Clarification of Answer by
j_philipp-ga
on
28 May 2002 11:21 PDT
Hello again,
one way to find out if a certain book after 1923 is in the public
domain is to see if it's listet at Project Gutenberg:
http://www.gutenberg.org/index/by-title.html
Also see a list of Project Gutenberg Books at the of North Carolina
FTP site:
ftp://ibiblio.org/pub/docs/books/gutenberg/GUTINDEX.ALL
(Note that many of those books are ones where the before-1923 rule
applies.)
Other Public Domain libraries online, for reference:
Bibliomania
http://www.bibliomania.com/
The Online Books Page
http://digital.library.upenn.edu/books/
An interesting article is "The Rules for Using 'Public Domain'
Materials" by Lloyd Jassin:
http://www.gigalaw.com/articles/2000-all/jassin-2000-11-all.html
Now, there might not be a copyright notice, which you should check on
a book. To quote "Public Domain and Copyright How-To" of Project
Gutenberg:
http://promo.net/pg/vol/pd.html
"If a substantial number of copies were printed and distributed in the
U.S. prior to March 1, 1989 without a copyright notice, and the work
is of entirely American authorship, or was first published in the
United States, the work is in the public domain in the U.S."
For comparison, please see "Copyright Basics - Notice of Copyright" of
the U.S. Copyright Office:
http://www.loc.gov/copyright/circs/circ1.html
"Although works published without notice before that date could have
entered the public domain in the United States, the Uruguay Round
Agreements Act (URAA) restores copyright in certain foreign works
originally published without notice."
Further information about copyright amendments in the URAA in
"Circular 38b" (Adobe Acrobat Reader needed):
http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ38b.pdf
Another issue: did the original publisher ceased to exist? Books could
well be in the public domain then, because they belong to nobody, thus
to everybody.
Or: maybe the copyright wasn't renewed after the first 28 years
period, thus books published up to 1948 could well be in the public
domain.
Let me add that the copyright protection of an original work is not
extended if new editions/ translations have new copyrights.
Also, again some works are falling into the Public Domain independent
of the publication date, as I listed before, so you should check if
the book is e.g. a United States Government publication, or a
research report funded by government agencies (even though it might
have appeared in a commercial journal).
If you're in doubt, you could contact the original publisher and ask
for copyright information on a title. You could also try ot ask
Project Gutenberg on copyright status of a certain title:
Contact information for Project Gutenberg:
http://promo.net/pg/contactinfo.html
And as a commentor pointed out, the information given applies to US
law. If you distribute to another country, you should make sure to
know the copyright laws that apply there, because US laws are not
applying.
In case you find out a book is copyrighted or you're still unsure, the
following might be valuable:
Copyright Clearance Center
http://www.copyright.com/Services/RLScorporate.asp
"Use CCC’s Republication Licensing Service (...) to get permission to
reproduce copyrighted works in your own materials -- [including] books
(...) Search for the name of the work containing the material you
want, review the price, then enter your request. (...) What you're
after isn't in the catalog? Simply identify the work and CCC will seek
permission for you."
(As you can see, even if it's not in their catalog you can have them
seek permission for you.)
Also, see "Proof of Public Domain" (albeit focussing on books with a
music theme, this should be of interest):
http://www.pdinfo.com/proof.htm
For more information and a good overview, please see this table, "When
works pass into the public domain":
http://www.unc.edu/~unclng/public-d.htm
You can also find an elaborate link list in the Google Directory
Reference > Libraries > Library and Information Science > Intellectual
Property
http://directory.google.com/Top/Reference/Libraries/Library_and_Information_Science/Intellectual_Property/
As to your second question: it should be OK to only use parts of the
work that's in the public domain. However, some works might have
special copyright restrictions; while you may be able to read them,
you may not be able to modify them (or sometimes even to redistribute
them).
I hope there haven't been more questions raised than answered, and
that the given resources are helpful.
To quote the Public Domain Information Project:
http://www.pdinfo.com/proof.htm
"An attorney will tell you that there really is no such thing as
absolute 'proof of public domain'. But you must protect yourself with
the best 'proof' you can find."
