, p. 29):<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Be <em>perceptible<\/em>,\u00a0formerly &#8220;tangible,&#8221; so this term encompasses both physical and electronic media<\/li>\n<li>Be an item <em>created<\/em> by a person<\/li>\n<li>Be <em>original<\/em><\/li>\n<li>Meet the requirements concerning the nationality of the creator \u2014 N.B. A work <em>no longer needs to be published<\/em> in order to be copyright protected!<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2>Articles &amp; books<\/h2>\n<p><em>Copyright &amp; Cultural Institutions: Guidelines for Digitization for U.S. Libraries, Archives, and Museums<\/em>\u00a0(2009), by\u00a0Peter B. Hirtle, Emily Hudson, and Andrew T. Kenyon, is a <a href=\"http:\/\/papers.ssrn.com\/sol3\/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1495365\" target=\"_blank\">PDF book available for free<\/a> under the Creative Commons BY-NC-ND 3.0 US license. It&#8217;s especially relevant to this article in the following ways:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>While <a href=\"http:\/\/www.copyright.gov\/title17\/92chap1.html#102\" target=\"_blank\">Section 102 of Title 17<\/a> offers a summary of the kinds of works protected, Chapter 2 has a thorough listing \u2014\u00a0though not legally complete, alas.<\/li>\n<li>Flowchart 3.1 (p. 40) helps assess the ownership and duration of copyright.<\/li>\n<li>Table 3.2.1 (p. 42) illustrates the copyright duration for print works that have never been published, never registered, anonymous authors, and deceased authors.<\/li>\n<li>Table 3.2.2 (p. 45) illustrates copyright duration for works first published in the US.<\/li>\n<li>Flowchart 3.2 (p. 48) shows copyright status for works published between 1923 and 1989.<\/li>\n<li>Table 3.3 (pp. 49-51) illustrates copyright status for works by citizens and foreign nationals <em>produced outside<\/em> of the US.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/web.law.duke.edu\/cspd\/publicdomainday\/2013\/shrinking\" target=\"_blank\">The Incredible Shrinking Public Domain<\/a> (2013) is an incisive article by Duke University Law School (CSPD, see below)\u00a0on how our copyright laws are becoming restrictive towards creativity and access.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/web.law.duke.edu\/cspd\/publicdomainday\/2015\/pre-1976\" target=\"_blank\">What could have entered the public domain on January 1, 2015 (under the law that existed until 1978&#8230;works from 1958)<\/a>,\u00a0written by the CSPD, shows how stingy copyright protection can be concerning the public public\u00a0\u2014 especially with film and music.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.eff.org\/deeplinks\/2014\/01\/law-belongs-public-domain\" target=\"_blank\">The Law Belongs in the Public Domain<\/a> (C. McSherry, 14 January 2014). US laws are in the public domain, but openness of state bills and local ordinances is a hotly contested issue.<\/p>\n<h2>Online resources<\/h2>\n<p>Despite the challenge in verifying copyright or public domain status, there remains a wealth of media available under the <a href=\"http:\/\/lis.iwaruna.com\/copyright-toolkit\/2015\/11\/12\/finding-media-producing-creative-works\/\" target=\"_blank\">public domain as well as DRM-free<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/web.law.duke.edu\/cspd\/\" target=\"_blank\">Center for the Study of the Public Domain<\/a>\u00a0(CSPD) provides information and news on when popular works of all media enter or remain in the public domain.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/copyright.gov\/records\/\" target=\"_blank\">Search Records<\/a> at the US Copyright Office to check on copyright status; see also the Copyright Renewal Database below.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/collections.stanford.edu\/copyrightrenewals\/\" target=\"_blank\">Copyright Renewal Database<\/a> is useful since heirs and corporations can and do extend the copyright protections of works!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/copyright.cornell.edu\/resources\/publicdomain.cfm\" target=\"_blank\">Copyright Term and the Public Domain in the United States<\/a>, maintained by Hirtle (last revised 1 January 2015), is one of the best, most comprehensive tools for determining copyright status and duration for all kinds of materials \u2014 including printed works, sound recordings, and architectural works!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/fairuse.stanford.edu\/overview\/public-domain\/\" target=\"_blank\">The Public Domain<\/a>: Rich Stim\u00a0defines and describes issues with public domain works.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/publicdomainreview.org\" target=\"_blank\">Public Domain Review<\/a> is an online journal that investigates ideas, news, and studies on the public domain, supported by the <a href=\"https:\/\/okfn.org\" target=\"_blank\">Open Knowledge Foundation<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.publicdomainsherpa.com\" target=\"_blank\">Public Domain Sherpa<\/a> offers tools on how to analyze and calculate public domain status.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/public.resource.org\" target=\"_blank\">Public.Resource.Org<\/a> focuses on &#8220;making government information more accessible.&#8221; You&#8217;ll find many federal, state, and local government documents, organized by agency,\u00a0that could otherwise be hidden or buried.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last modified 12 November 2015. Determining a work&#8217;s copyright or public domain status can be a challenge. Here are resources to help.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":1,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-43","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lis.iwaruna.com\/copyright-toolkit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/43","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lis.iwaruna.com\/copyright-toolkit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lis.iwaruna.com\/copyright-toolkit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lis.iwaruna.com\/copyright-toolkit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lis.iwaruna.com\/copyright-toolkit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=43"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/lis.iwaruna.com\/copyright-toolkit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/43\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":402,"href":"https:\/\/lis.iwaruna.com\/copyright-toolkit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/43\/revisions\/402"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lis.iwaruna.com\/copyright-toolkit\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=43"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}